Empires love their dissidents foreign

June 11, 2014 8:52 PM

Molly Crabapple talks Snowden, Pussy Riot, and Cecily McMillan: "Cooing over foreign dissidents allows establishment hacks to pose like sexy rebels—while simultaneously affirming that their own system is the best. The dissident fetishist takes a brave, principled person, and uses them like a codpiece of competitive virtue.

The Kremlin loves (American) whistle-blowers. The State Department loves (Russian) anarchist punks."
posted by anemone of the state (16 comments total)

Molly Crabapple effing rocks.

That is all.
posted by RakDaddy at 9:28 PM on June 11, 2014 [4 favorites]

May 5th PEN Literary Gala Honors Salman Rushdie with PEN/Allen Foundation Literary Service Award. $1,250 for 3 courses and wine.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 9:32 PM on June 11, 2014

Essentially, an exegesis of "one man's terrorist is another' man's freedom fighter."
posted by wuwei at 9:44 PM on June 11, 2014

...codpiece of competitive virtue...

Sadly I will try to fit this into everyday usage. I will force it if I have to.
posted by From Bklyn at 10:11 PM on June 11, 2014 [5 favorites]

That was a great piece. I was expecting something different (not quite sure what), but was delighted by what I read. And, yes, 'codpiece of competitive virtue' is a phrase that needs more airing.
posted by lesbiassparrow at 10:12 PM on June 11, 2014

Absolutely lovely piece, Molly Crabapple rocks! I would've loved a John Kiriakou reference thrown in though. As an aside, Lucy Steigerwald is another vice writer I always enjoy.
posted by jeffburdges at 12:46 AM on June 12, 2014

Alaa Abdel-Fattah, Icon Of Egypt's 2011 Revolt, Sentenced To 15 Years For Protesting
posted by jeffburdges at 3:27 AM on June 12, 2014 [1 favorite]

I'm working on a movie and I was so excited to find out Molly was involved.
posted by Brainy at 6:34 AM on June 12, 2014

> That was a great piece. I was expecting something different

Same here—I was thinking "Yeah, yeah, Americans love Russian dissidents and vice versa, you call that news?" but this is punchy and brilliant and exactly what needed to be said. Thanks for the post.
posted by languagehat at 7:01 AM on June 12, 2014

I didn't know that Pussy Riot had gone to visit and support Cecily McMillan. It is heartening to learn that.
posted by enn at 7:29 AM on June 12, 2014 [2 favorites]

here's Mark Ames with a concordant view:

FNM’s problems started before the show, when the concert venue operators at Moscow’s “Stadium Live” — one of the biggest arenas in Moscow, seating around 7,000 people — somehow got word that Faith No More planned to let Pussy Riot make a surprise appearance, and threatened and intimidated the band members to the point where the show was nearly canceled. Bill still doesn’t know how they figured it out — literally the only people who knew were a handful of Pussy Riot’s art collective, and Faith No More.

But the real shocker turned out to be the audience’s hostile reaction when Pussy Riot took the stage during the encore: Five girls wearing Pussy Riot’s trademark slasher/wrestler masks, holding up flares, mocking Putin for “pissing in his pants” in fear, unfurling a flag calling for the audience to support their Pussy Riot comrades being held in detention back in early July, when the trial was still just getting going.

(There are countless videos on YouTube showing Pussy Riot’s disastrous appearance.)

posted by ennui.bz at 8:32 AM on June 12, 2014 [1 favorite]

Thanks to this I just made the connection to the book that was sitting on my kitchen table.

I did know about her collaboration with MeFi's own but not the full extent.
posted by dhartung at 11:03 AM on June 12, 2014

Good piece. Thanks, anemone of the state.
posted by homunculus at 10:21 PM on June 12, 2014

As an aside, Lucy Steigerwald is another vice writer I always enjoy.

You might like Natasha Lennard too, if you're not reading her already.
posted by homunculus at 10:23 PM on June 12, 2014 [1 favorite]

American has a system of patronage and punishment that discourages rocking. Despite that, Molly Crabapple rocks.
posted by vicx at 4:37 AM on June 14, 2014 [1 favorite]

Caught Between ISIS and Assad - Molly Crabapple

One girl, who was 11 but whose growth was stunted by malnutrition, showed me a wart on her hand. “What do you want to be when you grow up?” I asked. “Turkish” she answered.

posted by Golden Eternity at 8:03 AM on June 27, 2014 [1 favorite]