Victoria Bonya’s video about Russia’s current problems has racked up more than ten million views. The blogger described President Putin as «a strong politician» who «doesn’t know a lot of things,» yet is feared by «the people,» «bloggers,» and «governors» alike.
She opened with the flooding in Dagestan and sharp criticism of the republic’s head, Sergey Melikov, then moved on to the oil spill in Anapa (with complaints about Krasnodar governor Veniamin Kondratyev), touched on the mass culling of livestock in Novosibirsk region, and complained about the Instagram ban. Several times she stressed that she was speaking directly to Putin on behalf of «the suffering people.»
The speech caused a major stir. Many Russian and Western journalists, opposition politicians, and political commentators saw it as a positive signal that could be summed up like this: «Even beauty bloggers are starting to wake up. She knows how to talk to ordinary audiences, she got the message about criticism of Putin and the blocks across to them. This could shift people’s views and turn Bonya into a protest leader.» Other readings suggest the blogger was acting on orders from someone inside the power vertical. The clients, the theory goes, were either the security services (to highlight the failures of the Kremlin’s political bloc to Putin) or the political bloc itself (to «let off steam» over public anger at the internet blocks).
State propagandists (Vladimir Solovyov, for one), United Russia deputy Vitaly Milonov, and Z-bloggers piled in with heavy criticism. Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov mentioned Bonya critically in the State Duma but used the occasion to warn the authorities about a socio-economic crisis that could spark a revolution. Bonya herself has ridden the wave of hype: she is attacking her critics and promising to sue them.
Dmitry Peskov’s statement that the Kremlin had «taken note» of the video added extra weight. At the same time, when answering a journalist’s question, Peskov avoided using the president’s name and ritually added that «work is under way» on the issues Bonya had raised. In reply the blogger thanked Peskov, even cried on camera, and demonstrated her loyalty by publicly refusing to speak to independent Russian or Western media. She framed her response to Solovyov’s criticism in a safe way too: the host, she said, is disgracing the president.
All this has amplified the resonance of Bonya’s appeal and turned it into a full-blown political event complete with competing interpretations. Many see it as a speech against Putin and internet blocks. Yet her actual words contain none of those motives. Bonya does not criticize Putin — on the contrary, she emphasizes his strength and only complains that his subordinates are not telling him the truth. In her version the president simply does not know about the people’s hardships, which is why he cannot help them. She says nothing in the viral video about the mass blocking of mobile internet or popular messengers, except for Instagram, which is personally important to her (and was banned back in 2022). New blocks and shutdowns are mentioned only in another clip (from March 13), which also contains a call to «rebel.» That one, however, generated zero buzz.
The idea that Bonya has «opened the people’s eyes» is dubious: Russians face these hardships every day and hardly need a beauty blogger to explain them. Her appeal and the subsequent uproar are a symptom of growing public discontent, not its cause.
At the same time, Bonya is using social issues as a convenient hook to draw attention to the criminal case against her friend Valeria Chekalina (accused of tax evasion). One could easily read this as blackmail: «I’ll keep highlighting problems and triggering the audience until you sort out Chekalina’s situation.» In parallel she is also advancing her own business interests — the Instagram ban hurts her income.
Bonya begins her «appeal» with criticism of Dagestan’s Sergey Melikov. That criticism comes right at the start — the strongest position in the video — and is therefore the top item on her agenda. It is worth remembering that Russian media have been actively reporting rumours of Melikov’s possible dismissal, while the governor himself is pushing back against them. Bonya’s viral video may be intended to shine an even brighter spotlight on the republic’s problems and nudge the top leadership toward firing him. The people who would benefit from such an outcome include long-standing opponents of Melikov, such as Rosgvardia chief Viktor Zolotov. Bonya’s own follow-up «summary» of the appeal, in which she again singled out Dagestan, indirectly supports this reading.
The theory that the Kremlin’s political bloc commissioned Bonya to release pent-up anger over internet blocks looks unconvincing. First, she only touches on the topic in the context of Instagram, whose four-year-old ban no longer feels like an acute grievance to most people. Second, any genuine «letting off steam» operation would have to be followed by visible concessions. The public should have been able to conclude: we appealed to the authorities, they listened, and they are meeting us halfway. No such rollback in blocking policy has occurred since Bonya’s video. It is also safe to dismiss the idea that the Kremlin is promoting Bonya so it can channel protest votes in the next State Duma election by running her on the ticket of one of the systemic opposition parties. As political analyst Alexander Kynev rightly points out, anyone with a second citizenship or even a residence permit in another country is barred from standing for election in Russia. Bonya, who lives in Monaco, certainly holds such a permit.
That said, it would be a mistake to downplay the very fact of Bonya’s statements and the resonance they have produced. They are yet another sign that Russian society has a growing demand for open public discussion of the country’s problems. People see that things are getting worse and want to hear about it not only in kitchen conversations but from influencers as well.
Literary Extremism
Security services have carried out searches at Russia’s largest publishing house, Eksmo, and questioned top executives, including CEO Yevgeny Kapyev. The publishers are being accused of extremism.
Eksmo’s imprint Popcorn Books used to publish young-adult literature, including titles that touched on LGBT themes. This was before the Russian authorities declared the non-existent «international LGBT movement» extremist. Popcorn Books had already faced complaints, but the parent company sold off the risky asset and the situation quieted down for a while. Eksmo complied with all Russian censorship requirements, published pro-war «Z-literature,» and its owner Oleg Novikov is well acquainted with Vladimir Putin’s aide Vladimir Medinsky (the house published his books). None of that was enough to shield it from prosecution.
Given the seriousness of the charges the security services are levelling at the top managers, Russia’s biggest publishing house could cease to exist in its current form or change owners. The mere fact that a publishing company that has been consistently loyal to the Kremlin is now facing repression shows that the book industry is no longer a safe haven for creative professionals who do not support the war but also do not actively oppose it. These people had been able to work on topics far removed from current politics — culture, philosophy, the history of other countries.
Meanwhile, émigré publishing houses have sprung up abroad that print books on subjects banned in Russia. They are on sale in the bookstores of countries where Russians travel for holidays or business: Armenia, Georgia, Kazakhstan. Just as in Soviet times, «tamizdat» (books published abroad) and any escapist cultural or philosophical output inside the country are now treated by the regime as hostile phenomena that must be suppressed. First the authorities imposed strict controls and total censorship in more «popular» spheres: they took over federal TV, then the tabloids, then the major business newspapers and popular websites. Now they have reached the more elitist domain of books.
The Kremlin’s political bloc — which is gradually turning into an ideological bloc as well — is devoting ever more attention to patriotic and statist education in schools and universities, along with quasi-ideological studies. Propaganda and ideological processing are also seeping into the corporate world. A relatively free book market and tamizdat represent one of the last serious obstacles to this ideological drive. The security services have now taken on the job of removing that obstacle.
In recent months the country’s top leadership has shown no embarrassment about reviving Soviet practices. Last week, for example, Putin gave the FSB Academy the name of Felix Dzerzhinsky. The tightening of rules in the publishing industry is part of the same trend.
