"Careful What You Say At School"

Original Russian article published in Glasnaya
Text by Rina Alexandrova

As the current school year got underway, so did the “military-patriotic” programming that has become a central feature of Russian education: Conversations on Important Topics, weaving camouflage nets and assembling drones in class, as well as “Letters to a Soldier” drives. Parents who disagree with the official line find that they must choose between holding their tongue and trying to raise a child who can think critically – without putting that child or themselves at risk. Glasnaya published these two monologues of mothers ruminating on their relationships with their children and the schools they attend. They show how life under censorship amounts to violence.

“Dear Mr. President, can I please have a dog?”

Anastasia, 34

Volga Federal District

My son Artyom is 12, and he loves Putin. Because Putin is our president.

I don’t know where he got that from – we almost never talk about the president at home. My ex-mother-in-law doesn’t either. It must have come from school.

In third grade, my son really wanted a dog and wrote a letter to Putin: “Dear President, please give me a dog.”

The letter was “passed down” to his school; they asked the school to provide a character reference. Then a reply came from the Presidential Administration on behalf of Putin, something on the order of: “I don’t know how your parents feel about a dog, so I can’t give you one.”

My son goes, “See, Mom? What a great guy – he answered.”

Sometimes there are moments when I want to speak less than kindly about our president. But I don’t do that in front of my son: I might say too much, and he’s just a kid – he could blurt it out somewhere. He’s a talkative one.

If, say, he decided to join the Young Guard of United Russia, or – I don’t know – hung up a portrait of the president, then we’d have to talk.

Because this man – Putin – has taken the lives of hundreds of thousands of working-age men, left families without sons, fathers, brothers.

Including my son – he left him without a father.

“We stick to the idea that: ‘Dad is a hero’”

After my ex-husband died, we told Artyom that his dad was a hero, that he defended the country. In reality, he was one of many who were used as cannon fodder. What else could we say? You have to lie.

If Artyom were 18, I would have told him something else. At 18, he’d watch his mouth. But right now my current husband and I, and the grandmothers, we all stick to this line [Dad-as-hero]; we keep our mouths shut about the rest. I don’t want him to go around telling people things.

In broad strokes he knows there’s a war and that there are “fascists” there, but we don’t go into the details. We’re protecting his psyche: he’s still a child; we don’t want to traumatize him.

I believe that, even now, kids should have a childhood.

From time to time, I have to hide my feelings. For example, we waited a month for the [repatriation of Artyom’s father’s] body. We kept hoping it was a mistake. I didn’t fall apart in front of my son; I acted cheerful.

In early October [2024], shortly before the funeral, my mother and I told him that his dad had died, that they would bring the body soon, and we would bury him.

He had a full-blown meltdown: “I don’t believe you – you’re all lying!” I suggested calling my former mother-in-law to check; he called, she confirmed it. After that he asked, “Why didn’t you tell me right away?”

He went to the funeral with us – closed casket, of course.

He and his father didn’t have a strong emotional bond. We’ve been divorced since 2017; Artyom was four then. They didn’t see each other often, but their relationship was fine.

When my ex decided to go there, the first person he told was our son; Artyom was 11. My ex-husband’s mother said, “Well great, he’ll make some money.” My mom and I immediately thought: “F—k.”

If it doesn’t touch you, you don’t understand what it’s like. I don’t think he [my ex] fully understood that people get killed there. He thought he’d get lucky; 500,000 rubles hit his bank account right away. He took our divorce hard, drank, couldn’t get his life together. It felt like he went there to put an end to it all.

“The school year went down the drain”

At school, a couple of classmates offered Artyom their condolences. Before that, he’d had conflicts with some kids, and after this they told him, “If anyone gives you a hard time, we’ve got your back.”

I told the homeroom teacher ahead of time and asked her to warn the others: if he needs to leave class, please be understanding.

The school year went down the drain. Fifth grade is a transition anyway – new teachers, different classrooms. And then this. Miss one day, then another: memorials, this and that. I didn’t push Artyom to pull himself together – which is probably why he didn’t really get anything done that year.

But I worried about him and decided it would be helpful for him to see the school psychologist. She asked him, “Do you trust your mom?” And he said, “Yes.”

I’m lucky that my children were spared trouble because of my antiwar position. As see on the news, not everyone was so lucky.

It turned out it wasn’t just what happened; it was also the idiotic peers he was fighting with – and their parents. Or maybe everything together. A kid lost his father, and then some mom shows up and screams at him. Lots of kids don’t know their fathers, they’re raised by mom and grandma. I taught him to live by his conscience, but you can answer back and defend yourself – that’s allowed.

I realized later that he’d been bullied; he didn’t complain even when they twisted his arms.

I’m generally non-confrontational and patient, like a typical Russian. But at the end of last year, we moved Artyom to a different school – and things got better.

“We shut the door and talk”

His elementary teacher was very sensible – apolitical, really. The fifth-grade teacher too, pretty sensible.

These days a lot depends on the teacher: whoever’s under the thumb of United Russia goes along with the agenda. We’ll see how it goes with his new teacher. Artyom doesn’t attend the Conversations on Important Topics – I arranged for him to have tutoring during that time. On the first day this year they told everyone to download the “Max” messenger [a state-run messaging service meant to replace Telegram and WhatsApp]. Communication with parents wasn’t moved to it, but the kids’ chat went over to Max, and students are being strongly encouraged to install it. We’re not downloading it.

I watch what I say, because we could end up going far away for a long time.

That was Artyom’s idea, not to install it. He himself said: “All the information will go somewhere it shouldn’t.”

Kids are savvy now.

As a result, my kid has no idea what’s going on in the class chat. I asked, “What about the classmates’ chat?” He said, “To hell with it.” We decided that if it becomes unavoidable, we’ll get him a separate phone just for Max.

Otherwise, I can’t say we’ve been forced into much at school. The one event was on June 22, laying flowers at the memorial for those who died in World War II. I went with him and think that’s important.

They also write letters to soldiers at school – I support that, too. We collected wool socks; I bought some and brought them in. The soldiers aren’t the problem. I’m actually behind them. They’re just like me and my ex, who ended up being a hostage to the situation.

At the memorial meal there was a woman I know whose son – a 20-year-old contract soldier – was killed; he went to the front after his mandatory service. Talking with her, I realized that, for me, my ex’s death isn’t just a death. It is a symbol of how f—d up Russia is right now.

It symbolizes immense pain, grief, and negative emotions.

But unless I’m in the kitchen with the door closed, I watch what I say, because we could end up going far away for a long time.

My current husband and I shut ourselves in our room and talk. We both have fairly visible jobs, but it’s not just about our professional lives: our son could let something slip at school that it’s dangerous to air in public. The risks are definitely higher for our family.

I watch YouTube and Instagram [which has been banned in Russia] with Artyom around. But I don’t feel entirely safe doing it: I don’t really know how access to “banned resources” is tracked, and it worries me a bit.

My son has his own YouTube account; he even uploads harmless videos now and then. He knows what a VPN is and even advised some relatives to install one. He doesn’t ask questions about why we use it. I don’t forbid him from watching things there.

He’s almost 13 and has his own view of the world.

Sometimes Artyom talks about also joining the army. But I shut that down: “No, you won’t.” That’s where I stop holding back. I tell him life expectancy at the front is very short, and it’s not worth going. All that’s probably over his head, because he’s still young and doesn’t grasp the horror.

“I don’t like kids marching in formation”

Rita Loginova, 37 (Novosibirsk  –  Prague)

My older son spent six years in a Russian public school. All that time I treated it like a storage facility for kids: I didn’t expect them to raise my child according to my views on how children should be treated. Don’t kick them, don’t allow bullying, give them a basic education. I’ll handle the rest.

Before 2022, I assumed I’d have to critically unpack with him how late-2010s Russian schools talked about contemporary life in Russia and how they presented the country’s history.

Militarism was always there: Zarnitsa war games, marching. When I was in school, there were lots of patriotic clubs, and for many it was a “cool” way to spend time – parachute jumps or martial arts led by patriots. But I grew up and became far less tolerant of that sort of stuff. I don’t like the normalization of military things in school.

I wanted my son to avoid all those military drills; I don’t like kids marching in formation. We discussed what he thought, whether it made sense to refuse to take part in patriotic programs and draw attention that way – and we acted case by case.

“Sweetheart, you’re making Comrade Major’s job easier”

In 2022 it all became much harder. At first, when leaflets promoting calls for donations to support “our boys” and the Z symbol started appearing in educational institutions, I tried to push back: tearing down notices from trolleybuses or the walls near the school and kindergarten.

I remember when they plastered the entire kindergarten with flyers asking parents to chip in for food to send to the front.

I filed complaints through the State Services portal to the district administration and to the local branch of the Union of Women of Russia [the source of the flyer] demanding they stop the campaign and raising the question of whether such a drive “discredits” the army – if parents at a kindergarten were being asked to provide sausage for soldiers.

I got back form letters along the lines of, “it’s all voluntary and anyway the drive is already over.” In the end, I decided I was putting myself and my child in danger and stopped filing such complaints. Turns out it’s quite easy to end up in prison for that – as we later saw.

My older son grew up in a family that discussed the news and shared different opinions about how life is lived in this country. Our attitude toward politicians and the country’s leadership was absolutely open and clear to him. He’s a smart boy and was never a flag-waving patriot; he’s critical of what’s happening in the country in which he was born has and spent most of his life.

For a while he skipped Conversations on Important Topics, then he started feeling uncomfortable standing out. Plus, that time slot often overlapped with homeroom. So he began attending, though he stayed critical of the school’s propaganda narratives. He found it particularly funny when foreign-language teachers started telling stories about so-called “Gayrope.” [Derogatory slur for Europe.]

We had to censor his actions too, because, since 2022, taking a critical stance toward the state has become very dangerous. Before that, I couldn’t have imagined I’d open his social-media page and see a link to a Kholod piece where kids talk about the war, and he’s reposting it with a quote. [Kholod is an independent, oppositionist media outlet.]

I went to him: “Sweetheart, I really hate to have this talk. But you realize you’re making the Comrade Major’s job easier? I’m begging you – don’t post things like that on this platform.”

I explained I didn’t want to totally muzzle him. He understood: “Okay, okay, I won’t anymore.” Since it was just VKontakte, and I spelled out the risk of real criminal prosecution, it didn’t turn into a big drama. But I know it upset him. I suggested he start an anonymous Telegram channel and post there, which he eventually did.

We now live in a country where children have to be politically correct. In the russian sense of those words.

We were talking about the news a lot then and sharing our worries, and after those conversations we had to be very specific: “Just don’t say any of this at school.” He grew up fast – those events had a lot to do with it.

With my younger child it was easier in some ways – at least the kids in his kindergarten weren’t being dressed in forage caps and soldier’s tunics for holiday performances, otherwise we’d have had to refuse to participate. On the other hand, he saw a portrait of Putin on every floor. A photo of the man who’s made so many children orphans was even in our group’s room, displayed alongside dolls. That made me furious.

“Doing the bare minimum expected of a mother”

I remember what Noize MC said when he was interviewed by Dud. He talked about a moment in 2021 when his son told a joke about Putin; everyone laughed, and then his wife added, “Guys, you have to understand – we need to use our judgment about who we can make those jokes around and who we can’t.” He and his wife looked at each other: “So that’s it – we now live in a country where children have to be politically correct. In the Russian sense of those words.”

I had similar thoughts, but I never seriously planned to leave Russia. In early 2022, when there were still lots of antiwar protests, I joined in on them. The first time I held up a protest sign, I was detained by the police, and later they came to my home – one officer actually came over to “invite” me to have an administrative offense report drawn up.

Plus, I worked as a journalist at an independent outlet and wrote pieces about mobilization and about how prisoners were recruited into a private military company. So my son and I talked openly about how different people might be “taking an interest” in our family. I’d read what happens to others and didn’t rule out encounters with the security services – from the less severe options like being called in for a “chat,” and talk of the juvenile affairs commission, to attempts to take my child away.

Meanwhile, the school chats kept announcing patriotic events, and I could see many people, sadly, supported them. For that reason, I didn’t get too close with other parents or teachers and barely took part in school life, doing only the bare minimum expected of a mother.

By 2023, after a year of living under that kind of strain – having to forbid our child from discussing things at school or writing on the internet; seeing several Russian journalists already in prison for their texts about events in Ukraine – I realized we probably had to leave. We were lucky to have the option; not everyone does.

Of course, after we left, the kids missed their city – their friends and relatives are there. But my older son doesn’t miss school at all. He remembers his school with irony and sarcasm, except for his first teacher – he remembers her fondly, as a kind, pleasant woman. And the younger one just started first grade – in a Czech school.

I guess I’m lucky that my children were spared trouble because of my antiwar position. As see on the news, not everyone was so lucky – many Russian women are separated from their children, because they opposed the war and are serving prison terms for it. Now I think that being so outspoken wasn’t pointless, but it definitely increased the risks for my family.

What censorship does to the psyche

When a child is taught where and what can or cannot be said, that’s called a “double message.”

“They hear: ‘be honest and be careful at the same time,’” explained psychotherapist Anastasia Elantyeva. “The psyche looks for a way to adapt; new behavior patterns form, become entrenched, and are reproduced as the norm.

Censorship destroys from within, through inner submission to the system.

“The child hears that as: ‘you can’t talk about everything at school,’ ‘truth is dangerous,’ ‘don’t show what I feel or think.’ They learn to use an internal filter: to choose carefully what to say, to whom, and in what circumstances – and when to hold back.

The result can be moral exhaustion, a constant sense of vigilance, shame, and loneliness.

“Until a child can think critically, taking in the whole picture, the filter may end up working everywhere – including at home – which leads to a loss of trusting contact within the family.

“The good news is that, if their family talks about what’s going on and explains why we shouldn’t share everything, children feel the support of adults that are important in their lives. You can explain the situation in simple, child-friendly language: ‘The world isn’t always safe; you’re not bad if you don’t share everything.’”

A traumatic way to care for a child

For parents, self-censorship brings different consequences.

“They live in a permanent state of self-constraint; it’s a painful experience of anxiety and inner conflict,” the psychotherapist continued. “A mother is in an unsafe environment, trying with all her might to keep her child safe – but that’s only possible by limiting truthful information.

“In the modern world more and more responsibility falls on mothers; they’re often in a state of self-constraint already. Now the mother is forced to pass on the skill of self-censorship before the child has stable agency (an awareness of self), not because it’s right or useful, but because she’s afraid. It’s a traumatic way to care for a child, and the mother will feel shame and helplessness, whereas caring for someone usually brings love and joy.

“It’s important for a significant adult – mother or father – to voice within the family, and to the child, their fears and anxieties, and the reasons for new behaviors that contradict their inner values.”

Censorship as part of a system of violence

“When a person lives with the constant thought, ‘be careful, don’t stick out, adapt’ – even if there’s no overt threat or it’s not explicit – they’re living in a situation of violence,” Elantyeva said.

“Censorship is a soft form of control, often disguised as etiquette or care. It’s connected to many violent actions and has much in common with bullying and gaslighting.

“Bullying instills guilt for who you are; under censorship, a person is likewise afraid to express themselves. Gaslighting breeds self-distrust; censorship does the same. Only here it’s not a specific person (an abuser) creating the situation, but a system – school, state, society. Social isolation trains a person to keep quiet and not show themselves to avoid rejection. Censorship becomes a cause of self-isolation.

“Bullying and censorship have equally traumatic consequences but different mechanisms. Bullying is external pressure through violence and fear; the person understands what’s happening and what the abusers did. Censorship destroys from within, through inner submission to the system. Often a person doesn’t even notice how they’re living under constraints, and how those constraints leave less and less room to maneuver.”