Update on Navalny in this thread from the NPR correspondent in Moscow.
For us on MLK Day, this is right out of the Martin Luther King Jr. playbook: Have an angry unjust ruler? Then do normal peaceful things and see if he lashes out with brutality—showing the world who he is.
This takes tremendous courage and willingness to sacrifice. You may die. But if *many* people do the right thing and act with courage and without violence, the vicious person will eventually be toppled or at least be remembered as an embarrassment.
The road is long.
Courage is contagious.
What other countries can do: make it less fun and easy to be enriching oneself by enabling and cooperating with brutal injustice. And associate their names formally with Putin for all to see.
Gather symbolically and peacefully to ask that justice be done through the law (if it were being administered rightly). And demonstrate for all to see that the leader does not care about just laws. *Eventually* the majority of the people begin to see it.
When someone is a dictator, reminding them that many think they are a selfish, lying, coward pierces their self-delusion. And it causes the dictator to choose between either appearing weak by giving in, or inspiring more resistance if he cracks down.
Originally tweeted by Andy Rowell (@AndyRowell) on January 18, 2021.