“What shall we do, our wise leader?” -asked stand-up comedian Alexander Dolgopolov during his performance in St. Petersburg stand-up club HopHead, in April last year. The video was published on YouTube and somehow it ended up on the screen of police major A.G. Ryapolov.
In the police document that Dolgopolov published yesterday on his Instagram account, police major A.G. Ryapolov asked the administration of the HopHead bar to clarify whether Dolgopolov spoke at their establishment about a year ago and asked for “full information about the person who appears in the video.”
“My career has reached a new level – two years ago, village bullies hunted me, now the whole state opens the hunt, wow!” – wrote a comedian.
The police are interested in “full details of the person speaking on the video” Alexander Dolgopolov – New Hour of Jokes , which was published on YouTube in April last year. The video was seen more than 2.7 million views.
In the video Dolgopolov jokes about the love of Russians for President Putin: “If Putin issues a decree that all Russians need to jump into the lava, they will say:” Oh my God, but where do we find the lava, we don’t have it in the yard, what should we do , our wise leader? “
In his other joke he said:“Our population has split into two camps. On one hand there are those who support Putin; on the other, there are those who can read, write, and reach logical conclusions.”
But today (January 23) it is reported that comedian Alexander Dolgopolov left Russia after the police made an ambush in the club where he was about to perform,said lawyer for the Agora human rights group Leonid Soloviev. The police wanted to talk with Dolgopolov after they received a complaint from a resident of Orekhovo-Zuevo, near Moscow, “he claimed that the words of the comedian offended the feelings of believers.”
Dolgopolov told MBH Media that the law on the protection of the feelings of believers “is discrimination against atheists.”
“There should not be such a law, there should be no trials for being atheist, these courts are unfair, I am right, and this person, no matter how offended he is, is not. And he is wrong precisely because, thanks to the law, we are in an unequal position, so I belong to the oppressed class. Russia will pay for it in the future, as it did at the beginning of the 20th century, when Orthodoxy was also insanely propagated. I won’t correct my jokes, ”said the comedian.
The comedian said in an interview with Real Time on January 22 that he planned to perform at the Big City bar in central Moscow and was about to test new material on the audience. But when he was preparing for a show, a man in civilian clothes approached the administration of the bar and persistently asked whether the comedian had already arrived and whether he would speak.
It was after this incident that Alexander and his team hurriedly left the bar. Club manager said that the artist “felt the threat” and decided to cancel the performance, and later left the country.
UPDATE-January 23, 9:26 EST
Alexander posted a photo from Tel Aviv on his Instagram account.
“We arrived! We are safe. Thanks for the support! ”- wrote the artist.
