4 Political humour is back
Putin's weeping has inevitably spawned dozens of jokes and playful one-liners. Twitter has broiled with mocking explanations for the PM's tears – sinusitis, onions, even an advanced squirting flower planted by the KGB. Within minutes of his speech, Russians were satirically referencing Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears, a popular 1980 Soviet film about three provincial girls who come to Moscow. Opposition activists have used the film's title on flyers for Monday's mass protests in Pushkin Square. Even US Senator John McCain has joined in, pinging the teasing tweet: Dear Vlad, Surprise! Surprise! You won. The #Russian people are crying too!
This revival in humour is something recent. Although Russia has a rich tradition of political satire, it has struggled to express itself in Putin's po-faced bureaucratic Russia. One of Putin's earliest acts as president was to shut down the country's popular Spitting Image TV show, Kukly, (meaning Puppets). Kukly had offended Putin by using an old joke from a story by the German writer ETA Hoffman in which a fairy casts a spell on an ugly dwarf so that others find him irresistibly beautiful.
Other spoof videos in the run-up to Sunday's election have depicted Putin as Montgomery Burns, the ageing miser from the Simpsons. Another satirises the poll as a 100-metre sprint. Putin, in the middle of the field, runs off before everyone else, shoots his opponents in the foot, and then jogs towards the tape. Vladimir Churov, Russia's election chief, helpfully brings the tape towards him.
5 The protests won't go away
Putin's teary speech will infuriate protesters, for whom he is a figure of loathing and contempt. He described Sunday's poll as "clean" and "honest". This is despite widespread evidence of fraud including carousel voting and the stuffing of ballot boxes. Putin has already ruled out re-running December's flawed Duma poll and has said he's not interested in investigating violations. This is one of the protesters' key demands. He may have won on Sunday without fraud – but the question is meaningless in a political system tilted so massively in his favour.
Angry demonstrators have noted that Putin's tears are in stark contrast to his usually inscrutable, and even callous-seeming, behaviour on other big public occasions. He failed to cry when children were killed during the 2004 school massacre in Beslan, or when the Kursk submarine sank. So why did he let the tears flow last night? One theory is that he had fallen victim to his own paranoia, and genuinely believed his victory wasn't a foregone conclusion.
Another, more elegant, explanation is that despite his reputation as a KGB tough guy Putin can be sentimental. It was Nabokov, in his Lectures on Literature, who pointed out that Lenin had a sentimental as well as a cruel side.
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Tobone
5 March 2012 3:29PM
Oddly enough I feel like crying when I see that face. So maybe he just caught his own reflection in the camera lens?
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Peace141
5 March 2012 3:31PM
"a re-run of December's flawed poll; the freeing of political prisoners; the sacking of Russia's discredited elections' chief"
thats anything but modest . They want an entire election to be held again ? which they have clearly no chance of winning
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cerises
5 March 2012 3:31PM
Perhaps the surgery has affected his eyes so as to make the tears ducts more likely to run (in the wind?). I'm no expert as you can tell.
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ViktorBurakov
5 March 2012 3:32PM
Liverpool burst his coupon.
Again.
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lastsocialist
5 March 2012 3:32PM
It's very simple: Putin stubbed his toe on the body of a dead British agent!
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Strummered
5 March 2012 3:32PM
Tears of joy as he is now able to continue his divine mission.
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notdrowningjustwavin
5 March 2012 3:35PM
He llves Russia in the same way a violent wife beater cries whenever she forgives him.
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limu
5 March 2012 3:36PM
Maybe he's just happy. I know such a theory is wild and fantastical...
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LibDemCurmudgeon
5 March 2012 3:36PM
Perhaps he listened to Whitney Houston's "The Greatest Love" prior to his appearance.
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Strummered
5 March 2012 3:37PM
Maybe he clocked the opposition demo today, there's a fair few there.
http://rt.com/on-air/opposition-demo-moscow-pushkinskaya/
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Gripemeister
5 March 2012 3:37PM
I don't think he can believe it's not butter either.
Or that he can't believe they've all fallen for it, well, not all, some actually see him as he is. A frustrated dictator in the making, perhaps he knows just what his people are going to be suffering over the next few years?
I don't know what it is about the human race, they are reasonable for a few decades then go off on tangents so wild the only thing to bring the race back to it's senses is the shedding of millons of lives. And perhaps billions this time around.
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PBCC
5 March 2012 3:39PM
Possibly Medvedev's spittle,before he's forced into relative obscurity?
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limu
5 March 2012 3:39PM
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jpnortham
5 March 2012 3:40PM
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cjwells
5 March 2012 3:42PM
Must be tears of relief - this guy has overseen the comittal of atrocious crimes in his own country and abroad, and here he is finally the indisputable champ, free to poison and shoot as he alone sees fit.
Come on Guardian, let's have a speech-bubble competition with this!
My entry is Putin saying "Hey! Are you out there George W. Bush? THIS is how you abuse power, you damn Yankee loser!"
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admiralaztec
5 March 2012 3:45PM
Seeing Putin feign emotion just warms my heart.
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Dreikaiserbund
5 March 2012 3:46PM
They have a name for it in the porn industry
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horseoutside
5 March 2012 3:46PM
Perhaps that his acute narcisism briefly got the better of him.....anyway, a brief show of tears will dupe these fools into believing that I am merely human, and not a particularly ruthless psychopath.
Dream on Mr. Putin.
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pgzats
5 March 2012 3:46PM
I really do not understand all the fuss about this matter that is very easily explained: he simply rubbed an onion on his eyes before starting his speech.....
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chebral
5 March 2012 3:47PM
Why is evryhting always in Fives with the Guardian? Now it's moved from football to politics..
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Tovarishch
5 March 2012 3:50PM
Nothing to see here, move on!
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horseoutside
5 March 2012 3:51PM
Response to chebral, 5 March 2012 3:47PM
Its part of the process of dumbing everyone down for the new millenium. Besides, the olympic symbol has five rings, so its probably an illuminati thing too.
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Microcord
5 March 2012 3:52PM
Er, what tears? I see none.
I do see a smoothly botoxed face though. (It reminds me of those being expertly made up in the TV series Six Feet Under.)
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idontmind
5 March 2012 3:52PM
Maybe he stubbed his wee toe or trodded on a plug..(the mug)
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fuzzydrummer55
5 March 2012 3:53PM
Putin is awful and some of his claims are ridiculous but unfortunately this article is not much better.
When was the last time you stood in Moscow in March with the freezing cold wind blowing in your face? Believe me you will be crying like a baby and your nose will be running.
Also, pauses which betray the feelings of a man who is under severe strain?!
Stick to proper journalism please. This isn't the Sun.
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northatlanticdrift
5 March 2012 3:53PM
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NikolayBacchus
5 March 2012 3:55PM
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CushyGlen
5 March 2012 3:55PM
Is what's happening in Russia all part of the Arab Spring?
Will one high profile dictator be replaced a shadowy one?
Its a pattern elsewhere.
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jpnortham
5 March 2012 3:55PM
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wougha
5 March 2012 3:56PM
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jekylnhyde
5 March 2012 3:56PM
The Big Hungry Crocodile.
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aberystwyth
5 March 2012 3:56PM
In Soviet Russia, tears cry you!
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Halo572
5 March 2012 3:56PM
Pissing himself laughing over what he is getting away with?
Very popular these days, there are many weeping citizens in the City of London instigated by laughing at the rest of us all so much.
At a certain point it crosses from identifiable chuckling/laughing into weeping/pissing themselves accompanied by painfully sore stomach muscles.
It can also be misinterpreted for grief, in the same way a sneeze can sound like a cough, so it looks like they could also be racked with remorse but actually have never had it so good.
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JConstantin
5 March 2012 3:57PM
He's crying for Argentina _ _ _ onion syndrom _ !
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Benulek
5 March 2012 3:57PM
"Mr Prime Minister, the Presidential Onion is ready."
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cerises
5 March 2012 3:57PM
Did she forget to take her teeth out, Dreikaiserbund?
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Drooza
5 March 2012 3:58PM
Response to notdrowningjustwavin, 5 March 2012 3:35PM
Someone should bottle those tears, and maybe stick them in the Lenin Mausoleum so the poor, deluded Babushki he's been swindling for the past 12 years can worship their Batushka.
Anyone see the yellow suit Zhirinovksy was wearing when he phoned Putin for some congratulatory phone sex? Quality.
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Gelatelli
5 March 2012 3:59PM
The low temperatures there bring tears to anyone's eyes. On reflection, it could be that he's just heard the free and fair electoral total figure voter turnout is 136%.
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OpinionatedFrog
5 March 2012 4:01PM
Ahhh Vladimir Vladimirovich, you big softie !!!!
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bluebellnutter
5 March 2012 4:02PM
The only thing it tells us is that he has an onion secreted somewhere about his person.
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moono
5 March 2012 4:03PM
What a cynical article. The man has just been returned to office by his countrymen. And he's a Russian. Why not clamour for street violence and berate the fairness of the elections like the BBC ? I'll tell you, that's Saturday's Guardian edition cancelled. Only The Observer left to go.
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raindancer68
5 March 2012 4:04PM
Dubya robbed Gore of his election victory, thanks to rigged Diebold voting machines, so Putin's just taking his cues from the most influential Western power, isn't he --although at least Dubya to his credit didn't fill the cracks in his face with botox.
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dancer62
5 March 2012 4:05PM
The KGB hardman hitman is going soft. Old Vlad was blubbing because he just could not believe he had got away with it ! Where is 007 when you need him?
"........ Lenin had a sentimental as well as a cruel side."
That's right, he cried like a baby on the occasion of the one millionth dissident being sent to the Siberian salt mines for re-education and eventual execution. Oh, - or was that Stalin. All these Russian dictators seem the same to me.
Now, where is 007 Miss Moneypenny? We have a very important mission for him.
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NotSingingAnymore
5 March 2012 4:08PM
Perhaps he has just dropped a hammer on his toe or sat on a sickle?
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Euroczar
5 March 2012 4:09PM
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Milton
5 March 2012 4:10PM
I will stop saying this soon, honestly: I will. But ...
... the human race demonstrates on a more or less weekly basis that it is not fit to govern itself.
What do you reckon ET thinks, looking at us from the outside? Supposing he is a relatively wise entity, say on a par with some of our best homegrown scientists, writers, philosophers?
It must be like looking through a glass window while bad-tempered toddlers trash the nursery; selfish, egotistical, self-absorbed, conscienceless children, each convinced that his lies will be believed, each manouevering for a bigger share of the sweeties, without reflection, introspection or humility.
Hey, ET. Pick up the phone please. We could do with some help down here.
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kanchelskis
5 March 2012 4:11PM
"Putin's recent facelift has not been a success"
Sorry but I stopped reading at that point. I thought this article was about an important historical and political event?
Putin's tears: Why so sad, Vlad?
As Gelatelli points out - it's still very cold in Moscow. It'd make my eyes water....
Considering all the gush we get (and will continue getting) about the American elections I would have expected something more serious than comments about plastic surgery.....
The Guardian never really seems to be able to write seriously about Russia. It falls back on those good old stalwarts - cliches and stereotypes.
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mike944
5 March 2012 4:12PM
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Batcow
5 March 2012 4:12PM
"but his tears during his victory speech were more of a mystery"
Has anyone considered that he might be a narcissistic sociopath? Mystery solved I think.
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kanchelskis
5 March 2012 4:13PM
Response to NotSingingAnymore, 5 March 2012 4:08PM
Hilarious! Inspired!
You could write for the Guardian with comments like that....
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