This article inspired me to check and Teddy Boy Greg (the disgruntled white power barber with a ton of ridiculous facial tattoos who moved to Russia to get away from what he called “degenerates”) has recently died in Ukraine

I’m entirely in favor of a program that promotes the voluntary exit of xenophobic reactionary cunts from the US, as long as we can come up with some way to not let them return after it inevitably all goes to shit for them.

My schadenfreude is through the roof

Ilja Belobragin, general managing partner at Move To Russia, a company which helps foreigners relocate to Russia, says something he frequently hears from his clients is that they “don’t recognise the community around me anymore”.

Some prospective migrants complain about high immigration in their own countries or what they see as declining living standards, he says.

Let’s break this down: The people say they “don’t recognise the community around [them] anymore” because of “high immigration”, so they decide to become an immigrant surrounded by people of a different nationality than them.

As I see it, this is for one specific reason only: I don’t believe it’s the different cultural values from immigration that bothers them (they are literally moving into a wholly foreign culture; although I’m sure the Orthodox church gives some perverse appeal), but I believe they are bothered by ethnicity/skin colour. I believe these people are racists more than they are xenophobes.

I believe, for these people, Russia is a better alternative only because they have a certain perception of white-skinned Russians. I don’t think these people are aware of places like Tuva, or Yakutia, or Chechnya - and I don’t think they would ever visit those places. To say their quiet part out loud, I think these “conservatives” are just people who are white supremacists, moving because it’s a “white country” in their eyes, and thinking all white people have some shared essence. This is how they can justify to themselves being a foreigner in a foreign land. How else could they justify it to themselves?

it just constantly boggles my mind how mentally ill people (Leo clearly has some form of mental illness) and truly idiotic people (again, applies to Leo) always seem to have enough money to just blow away like this. Meanwhile intelligent and sane individuals are barely scraping by.

I mean i’m comfortable in life, more than comfortable, but i don’t have “move to another country simply because I hate a particular thing in society” money.

Yep, and please prevent them from ever coming back. May they rot in Russia.

1. Not really very different to the promises of great new lives made to people joining ISIS
2. Oh the irony of becoming a migrant elsewhere whilst complaining about migrants at home.

Some prospective migrants complain about high immigration in their own countries or what they see as declining living standards, he says.

Worried about immigration and poor living standards? Become an immigrant in Russia! Conservatives aren’t great at thinking things through.

Many of the would-be migrants are attracted by Russia’s Shared Values visa, sometimes called the “anti-woke” visa (…)

Introduced by President Vladimir Putin in 2024, the visa offers temporary residency for up to three years to citizens of 47 countries Russia considers “unfriendly”.

There is no limit to the number of people who can apply and applicants do not need to pass the usual Russian language, history or law tests.

Instead, they must declare that they share Russia’s traditional spiritual and moral values and reject what the Russian government describes as the “destructive neoliberal ideology” of their home countries.

Imagine no alarm bells going off as you read that 🤦

Also, the USA is one of those 47 countries! Remember that the next time Trump boasts about his good relations with Russia and/or Putin being his buddy.

The whole article - Leo’s story - is worth the read.

Following their move to Russia, Leo’s family became one of the most visible examples of Western migration.

Russian state media filmed their asylum ceremony and Leo publicly thanked President Putin for welcoming them. At the time, Leo believed he was helping to pioneer what he calls “an unprecedented piece of immigration legislation”.

But the reality proved more difficult than he’d anticipated.

Within weeks of arriving, Leo says they were defrauded of 5 million roubles – about £52,000 ($66,000) – by a contact they trusted, leaving them homeless.

When I spoke to Leo earlier this year, he was living separately from his wife in the city of Ivanovo, and his older children had returned to the United States.

Asked whether Russia had lived up to his expectations, Leo describes the last two years as the best and worst of his life.

Something in the article reminded me of the Anastasia movement, one of those esoteric cults you need to look a little closer at to see the fascism.

Imagine being dumb enough to think Texas isn’t conservative enough for you

Leo is a devout Christian who had become increasingly disillusioned with…the rise of the LGBTQ movement.

Although he is committed to staying in Russia out of a sense of “destiny”, he now says he misses the freedoms that have shaped the American personality.

“[In] Russia you don’t have these human rights values.”

I mean…

If we get rid of those idiots that way, why should we complain? I mean, there are enough sources of information to see how a county is. If you only rely on state-issued propaganda and you fall for it, don’t expect any sympathy.

I guess credit to them for following through but now they’re in the Find Out phase.

Conservatives, tankies should really be careful for what they wish for.

The dumbest of the dumb.

I wonder if he’ll be drafted

Within weeks of arriving, Leo says they were defrauded of 5 million roubles – about £52,000 ($66,000) – by a contact they trusted, leaving them homeless.

Although he is committed to staying in Russia out of a sense of “destiny”, he now says he misses the freedoms that have shaped the American personality.

“[In] Russia you don’t have these human rights values.”