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‘She’s like a cyber-policewoman, like Robocop or Judge Dredd’ Russia's government censor inspires some unorthodox cosplay at a St. Petersburg comics festival

Source: TJournal

This past weekend in St. Petersburg was a grand time for folks who can’t get enough cartoons, movies, comics, and games. The city hosted “The Big Festival on Comics” on June 10 and 11 at the Street Art Museum, welcoming nerds of all ages for a celebration of “cosplay and nostalgia.” The festival featured guest panels with several Russian YouTube stars and popular voice actors, as well as artists and writers from Marvel, DC, and Vertigo. Among the visitors dressed as Harry Potter, Ned Stark, Batman, Deadpool, Scott Pilgrim, and other international pop icons, one woman stood out for her unusual costume, dressing up as “Roskomnadzor-chan,” or “RKN-chan” for short, a semi-erotic anime character satirically based on Russia’s government censor. The website TJournal spoke to this person, who identified simply as Maria, to learn more about her cosplay choice.

Maria told TJournal that she has two social media accounts, one on Instagram and another on Vkontakte, where she posts memes about RKN-chan and shared updates from this year’s “Bigfest.” Maria didn’t reveal much about herself, saying only that she works in an office “indirectly related to justice” and doesn’t really understand what Roskomnadzor actually does.

“Honestly, I don’t really know that much about Roskomnadzor’s mission as a government agency. I guess they block websites with bad information, and Internet users don’t really like that very much. But that’s all politics. I think RKN-chan’s mission is to punish bad guys and protest the good guys. She’s like a cyber-policewoman, like Robocop or Judge Dredd, but in the guise of a cute girl. I’ve got a banhammer that I use to block websites and handcuffs to catch criminals. Except I didn’t bring any of that to the festival. I didn’t manage to make it or buy it. But someone loaned me a six-barreled machine gun, so don’t you worry. The criminals got what was coming to them,” Maria told TJournal.

So why dress up as the censor’s unofficial mascot? Maria says she made the decision partly to avoid what other women wear to cosplay festivals. “Usually cosplayers choose these characters from anime, computer games, and comics. You look around and you think to yourself, ‘There goes another Batman or Superman.’ And after ‘Suicide Squad’ came out, all the girls started dressing up like Harley Quinn, which got old really fast,” Maria told TJournal.

The concept of RKN-chan belongs to cartoonist Dmitry Serebryakov, who publishes artwork under the name “Flick the Thief.” Serebryakov often depicts RKN-chan in her underwear or totally nude. In many comics, she appears as a cutesy dominatrix, making advances on other sexualized anime characters — typically other women. RKN-chan herself is modeled on “Nyash Myash,” an anime version of former Crimean Attorney General Natalya Poklonskaya, who now serves as a deputy in Russia’s State Duma. You don’t have to look hard on the Internet to find illustrated depictions of erotic encounters between RKN-chan and Nyash Myash.

In February 2017, Roskomnadzor even included RKN-chan in a post on the agency's official Vkontakte page. Vadim Ampelonsky, Roskomnadzor's spokesperson, later confirmed that the agency had consciously depicted itself as the popular anime character.

Though she dressed up as an Internet meme unique to Russia, Maria told TJournal that she doesn’t think the RuNet is anything special. “Our RuNet isn’t any different from the rest of the world’s Internet. There’s lots of information, lots of users, people argue around the clock, and there are tons of ads. The jokes are the most fun. Internet culture is the kind of thing where there’s never news or a discussion without a joke or a meme,” Maria told TJournal

You can read Maria’s entire interview with TJournal in Russian here.

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