Navalny's snow pile
| Navalny's snow pile | |||
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| Part of Russian opposition | |||
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Inscription "NAVALNY" on snow pile, later removed
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| Date | February 2018 (2018-02) — 2021 (2021) | ||
| Location | |||
| Methods | Activism | ||
| Result | Limited success
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| Parties | |||
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Decentralized Municipal housing and utilities companies | |||
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| Political activities
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Related
Alexei Navalny's signature
Logo Russia of the Future | ||
Navalny's snow pile, also known as Snow piles fear Navalny[1] is a political flashmob in Russia between 2018 — 2021. The flashmob consisted of Russians writing surname of Alexei Navalny on abandoned snow piles in order to make the municipal administrations — ZhKKh clean them in time. The flashmob's main wave took place after Navalny published a Twitter post mentioning this flashmob.[2]
Context
In February 2018 a record high snowfall fell in Moscow and Moscow Region. Hundreds of trees have crushed on parked cars in Moscow. One person died. Car owners were urged to use public transportation. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin allowed Moscow schoolchildren to stay home from school on Monday. Snowfalls disrupted operations at the capital's airports. The snowfalls put the Housing and Utilities services on high strain, as only on 4 Feb 2018 utility workers removed 1.2 million cubic meters of snow from the capital's streets.[3]
One of flashmob's inspirations was Vladimir Putin's policy on censorship of Navalny's content and any mentions of him. For example, on February 12, 2018 after Roskomnadzor complaint YouTube demanded the removal of Navalny's broadcast about the investigation into Deripaska, Prikhodko, and Rybka.[4][5]
According to Tatyana Grigoryeva who started the flashmob, she was inspired by a joking Facebook post of journalist Mikhail Kozyrev, where he ironically called for writing Navalny's name on snow piles in order for them to disappear, because any mention of Navalny on state media was considered inappropriate. President Vladimir Putin himself famously refused to call Mr Navalny by his name, usually referring to him as "that person" when asked about him.[5]
The flashmob
The flashmob started in February 2018, when Tatyana Grigoryeva tried to write Navalny's name on the forgotten snow piles in Moscow. After the snow piles were cleaned she published four photos of the opposition leader painted on snow and later took video of two street cleaners scraping away one of the markings from a pavement. Her video has been viewed more than 47,000 times.[5]
The snow piles flashmob was a series of satirical pro-municipal utility company responsibility civic actions, where citizens wrote the opposition leader's name on uncollected snow piles to force responsible cleaning action. Exploiting the state's strict political censorship of the opposition leader, residents weaponized bureaucratic reflexes to force utility workers to remove the "agitation."
Snowdrifts with the name of Navalny have been spotted in Moscow,[6] Irkutsk, Omsk, Tomsk,[7] Novosibirsk,[8] Nizhny Novgorod,[9] Saratov, Vladivostok,[1] Kirov,[10] Saratov[11] and Yekaterinburg.[12]
As the flashmob evolved, some citizens experimented by writing the names of other politicians, such as the CPRF 2018 Russian presidential election nominee Pavel Grudinin, the effectiveness of Grudinin's surnames turned out to be similar to those with Navalny's surname.[1] Deputy of Moscow City Duma Yelena Shuvalova partook in the trend, calling her supporters to write the surname of Grudinin on the snow piles.[13] In Saratov local residents also painted Putin, Sobchak and Radaev surnames on snow piles.[11]
Reactions
Russian users on the internet created multiple jokes about the flashmob:"What if I write 'NAVALNY' on the floor of a room, will they take it down too?" "What if I write 'NAVALNY' on the city hall, will they tear it down?", "What if I write 'NAVALNY' on the old bridge, what are the chances they'll build a new, decent bridge?", "I wish I could write 'NAVALNY' on my loan debts."[14]
Alexei Navalny himself also mentioned the flashmob multiple times:
"There's an effective way to clear snow, even if you're not a government official, just an ordinary person. It sounds like a joke; I didn't believe it myself at first. Look, in Nizhny Novgorod, there was a huge pile of snow, someone just wrote "Navalny" on it, and it was cleared away in no time. The same thing happened in Kirov, someone was having fun, they wrote "Navalny" as a joke, and the housing and utilities department immediately showed up and cleared it away"[10]
- Alexei Navalny, 2019 on air on Navalny Live
See also
References
- ^ a b c "Флешмоб «Сугробы боятся Навального» добрался до Новосибирска". RBC (in Russian). 2018-02-27.
- ^ "Снегопад в Москве. Горшочек, не вари". BBC News Russian (in Russian). 2018-02-05.
- ^ "YouTube потребовал удалить эфир Навального про расследование о Дерипаске, Приходько и Рыбке". Meduza (in Russian). 2018-02-12. Retrieved 2026-08-02.
- ^ a b c "Russians use Navalny's name to clear snow". BBC News. 2018-02-12.
- ^ "В Москве очистили двор из-за надписи «Навальный» на снегу". Бумага (in Russian). 2018-02-11. Retrieved 2026-08-02.
- ^ "В Новосибирске на сугробах написали "Навальный", чтобы снег убрали". Radio Svoboda (in Russian). 2021-02-11. Retrieved 2026-08-02.
- ^ Anna Ivanova (2018-02-27). "Флешмоб «Сугробы боятся Навального» добрался до Новосибирска". RBC (in Russian). Retrieved 2026-06-06.
- ^ "Сугроб в Нижнем Новгороде убрали после появления на нем надписи «Навальный»". Коммерсантъ Нижний Новгород (in Russian). Retrieved 2026-08-02.
- ^ a b "Алексей Навальный прокомментировал сугроб со своей фамилией в Кирове". Pro Gorod Kirov (in Russian). 2019-02-16. Retrieved 2026-08-02.
- ^ a b "В Саратове сугробы расписали надписями «Навальный», «Радаев», «Путин» и «Собчак»". Свободные новости (in Russian). 2018-02-13. Retrieved 2026-08-02.
- ^ "В Екатеринбурге рабочих послали засыпать надпись «Навальный» на пруду". Znak.com (in Russian). 2018-02-12. Retrieved 2026-08-02.
- ^ "Агитационные сугробы за Навального и Грудинина оказались одинаково полезными". Daily Storm (in Russian). 2018-02-12. Retrieved 2026-08-02.
- ^ "Сугробы против Навального: в Томске «агитсугроб» снес указатель полиции". Бобр Медиа (Babr24) (in Russian). 2018-02-15. Retrieved 2026-08-02.