Originally published at: 16-year-old in Russia sentenced to 5 years in prison for blowing up the KGB's virtual building in Minecraft | Boing Boing
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That’s definitely getting close to thoughtcrime…
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No, I don’t want’a go to Russia/Putinville.
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For someone prone to going without his shirt, Vovik has a very thin skin.
If I wanted to prank this fascist kleptocrat/former KGB thug in Minecraft I would have re-produced Detskii Mir, the big toy store across the street, and then dug the secret tunnel from it to the Lubyanka’s torture cellars.
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So virtual prison, right? Right?!
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Wafer thin…
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Nyet, it’s gulag for you.
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Maybe it’s a ruse and the FSB is really entering him in their super-secret spy training program where eventually he’ll be deployed as a sleeper agent in Zuck’s Metaverse.
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More like creeper agent, amirite?
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I mean, yeah that is exactly what this prosecution is all about. Shutting down the wrong type of thinking. FTA:
Uvarov and two other teenagers in the Siberian city of Kansk were detained in the summer of 2020 for spreading leaflets in support of a Moscow mathematician and anarchist activist who was on trial for vandalism.
They put one of the leaflets on a local building of the FSB, Russia’s powerful domestic security agency and successor of the Soviet-era KGB.
Police took their phones and said they found an exchange about plans to blow up an FSB building that they had created in the popular block-building game Minecraft.
According to investigators, the teenagers were also learning to make improvised explosive devices and practised detonating them in abandoned buildings.
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Any 16-year old who doesn’t look at a model of a secret police headquarters and instantly think “Wouldn’t it be cool if I could blow that up?” has something wrong with them. My personal stereotype of young Russians involves large (and admirable) doses of iconoclasm and nihilism. If every Russian teen isn’t plotting how to level a Minecraft FSB HQ, then I’m sorely disappointed in the whole generation.
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I wished the judge have had the sense of humor to the set the sentence to “as long as it takes to restore the minecraft building (from last nights backups.)”
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or, y’know, take the barest of precautions against griefers of any sort. Slap a fuckin’ worldguard region down on it, or if you haven’t done that, use whatever block-logging addon you use to do a rollback.
What kind of mickey mouse operation are these server owners running? yeesh.
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Can we get a world download? I think the entire minecraft community should get in on this and upload videos of the most creative ways they’ve blown up the kremlin
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“According to investigators, the teenagers were also learning to make improvised explosive devices and practised detonating them in abandoned buildings.”
So it wasn’t just virtual explosives.Given his age, 14 at the time, the penalty is outrageous, but I think many countries wouldn’t be too happy about an anarchist trying to learn about explosives.
should you wish to believe the Russian authorities…
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I for one find it completely believable how the opposition politicians are all guilty of financial crimes and tax evasion. It’s almost uncanny.
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Even his defence lawyer admitted they had played with explosives. He just claimed they meant no harm.
“Lawyers for the teenagers said they were playing in empty fields and had no intention of causing harm.”
I’m not defending years in prison for a kid, but lets at least be clear what he was actually sentenced for, even if as a story about how horrible Russia is it’s better to just bring up minecraft.
There is a lot of empty space in Russia
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I don’t think this constitutes such an admission.
From the article: "Uvarov and his friends from Kansk in Krasnoyarsk region, Siberia, were also accused of experimenting with real explosives and were training "for the purpose of further terrorist activites”.
Lawyers for the teenagers said they were playing in empty fields and had no intention of causing harm."
The juxtaposition of the sentences means it could be read that way, but it is far from a clear admission. He does not say “playing with explosives.” And are we talking about fireworks here or what?
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