A Man in Kazakhstan Held Up a Blank Sign to See If He’d Be Detained. He Was

“I want to show that the idiocy in our country has gotten so strong that the police will detain me now even though there are no inscriptions, no slogans, without my chanting or saying anything”.

This one hit a nerve. On a theoretical level, I can understand how some countries are oppressive, belligerent and have total contempt for their population. But the reality of a 22 year old man being arrested for no reason whatsoever, that's really a step above what I'd consider dystopian. We're not talking about making a joke or writing an article or something that criticizes <insert authority figure>. We're talking about doing nothing.

So from one guy on the other side of the planet, let me express what you can't, Aslan Sagutdinov: Kazakhstan's government is an absolute horror, and I hope you get to replace it with something humane soon, and hopefully in a peaceful way.