Dumping vodka, banning Dostoevsky: some anti-Russian protests are empty gestures

[brooklynite]

The Guardian

Earlier this month, a group of small-town officials in New York gathered news crews to watch them dump bottles of vodka on to the pavement. This follows bans on the sale of Russian vodka by at least 11 US states, and protests from bar owners around the country, including Bob Quay of Bob’s Bar in Grand Rapids, Michigan, who stopped serving Stolichnaya last month after learning about US sanctions against Russia and deciding he “would put on sanctions as well”.

The reality is less than 1% of US vodka imports are actually made in Russia. Stolichnaya – which rebranded as Stoli this month – is produced in Latvia and was founded by a Putin critic who was exiled from Russia in 2000. Svedka? Made in Sweden. Smirnoff? Made in the USA. As one liquor store wrote in a note to its customers recently: “No need to dump them out anywhere except your glass.”

Vodka isn’t the only “Russian” product being targeted regardless of actual Russianness. Rick Anderson, a North Carolina deli owner, made headlines last week when he renamed Russian dressing “Ukrainian dressing”, which he said “tastes just like our old dressing, without the notable hints of genocide”. He should rest assured that, just like French dressing and Italian dressing, Russian dressing was created in the US – sauce historians believe it originated in New Hampshire.

Some restaurateurs have gone to extremes to avoid any association with the war. Le Roy Jucep, a Quebec diner that claims it invented the celebrated Canadian dish poutine, announced earlier this month it would no longer use that name over fears that it sounds too close to the Russian leader’s name in French. Instead, it’s calling poutine “fries-cheese-gravy”.

[Cartoonist]

1. When they ban Tchaikovsky

They can stick it in their ear.

[BlackSkimmer]

2. They already tried to erase Yuri Gagarin.

There were a couple threads on it. Smh.

[Gore1FL]

3. I never got the "I'll destroy this thing I already paid for" protests.

I can see renaming poutine, but not as a protest against Putin, but rather to avoid having to explain the non-relation of the meal to the Russian dictator for every inquiring customer.

[Ocelot II]

4. This is just as stupid as the whole "Freedom Fries" thing,

where the righties were mad at France because France opposed invading Iraq. So some GOPer in Congress renamed French fries (which aren't actually French) on the menu in the Congressional cafeteria. I don't care much for vodka, but Russia has produced a lot of great art and literature and I'm not about to reject Boris Godunov just because the country currently has a terrible leader.