Earlier today I attended the protest at the Consulate of the Russian Federation on Bloor street in Toronto. It was a pretty good turn out, about a hundred or so people and a fair bit of media types. The protest was directed at the unjust imprisonment of some members of the Russian feminist punk band, Pussy Riot, for a blasphemous performance in an Orthodox church, which I posted about a while ago. Justin Trottier, representing CFI Canada, was the first speaker of the day and gave a speech supporting free expression and separation of church and state:
Pussy Riot member Nadezhda Tolokonnikova told the court: “It makes you want to weep to see how the methods of the medieval inquisition are brought out by the law-enforcement and judicial system of the Russian Federation.”
The Centre for Inquiry is interested in this case because so many of its issues intersect with the values we espouse, and the values we believe Canadian citizens espouse: church-state separation, free speech and the right to freely criticize religion.
For more information, check out: Free Pussy Riot
UPDATE: Pussy Riot Video