Having finally eliminated Russia’s most prominent political dissident, Alexei Navalny, Moscow is now setting its sights on other pressing threats of foreign-backed opposition: My Little Pony. The American-owned children’s toy and media franchise – including a popular animated TV programme, ‘Friendship is Magic’ – rose up the ranks of Putin’s hit-list last year amid allegations that it promoted LGBTQI+ values. This claim was apparently due to one of the series’ main protagonists, Rainbow Dash, who (shock) sports a multi-coloured tail and mane, as well as a 2019 episode which featured a same-sex couple.
Such flamboyance and gender-bending – albeit anthropomorphic – was more than the notoriously homophobic Russian regime could bear. Shortly after Russia’s Supreme Court outlawed the nebulous ‘LGBTQI+ movement’ as an extremist organization in November 2023, the country’s online movie database changed its rating for ‘Friendship is Magic’ to the ‘adult’ category, without explanation. Then in February a fan convention for the diminutive pony propagandist – whose mascot had even donned the nationalist garb of a Russian-flag coloured mane – was forced to close when police raided the event to sniff out evidence of inciting, as the organizers explained, ‘non-traditional relationships… adult content for minors, and general horror and darkness’. The officers came away unsparklingly empty-handed.
