'It's Not A Band, It's A Movement' — Pussy Riot Rages On

It’s no shock that with what’s going on in Russia right now Pussy Riot would be in the thick of it. No rock band — if that’s what Pussy Riot is, and that’s really only a slice of what they do — has ever been as consistently politically active and agitated as these women.

Approximately 5,100 people were detained across 95 cities protesting the arrest of Alexei Navalny as of Jan. 31 — Vladimir Putin’s antagonist critic and alleged poisoning victim — and on Feb. 2 another 1,400 were arrested in Moscow and St. Petersburg after his conviction.

For nearly a decade, Pussy Riot has been online, on television (from real-life protests to a guest stint on “House of Cards”), in our faces and sometimes in jail. It was started by 15 women and the group usually has dozens of members now. The credo: Anybody can be in Pussy Riot — there’s no set number of participants.