It amazing how orderly people die in Russia, virtually the same number every day. What a country!
What I find most stunning about Russia is the low vaccination rate. Usually you would expect more people to follow Putin's wishes. May actually be a strong indicator that he's actually not very popular despite his "election results".
https://www.newyorker.com/news/dispatch/why-russia-hasnt-cracked-down-on-covid-19
I read this a week ago. Whether it's right or not it was an interesting read.
So, chiming in as someone from the Balkans, and I assume some of these things might be true for Russia as well.
Young people there are generally brasher and less scared about such things. While you might have luck convincing a 20-year-old German to fear a virus with a 0.1-0.2% chance of death (for their age group), you won't have such luck in the Balkans.
Due to our history, people are much more tolerant of risk, and the easiest way to get overthrown would be to implement draconian measures now when younger people know their chances of something happening are extremely low.
This is 24 hours old, from the anti-Rio-Tinto protests in Belgrade, the main highways were blocked:
People are apathetic to corruption, election fixing, nepotism, etc. But try to infringe on their most basic rights or not listen to them on something they really care about, and it might be October 5th all over again.
People want to live, not simply survive.
