If you grew up in Boston, you actually grew up thinking that Patriots' Day is a major American holiday, sort of like… — Masha Gessen American Copy Share Image
I mean, hunger strike is almost a ritual in a Russian prison colony. It actually has been going back to Soviet times.… — Masha Gessen Hunger Copy Share Image
The American justice system administers punishment. It does not conduct inquests and it does not find facts. — Masha Gessen American Copy Share Image
I was a political journalist for a long time. I wrote a book about Putin. I made all kinds of trouble. — Masha Gessen Book Copy Share Image
“No one is easier to manipulate than a man who exaggerates his own influence.” — Masha Gessen Influence Copy Share Image
You risk everything if you so much as join a legal protest demonstration in Russia. It raises the stakes. — Masha Gessen Protest Copy Share Image
Any country is either becoming more democratic or less democratic. I think the United States hasn't tended to its journey toward democracy… — Masha Gessen Country Copy Share Image
I think that Putin's strategy has been throwing a lot of money, fairly haphazardly, at a lot of projects aimed at disrupting… — Masha Gessen I think Copy Share Image
I think that Russia was like a lot of other countries, a lot of empires, in being a tyranny up until the… — Masha Gessen Country Copy Share Image
I have experienced power as a journalist. On three different occasions, when I wrote about individual immigrants or refugees, the article -… — Masha Gessen Change Copy Share Image
Nobody knows what self-radicalized means, and that's one of the weird things about the way that we talk about terrorism. We talk… — Masha Gessen Case Copy Share Image
Putin, I believe, was actually born to be a KGB agent. And I say born because I think that his father was… — Masha Gessen Believe Copy Share Image
“The Agat Institute was a God- and state-forsaken outfit inhabited by dead souls and a few disoriented live ones like Yekaterina, who… — Masha Gessen Programming Copy Share Image
St. Petersburg, under the czars, had been a grand city. It was a planned city, and it had - there were all… — Masha Gessen Apartment Copy Share Image
For the first stage of his dictatorship, Vladimir Putin was involved in destroying public space. On the first day he was in… — Masha Gessen Democracy Copy Share Image
Donald Trump creates word salads. And that is awful to language, because we try to parse out what he's saying and try… — Masha Gessen Choices Copy Share Image
You can't expect people who didn't exist as a community at all until about twenty years ago to have formed a political… — Masha Gessen Activist Copy Share Image
Every day, there'd be somebody interviewing me as a "lesbian living in Russia." It got to the point where I would joke… — Masha Gessen Children Copy Share Image
“But the funniest one they showed us was about the need for leisure time. I was sitting next to women who work… — Masha Gessen Comedy Copy Share Image
“At the time of the October Revolution, the Russian intellectual elite had been both a part and a partner to the European… — Masha Gessen Communication Copy Share Image
“Little Octobrists are future Young Pioneers. Little Octobrists are studious kids. They study hard, love school, and respect their elders. Little Octobrists… — Masha Gessen Hard love Copy Share Image
For years I was the only publicly out gay person who was not a full-time gay activist: my position as a quasi-foreigner… — Masha Gessen Discrimination Copy Share Image
I think that when you emigrate, when everything you took for granted disappears, it's a kind of loss of innocence. When you're… — Masha Gessen I think Copy Share Image
Both Trump and Putin use language primarily to communicate not facts or opinions but power: it's not what the words mean that… — Masha Gessen Impossible Copy Share Image
A political conversation is a conversation in which people with different views come to agreements about how they're going to inhabit this… — Masha Gessen Communication Copy Share Image
Putin has built a mobilisation society, his sky high popularity numbers, which Donald Trump so envies, are fully dependent on being able… — Masha Gessen Donald trump Copy Share Image
Since 9/11 we have somehow come to accept the 'radicalization' narrative, which basically holds that people become terrorists through a series of… — Masha Gessen Accept Copy Share Image
Putin was very careful to gradually sort of rotate people in and out of power, to make sure that he had competent… — Masha Gessen Bureaucrats Copy Share Image
Trump very much wants to be liked by Putin and I think sincerely admires him. Putin doesn't know how to deal with… — Masha Gessen Deal Copy Share Image
To exercise ignorance, racist prejudice, a love of power and total disregard for factual accuracy, one has to inhabit a world where… — Masha Gessen Ignorance Copy Share Image
Putin really assumed that once Trump - who had such clear admiration for him - was elected, it would be convenient for… — Masha Gessen Admiration Copy Share Image
You know, I don't walk home alone at night. If I drive into our courtyard after dark, I ask my partner to… — Masha Gessen Alone Copy Share Image
To effectively create the image of an enemy you have to show first of all that the enemy is extremely dangerous, but… — Masha Gessen Create Copy Share Image
I really can't abide conspiracy theories, because I believe that everything in the world stems from idiocy and incompetence. That's certainly true… — Masha Gessen Believe Copy Share Image
Russians didn't elect Trump. Even if there was collusion, even if every hypothesis that has - that is at play in the… — Masha Gessen He Copy Share Image
The Soviet system of propaganda and censorship existed not so much for the purpose of spreading a particular message as for the… — Masha Gessen Censorship Copy Share Image
I think there was certainly contact between the Trump campaign and Russians, which is perfectly normal. All campaigns in the modern age… — Masha Gessen Age Copy Share Image
I have no doubt that there are Russian efforts to disturb the fabric of American democracy, but they're disruption efforts. They're troublemaking… — Masha Gessen American Copy Share Image
Now, academics are not always the easiest people to talk to, and the scholarly papers aren't always the easiest papers to read,… — Masha Gessen Always Copy Share Image
Russia, at the start of the 21st century, at least in its larger cities, very much resembled the United States of the… — Masha Gessen Being Copy Share Image
