Confession time – we have a fidget spinner in the office.

Mostly it’s just so we can say we’re in touch with the youth of today, but it’s also so that Seth can talk business whilst attempting a hand-to-hand fidget transfer.

(Between us, he has yet to be successful.)

I suppose they’re reasonably fun to fidget with, but if you ask Ruslan Ostashko, the editor in chief of the Putin-supporting news outlet, PolitRussia, they’re actually part of a plot to “zombify” kids using “political technologies”.

Russia man, what a trip.

Ostashko is so enraged by fidget spinners that he appeared on a popular TV channel for a special report:

“It is a mystery why it has become so popular in Russia right now,” a newscaster said as he introduced the investigation. Why are these fidget things happening? Who is spreading them? The Putin opposition, that’s who.

Now there’s no translation on this, but if you skip through the video you’ll see that it’s all about the spinners.

Some of that was actually discussed via Gizmodo:

Aleksei A. Navalny is one of the most prominent anti-corruption activists in Russia and because of that, he spends a lot of time in and out of jail. The case against the spinner grew stronger when the investigate reporters discovered this clip of Navalny sitting in court back in May.

The clip in question:

Who the hell is playing with a fidget spinner in court and why? Weird.

Ostashko knows why:

Ostashko told the reporter that this was an obvious ploy to pull children over to the dark side of politics. “Those who understand political technologies, they understand very clearly that this simple thing is controlling the masses,” he said.

Almost like they’re trying to distract from real issues, like how Putin routinely orders the execution of journalists (HERE).

What next, the earth being flat?

[source:gizmodo]