Torture is a huge Russian problem. But the topic of torture is so painful and frightening that society prefers to ignore it. Influencers – popular actors and musicians who participated in the project Russian Yoga School, helped us to raise awareness about this crucial and taboo issue. Their reputation and popularity allowed to draw an attention to this project, that prompted PR topic for discussion.

One in ten Russians has experienced torture or threats of violence at the hands of law enforcement (by "Levada-Center" — Russian independent, non-governmental polling and sociological research organization). But the topic of torture is so painful and frightening that society prefers to ignore it. Furthermore, many people believe that torture remained in the Middle Ages. Our goal was to attract attention to the difficult issue of torture and increase donations to the Committee Against Torture. Committee Against Torture is an organization that provides support to victims of torture, from assisting them and their families and conducting independent investigations to representing them at the European Court of Human Rights.

Russian Yoga School is a social project concerning torture in Russia.

It is a series of videos in which well-known Russian actors and musicians describe widespread forms of torture as if they were yoga exercises. This way of presentation was chosen due to the fact that law enforcers cynically give the forms of torture the kinds of innocent names (“Swallow”, “Baby Elephant”, “Songbird” etc) better suited to yoga poses than brutal forms of abuse. It is this horrific paradox that the project’s creators have underlined.

Due to the complexity of this issue we had to seek a solution how to attract more audience. We decided this by choosing a platform for this project (news portal Meduza.io) and by choosing its participants (popular musicians and actors). Key message: "Law enforces torture people as we speak". Target audience = audience of news portal Meduza.io where we have published the project — people who care about current situation on the world but don't know about torture problem.

Popular Russian actors and musicians starred in videos. A series of videos was shown as a special project on the info portal Meduza.io. This is one of the largest online news magazines in Russia with a high level of public confidence (69% of readers under 45 y.o., over 13,000,000 unique web visitors

over 100,000,000 web views). The videos published on the portal went together with journalistic materials, written by the editorial staff. There were monologues of real victims of torture, who survived those abuses. In addition, links to videos and special project were posted on the social networks of influencers who participated in the project and on the YouTube channel of Meduza.io.

Within a week after the release of this video, Meduza.io actively promoted this special project in its social networks.

// In just 10 days, the Committee against Torture received over 500,000 rubles in donation, of which 160,000 rubles will be donated monthly. For Committee this amount was the largest that ever donated by private persons over such a period.

// All the raised funds went to pay for treatment and recovery and for the necessary examinations for victims of torture.

// This project in Meduza.io has become 2.5 times more popular than the average project published on the portal.

// The campaign has reached over 13,000,000 people (views of video and material on Meduza.io, comments and reposts on social networks, coverage of social networks of influencers, who participated in this project, news about the project in other media, etc)

// The project attracted the audience that had previously ignored the problem.

One in 10 Russians say they have been tortured by law enforcement officials, a survey by the independent Levada Center pollster said. Russian law enforcement has been rocked with several torture scandals, with victims including LGBT people in Chechnya, Jehovah's Witnesses and prisoners. In 2018, United Nations human rights investigators called on Russia to halt frequent torture of detainees and prosecute perpetrators. Security forces cynically give torture innocent and joking names, many of which resemble yoga asanas: Little Elephant, Songbird, Swallow etc. We have underlined this horrific paradox on the project Russian Yoga School.