Ovechkin’s social media dilemma fuels debate amid Russia’s crackdown on free speech

TSN Senior Correspondent

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Alex Ovechkin’s Instagram profile features a photo of the Washington Capitals star grinning and flashing a peace sign as he stands next to Russian president Vladimir Putin.

While Ovechkin has been under public pressure for the past two weeks to replace that photo, taken in the Kremlin after Russia won the 2014 world championships, doing so may put the lives of Ovechkin’s family in danger, The New York Times reported, citing unnamed sources.

ESPN reporter Emily Kaplan, also citing unnamed sources, has reported the Capitals asked Ovechkin to either change his Instagram profile photo or deactivate his account, but Ovechkin declined, citing concern for his family’s safety. 

Since its invasion of Ukraine, Russia's government has introduced new laws that allow for prison sentences of up to 15 years for those who even describe the conflict in Ukraine as a war. Putin on Wednesday referred to pro-Western Russians as "scum and traitors."

Andrei Soldatov doesn't believe, however, that Ovechkin or his family would be at risk if he changes his social media profile photo.

Soldatov, an expert on Russia's surveillance culture and the co-author of The Red Web: The Struggle Between Russia’s Digital Dictators and the New Online Revolutionaries, argues the potential risk to Ovechkin is overblown.

“I'm a bit tired of the argument that it's too dangerous,” Soldatov wrote in an email to TSN. “He is a celebrity, and for Christ's sake, Russia is not (at least yet) Stalin's Soviet Union. We have thousands of people going to the streets to protest almost every day. My friends and colleagues are raising their voice against the war, and they are not afraid, though it's much more dangerous for them.”

Nikolai