In the UK, the “Masha and the Bear” cartoon has been was called Putin’s propaganda. The animated series about the adventures of a girl and a bear who is trying to take care of her is love by millions of children around the world. Critics claim that this animation is a tool of Kremlin’s “soft propaganda”.
A professor at Buckingham University, Anthony Glees, notes in The Times:
“Masha is angry and rather unpleasant, but brave. She jumps above the belt. It would not be an exaggeration to claim that it behaves like Putin. ”
Previously, “Masha and the Bear” has repeatedly been accused of propaganda. Similar statements were made by the Estonian, Finnish, Lithuanian media. Last year, Ukrainian activists proposed to ban the series on the territory of the country. In turn, the Russian state media called the criticism of the series “pathological Russophobia”. The Moscow studio Animaccord, which owns the animated series claims that this is an independent project that has never received government funding.
