Russia targets "childfree" movement with hefty fines

The legislation bans the so-called child-free propaganda, or the conscious decision not to have children. From now on, it will not be allowed to promote this in any way in the media, Russian films, or advertisements.

According to the legislation initiated by the ruling United Russia party, childlessness cannot be promoted on social media either.

The authors of the legislation, initiated by Duma Chairman Vyacheslav Volodin, explain that "the ideology of childlessness" is contrary to Russian "traditional values," which are based on a "strong family." According to the authors, childlessness leads to the "degradation of social institutions."

Once the legislation comes into effect, those promoting conscious childlessness will face severe penalties. For promoting childlessness, e.g., on the internet, one can face a fine of up to 400,000 rubles (over $4,200). For advertisements with similar content, one can be fined up to 5 million rubles (about $53,000).

Russia has been struggling with a demographic catastrophe for many years, and the invasion of Ukraine has only worsened this condition. According to data from the Russian Statistical Office (Rosstat), just over 1.2 million children were born in Russia last year. For comparison, in 2014, over 1.9 million children were born. The situation was only worse in the 1990s, right after the fall of the Soviet Union.

The Kremlin also includes millions of residents of the occupied territories of Ukraine in its statistics. Otherwise, the number of Russian citizens in the past nearly three years would have drastically decreased, also due to thousands of soldiers falling in the war.

Russian authorities are also increasingly vocal about the need to limit abortions, which can currently be performed on request (under health insurance) up to the 12th week of pregnancy. In 2022 alone, over 500,000 abortion procedures were performed.