Stand-up comedian Denis Alien left Russia after being threatened because of his anti-war stance. He announced this on his YouTube channel.

The comedian said that due to the fact that in the first days after the start of the war he spoke out about what was happening on social networks and went to rallies, he began to receive threats. In particular, he received an audio message with the following words: “What I want to explain to you, f**or f****y, we are now fucking near Kyiv. But helicopters fly very fast, fucking Russian, fucking ours. And we'll fucking be at your door in six fucking hours with full ammo."

“At first it was unpleasant and even a little scary, but then these people began to pretend to be Chechens, and it became a little easier. Because these people portray the Chechen accent in the same way as Moscow stand-up comedians portray it, ”said Alien.

Law enforcement agencies became actively interested in the activities of comedians even before the war. Employees of the Main Directorate for Combating Extremism of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, also known as Center E, went to many performances as if they were on duty, and often filmed the concerts on cameras. In 2018, the police briefly put comedian Danila Poperechny on the wanted list after State Duma deputy Vitaly Milonov complained about his clip "Popkultura". The latter also filed a lawsuit against Poperechny, but the court rejected it.

In January 2020, a resident of Orekhovo-Zuyevo complained about stand-up comedian Alexander Dolgopolov because he offended the feelings of believers. The reason was a joke that Jesus should have been called Bogdan, since this is the ideal name for a God-given child. Dolgopolov was forced to leave the country for Israel for six months.

On August 30, 2021, the Ministry of Internal Affairs banned stand-up comedian and citizen of Belarus Idrak Mirzalizade from entering Russia for life, recognizing him as a threat to national security because of a joke about Russians, mattresses and shit. Before that, he served his sentence, having spent 10 days in a special detention center. Because of this joke, he was attacked on the street, hit on the head. The police were not looking for the attackers. Now Mirzalizade is not in Russia.