Mystics, meet Russia’s muzzle Lawmakers move forward with legislation to ban advertisements for ‘new age and magical services,’ from astrologists to witches

Russian lawmakers Nina Ostanina, Andrey Svintsov, and Alexey Kornienko have drafted legislation that would ban advertising for various “new age” and mystical services and implement government mechanisms to identify and block any resources promoting such services. The bill would amend Russia’s laws on advertising and information technology.

The State Duma deputies sponsoring the legislation listed the 36 “professions” they deem to be too phony and predatory to promote in public. The bill’s draft text features definitions of the various services and offers insights into what lawmakers feel separates, for example, chakra therapists from runologists and astrologists.

According to Ostanina and her colleagues, a chakra therapist is “an individual claiming the ability to correct the energetic and/or psycho-emotional state of the human body.” Meanwhile, runologists practice “rune divination, interpreting their symbolism, combinations, and methods of fortune-telling, as well as performing ritual practices associated with runic symbols for the purpose of advising citizens.” On the other hand, Russia’s astrologists offer “consultative services and practical advice based on a claimed ability to facilitate transformations of a person’s physical and psycho-emotional states through mystical services.”

The legislation’s list also singles out alchemists, “lucid dreaming practitioners,” spiritual gurus, “crystal therapists,” Reiki masters, tarot card readers, Feng Shui specialists, mediums, and numerologists. You’ll even find “witches” (persons claiming a supposed ability to influence events, people, or objects through practices described as “magical” and/or “sorcerous”) and “mages” (persons engaged in “conducting rituals and ceremonial practices not included among the rituals and practices of legally recognized religious organizations in Russia”). 

The legislation would ban advertising, but only for the services listed among the new-age and mystical professions. The bill would also empower the Prosecutor General’s Office to act without court orders and block websites and online platforms featuring such advertising.

Lawmakers notably omitted psychics, clairvoyants, sorcerers, and wizards. Of all the many kinds of fortune-tellers in the world, the legislation explicitly mentions only tarot card readers. It’s possible that the bill’s authors consider some familiar mystical services to be derivative of the activities they did specify, which would explain a separate provision in the legislation that prohibits advertisements for other new age, spiritual, and energy-related “services that may represent combinations and/or derivatives of these concepts.”

It’s also worth noting that the list includes a number of exceptions, specifically for individuals with higher education degrees in medicine or psychology, as well as members of religious organizations.

Religious figures in Russia would be prohibited from promoting services as witches, but they could engage in and advertise services similar to those of magicians or spiritual gurus.

Under the legislation, trained psychologists would be allowed to offer a broader range of new age, spiritual, and energy-related services. They could market themselves in the following fields:

• “play practitioners” (using game-based methods to conduct transformational, psychological, or developmental sessions aimed at self-discovery, simulating life situations, and finding solutions),
• “neurography specialists” (using a drawing technique to harmonize a person’s psycho-emotional state and cognitive processes),
• “lucid dreaming guides” (developing awareness during sleep for the purposes of personal and spiritual growth),
• “family constellation facilitators” (interpreting internal states and role-based interactions to identify hidden causes of a client’s personal and family issues), and
• “regression therapists” (accessing memories — including “past life memories” — for the subjective psychological processing of emotional states and for seeking solutions to life situations).

Those with higher medical education would also be permitted to advertise themselves as nutritionists (persons who claim “the ability to determine personalized nutritional strategies for therapeutic purposes”).

Demand for new-age and mystical services in Russia has steadily increased in recent years. “These scammers stole more than 100 billion rubles [$1.08 billion] from the pockets of households and families in 2024 alone,” State Duma deputy Nina Ostanina claimed on her Telegram channel.

In the bill’s explanatory note, the authors also suggest drawing on the experiences of countries like South Africa, China, India, and Saudi Arabia:

We’d love to answer this one, but we’re too busy begging Zoltar for a better body and studying the Grim at the bottom of Harry Potter’s teacup. The one thing we can tell you about this draft legislation is that the bill submitted to the State Duma is significantly more polished than its legislative predecessors.