I am curious how the average Russian feels about this.
Do they support putin. Are they against the invasion of ukraine?
.. or is Russia so oppressive that it is not safe for anybody to speak freely on the issue if they do not support putin?
There are different opinions in Russia about that.
Many people support Putin, many people not.
It depends on what medias you watch.
There's a lot "opposite" medias who criticise current government. I'd say they tell the same point of view as the point of view in the USA.
Putin doesn't touch them except they cross some red lines (like explicit support for Nazism). Then such medias begin to have big problems.
There's a lot of media personalities (well-known actors, singers, scientists, etc) who condemn russian aggression against Ukraine and they condemned most russian government activity before that agression.
Some other people think that's because these they have some realty in USA/Europe and they are being afraid to loss it. Looks like nobody is being afraid of Putin, but they are afraid on USA/Europe.
But i'd say last 2-3 days that's going to be dangerous to publicly criticize Russian aggression soon. Of course that's related to popular bloggers with millions subscribers. No any problems for some random persons with 50-100 member communities.
Last 2-3 days russian government asked to not call that "a war", "an invasion", but "a special military operation".
Not sure if there will be some problems for those who ignore, but i'd say it's time for big changes in Russia.