2 ms·

Right, and most of the footage of Russians being miserable that we are familiar with is from after the introduction of “shock therapy” (ie during the ruthless,

by smcl 3y ago

Right, and most of the footage of Russians being miserable that we are familiar with is from after the introduction of “shock therapy” (ie during the ruthless, sudden introduction of capitalism). This is always a hard topic to discuss with those not exposed to any life in former Warsaw pact countries. Because there’s a chance they’ll ignore what you say about the day-to-day life of your average person there (and how it was largely ok if often a bit poorer than much of the west), and assume you’re trying to say “communism and everything that came with it was perfect”.

pjc50 3y ago
Not that you'd have been allowed to film Russians being miserable beforehand; don't forget the 1932 Pulitzer/Holomodor controversy. There's probably a whole field of study in what went wrong with the airdropping of "capitalism" and "democracy" into both post-Soviet states and Afghanistan. It clearly missed a number of elements which were required for those plans to work, mostly around trust and rule of law but also around class and small-l liberalism. Somehow these were more easily overcome the closer (geographically) the country was to core Europe. Then there's the semi-democratic not-very-liberal outcomes of Poland and Hungary thirty years on.
- smcl 3y ago
  There is plenty of documentary footage available of life in the USSR and in the Warsaw pact countries. It’s just most people won’t have seen it because it’s rarely that interesting, it doesn’t portray some dystopian nightmarish hellworld[0] (nor a communist utopia), it’s largely just sort of mundane, ordinary and familiar. What I saw of Czechoslovakia, for example, looked not dissimilar to much of the UK. Maybe I look like I'm going to bat for the former regimes in these countries but I promise I'm not. It's a really interesting topic and while I can understand if those who lived during this time wouldn't want to relive it, I also wish it wasn't just lazily dismissed using stereotypes by much of the rest of the world (you're not included in that, you seem to have some interest and knowledge on it) [0] - yes there was KGB/StB/stasi, suppression of opposition and other brutal things. I was in a former secret police prison just this weekend so I’m keenly aware of that.
  - jayski 3y ago
    I enjoyed your comments on this thread, thanks for sharing your perspective.

by smcl 3y ago

pjc50 3y ago

Not that you'd have been allowed to film Russians being miserable beforehand; don't forget the 1932 Pulitzer/Holomodor controversy. There's probably a whole field of study in what went wrong with the airdropping of "capitalism" and "democracy" into both post-Soviet states and Afghanistan. It clearly missed a number of elements which were required for those plans to work, mostly around trust and rule of law but also around class and small-l liberalism. Somehow these were more easily overcome the closer (geographically) the country was to core Europe. Then there's the semi-democratic not-very-liberal outcomes of Poland and Hungary thirty years on.

smcl 3y ago
There is plenty of documentary footage available of life in the USSR and in the Warsaw pact countries. It’s just most people won’t have seen it because it’s rarely that interesting, it doesn’t portray some dystopian nightmarish hellworld[0] (nor a communist utopia), it’s largely just sort of mundane, ordinary and familiar. What I saw of Czechoslovakia, for example, looked not dissimilar to much of the UK. Maybe I look like I'm going to bat for the former regimes in these countries but I promise I'm not. It's a really interesting topic and while I can understand if those who lived during this time wouldn't want to relive it, I also wish it wasn't just lazily dismissed using stereotypes by much of the rest of the world (you're not included in that, you seem to have some interest and knowledge on it) [0] - yes there was KGB/StB/stasi, suppression of opposition and other brutal things. I was in a former secret police prison just this weekend so I’m keenly aware of that.
- jayski 3y ago
  I enjoyed your comments on this thread, thanks for sharing your perspective.