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Perhaps it's a small thing, but I remember as a young boy, probably in the early 70s and the Cold War, my mother telling me about the USSR. I specifically recal
by CWuestefeld 12y ago
Perhaps it's a small thing, but I remember as a young boy, probably in the early 70s and the Cold War, my mother telling me about the USSR. I specifically recall her saying "over there you need to have papers to travel, so we couldn't just go visit your grandparents like we're doing today".
For whatever reason, that stuck with me for 40-odd years, so the differences today really do resonate with me.
- saint_fiasco 12y agoI agree there is a superficial similarity, but it seems strange to focus on that little detail. What prevented people in the USSR from visiting their family wasn't the requirement of ID per se. It was the fact that the government could confiscate all your documents and basically turn you into an unperson. In my country, which had a recentish authoritarian past, the Constitution (we made a new one when we changed the form of government) says that everyone has a right to an identity, and nobody can take that away from you.