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Haunting message penned from Soviet 'slaves' found buried in Urals theatre
- gyardley 11y agoI can't for the life of me figure out why the headline writer put the word 'slaves' in quotes.
- sologoub 11y agoProbably because they were technically convicts from governments point of view, instead of outright slaves or someones property. I'm a bit surprised by 1954 as the date, since it's pretty far from the original purges in the 30s, but not at all surprised by the find. The disappearances and summary judgements, resulting in either executions or the slow rot of the labor camps, are well documented. A person I know from that same town found a German gun folded in oiled cloth in his parents' ceiling when he was renovating. The building was built by German POWs.
- CWuestefeld 11y agothey were technically convicts from governments point of view This isn't entirely true. The work camps were powered by convicts, but also by putatively free exiles who had been sent there for a variety of reasons. And in some cases, convicts who had completed their sentences were technically freed, but not allowed to leave the camps anyway. Source: I'm currently reading "Gulag: A History" by Anne Applebaum. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/224379.Gulag https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/224379.Gulag
- gcv 11y agoA huge number of soldiers returning from the war had been handed 25-year (in most cases equivalent to life-long) sentences under the 58th article of the Soviet penal code (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_58_(RSFSR_Penal_Code) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_58_(RSFSR_Penal_Code) — the Soviet Union officially had no political prisoners, only criminals). For the most part, their crime was contact with other Allied troops, so it was easy to accuse them of contact with the West, and eliminate any dangerous ideas they could have brought into the bright nation of the dictatorship of the proletariat, the heaven of the working man. These people would have been serving their sentences through the 1950s, and Khruschev's rehabilitation policies (far from popular in the Politburo) did not start until 1956.
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 11y agoI know it was called the glorious proletariat, but I was wondering if the working men, proles, brought it about. I guess they didn't, but I am wondering how it all happened.
- eveningcoffee 11y agoThey deported loads of people from occupied territories after end of war and releasing them only started around that time.
- M8 11y agoBecause they were prisoners? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penal_labor_in_the_United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penal_labor_in_the_United_State...
- cushychicken 11y agoAnd what, apart from legal approval, is morally or materially different about forcing a prisoner to work and forcing a free citizen to work?
- lqdc13 11y agoWhat, apart from legal approval is morally or materially different from performing capital punishment on convicted murderers and performing capital punishment on a free citizen? The point is there is a spectrum/grey line.
- ars 11y agoI find it pretty disturbing that you can't tell the difference. That's a rather serious moral failing on your part.
- cushychicken 11y agoSweet! Value judgments on the internet!
- dragonwriter 11y agoPrisoners have been one of the most common types of slaves in history. And one of the few explicitly tolerated as such in places that like to claim they've abolished slavery. [0] [0] See, e.g., US Constitution, Amendment XIII
- jader201 11y agoThe article seems to refer to them as "prisoners" more often than "slaves", so this may be why (and the article is more sensational using "slaves" in the title vs. "prisoners").
- unics 11y agoI understand that it can be subjective and will assume the writers audience might find the context sensitive. In this case it seems to fit well in my opinion.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- topynate 11y agoI understand your sentiment completely – they were slaves and that crime should be recognised. The reason the headline has the word in quotes is that it's quoting their own statement about themselves: quote quotes, not scare quotes.
- jvm 11y agoMy guess it that the word "slavery" usually implies chattel slavery, whereas these people were serving sentences of penal servitude. Others have pointed this out, but penal servitude is alive and well in the US prison system as well [1] and it's not common to use the word slavery for that. Maybe they should, but it is arguably a different concept from chattel slavery. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penal_labor_in_the_United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penal_labor_in_the_United_State...
- meatysnapper 11y agoHooray prison-industrial complex :(
- chc 11y agoI think that's because it's literally quoting the letter-writers' description of themselves.
- mempko 11y agoIs this a good time to talk about the US prison labour system we have now? Where many are forced to work. I guess if you give them pennies on the dollar, they are not slaves right? EDIT: Judging from the down votes, I guess it is not a good time. Maybe tomorrow?
- mhurron 11y agoYes, every story should be made to be about the US. It's really the only place that matters. Oh and FYI, slavery for punishment is legal in the US.
- humanrebar 11y agoWell, not chattel slavery, which is what Americans usually mean by the term. The prison can't sell prisoners like you could sell a car or something.
- mempko 11y agoActually this is one of the most appropriate stories to mention the US. US has the most prisoners in the world and the Russian prison slaves wished a world where there would be no slavery. That world is not here yet.
- notdanariely 11y agoJudging by the responses in this thread, your comment was deemed off-topic. I think part of the reaction is that your tone sounded like you were pushing an agenda. Then when people said they thought it was off topic, you doubled down on the insist tone. Both of those things are a turn-off: people don't want to see reddit-like behavior (taking a topic about a historical discovery of slavery conditions in Russia and turning it into a US-centric political hot-button issue). I thought your initial comment was a little off-topic, personally. But the defensive / insistent tone in this reply makes me think that you actually were pushing an agenda, and that the criticisms were valid. (Essentially, to me, you proved their point: you weren't interested in discussing the focus of the article, but wanted to hijack the thread to talk about an issue important to you.)
- mattgibson 11y agoI wonder if in years to come, there will be similar stories when messages from enslaved foreign tech workers are found buried in leaked source code.
- knodi123 11y agoprobably not.
- staunch 11y ago> Hello, future generation! And may your era have no slavery and no humiliation of man by man. > Cheers from us, > Prisoners I.L.Kozhin, P.G.Sharipov, U.N.Nigmatulin. Feels good to have heard their words. Too bad we can't respond.
- shanusmagnus 11y agoI was going to say the opposite -- feels shitty to read that and see that it's still happening, though I guess I could take comfort in that it's less prevalent now.
- Semiapies 11y agoI'm just glad they've finally been heard.