Thread 17918294

What was the transition of the Soviet Union to modern Russia like, especially for the average person who only knew of the world from Soviet propaganda and brainwashing?

>>17918294 (OP)
Imagine having a very cynical attitude to the official propaganda line only for it to be proven correct (and you cant go back)

>>17918294 (OP)
It broke the minds of generations. The 90s were the Russian Weimar.

>>17918294 (OP)
it was a giga shitshow, Russia has only partially recovered from it, and even then the same guys who were in charge during said shitshow seem determined to undo any progress they made to unfucking it

Im guessing what they were taught in soviet schools still carriers with russians attitude towards westerners to this day. They were literally taught shit like how everything in the world was invented by soviet or russian scientists

>>17918294 (OP)
it was a fucking travesty, total social, economical and demographic collapse
worse than ww2

>>17918294 (OP)
Collapsing was the best thing that ever happened to that shithole.

>>17918294 (OP)
Here's a quote that sums it up
>Everything they told us about communism was false, but everything they told us about capitalism was true

The recognized that the party propaganda was, in fact, correct. Probably the communists even won the elections in the 1990s, but the oligarchs and the CIA rigged it so they could not go back.

>>17918536
You're unironically parroting said propaganda if you think KPRF was going to "go back".

>>17918333
Fpbp

>>17918549
I meant to write "CIA propaganda".

I think the most blackpilling thing would be witnessing all the "social parasites" immediately move up and find success. People with ties to organized crime, experienced at moonlighting and with a large schmoozy network of support found themselves to be pretty okayish. Lots of the new oligarchs came from this criminal class. All the ones that didn't take or give bribes and just did the "right " thing fell into total destitution.

China had the same thing with the Deng reforms, it was the people already breaking the rules that had the early founder effect and benefited in the late 1970s and early 80s. During the Mao era all the ones that didn't steal or bribe, fucking starved to death in many areas of the country.

When communist systems collapse, it's always the cheats that are rewarded.

>>17918552
>When communist systems collapse, it's always the cheats that are rewarded.
It's the same way in all of the "capitalist" systems. Honor and integrity don't sell.

>>17918530
wow, that's fucking grim

>>17918530
fucking hell, that sums it up nicely.
I still beleive capitalism is the least worst of all systems, but it needs a shake up once a good shakedown and breaking apart of large companies once in a while

>>17918530
>everything they told us about capitalism was true
As in, the bad parts?

>>17918294 (OP)
I finished reading the book 'Empire of the Absurd' and was wondering the same thing
https://laurivahtre.ee/empire-of-the-absurd/

Some things that stuck out to me
-People could not tell jokes without worrying about someone snitching about them to the KGB
-Karl Marx and Lenin were basically religious figures, everyone was basically taught they were infallable beings WHO COULD NOT BE WRONG, EVER. They basically had idols of them placed everywhere.
>For example, every learned paper had to quote the classics of Marxist-Leninism, who were Marx, Engels, Stalin and Lenin; after 1956 only Marx, Engels, and Lenin. They and only they were the classics, whose work contained all the universe’s wisdom. By definition, therefore, it was not possible that even one excerpt from some work by some classic wouldn’t be good enough to quote, no matter what the topic. Even if the work dealt with the syntax of the Karakalpak language or the specific features of the Hotchkiss drive in movie projectors – the three bearded men had said something wise about it, some even a hundred years ago. Geniuses, what else can you say.
-shortages of shit everywhere. Unless you were higher up and had connections, in which case you had special stores only these special people could use and they lived well
-crazy plans which if pointed out how ridiculous they were, would result in visit from KGB
>Absolute power forces its way into every sphere of its subordinates’ lives. Just as it was in Orwell’s “1984“, so it almost was in the Soviet Union. Long chains of glorious new campaigns were forged where everyone was forced to devotedly assist and participate, be it a campaign to install hydroelectricity or develop a wondrous new two-headed strain of wheat. We had to proclaim our support; we had to exhibit our boundless loyalty; we had to resolutely express condemnation; we had to selflessly struggle. For who or against who, that was regularly announced by the Communist Party.

>>17918353
What’s really tragic about it is the reforms that were being put into place might have eased the USSR into a more open, functional, free society that could have potentially addressed the skeletons in its closet and granted both economic and civil liberties/local autonomy to its people (including the needed market reforms not wholly dissimilar to the Deng lead ones in China and even an ultimate end to one party rule). The Nomenklatura however felt deeply threatened by this, and lead by KGB hardliners they tried to coup Gorbi. That ensured the catastrophic breakup of the USSR and the resulting ancap train with no breaks outcome followed by a return to brutal authoritarianism. Then the same goons that forced that outcome spent the next thirty years blaming Gorbi and democracy for the thing they caused.

>>17918681
Some other choice quotes from the book. People who grow up in those times could still possibly be conditioned to this day be these things

>There is nothing absurd in growing corn; it was changed into an absurdity by Khrushchev, whose grand scale plan was to plant corn really everywhere, including in the polar regions. Even in Estonia, which is far from a polar region, it is useless to plant corn and expect any sort of crop, even for livestock feed. The Baltic German landlords, at one time the upper crust in Estonia and Latvia, had learned this already in the nineteenth century, yet Estonia still had to participate in Khrushchev’s farce. As everybody had to cultivate corn, then, without exception, everybody did cultivate corn – for he who did not cultivate corn was not a Soviet person. And whoever was not a Soviet person was therefore an enemy.

>Lauri Vahtre is an excellent person to talk about the truth. He was born during the heights of Soviet Absurdity and lived most of his life under it. He was personally touched by the highest levels of absurdity as a youngster when some verses in one amateur poetry-almanac took him to the interest-field of the KGB. Such almanacs were actually not forbidden, but since they were neither allowed, the very fact that one would participate in such activities was enough for the KGB to label a person as “under suspicion”. Later, just before graduating from university, Vahtre was expelled – a punishment, which, in these days, was almost equal to a march-order to Afghanistan. The actual reason was his antipathy towards the Soviet regime, Soviet ideology and Soviet reality which he couldn’t hide.

>However, you could never know what was going to happen with Comrade Sapozhnikov later, whether he became a hero or traitor. Because of this, it was good if all information, including the Party’s own propaganda, faded as quickly as possible from memory.

>>17918294 (OP)
>the average person who only knew of the world from Soviet propaganda and brainwashing
that's a retarded trope. the whole charade fell exactly because the average person knew about the differences.

>>17918669
yes

>>17918294 (OP)
How ever tankies recovery?

Crime was rampant. It wasn't until Putin came to power that things started to settle down.