Russia | Because these are people, who are so much like you (they're European), and yet, there are so very many of them who live very badly (in terms of wealth, health etc.). And yet, you then understand, there are still surprisingly many who make out all right, live full, rewarding lives, live deeply and passionately. Even if the mortality rate is very high. |
| But if pressure increases beyond a certain point, people "break apart", get warped, and it's their mind, not their body, that "warps" first and fastest. People go crazy. [This probably is implicit in the way kul'tura works, as a world of "fantasy"]. They cannot stand the additional pressure. This is the danger that Gorbachev saw: "Listen people, things have to change now, so let's do it calmly, not go crazy, for if we do, you all know what it's going to be like. So let's just pretend that we're being calm, maintaining the status quo. Hold back. We've all been hurt by this. We're all in this together." |
| A traveller through Soviet Russia was impressed by a basic uniformity, sameness of material conditions. This, which is often experienced as monotony/greyness, also implied a fairness [likewise an a-national tolerance] - a standard of living where excessive personal luxury was frowned on, hidden away, nobody really knows who governed them, government was hidden and impersonal, almost magical, because such an unpredictable force. Under Stalin the pressure of this configuration was too much for most people. There was a big change, and people rushed loyally into it, and many of them were crushed (physically or psychologically) by it. But after Stalin, things were more or less calm. People were hurting. And things were getting worse, materially speaking, but very slowly. As far as the vlasti were concerned, things were basically very calm, and slowly (with many reverses) getting better, more liberal. But then the economy caught up with them again. |