john turner
You don't want to do that. Trust me.
Well - it depends on how you look at it..?
So at the time in the west (UK,US etc.) there were many people unemployed, claiming benefits, on the breadline etc.
In the Soviet Union - there was no unemployment - you were given a job whether you liked it or not - everybody worked, nobody was poor and unemployed..
Nobody was rich or even "well-off" apart from corrupt party officials maybe - but everybody had their place - but it may not have been the place they wanted!
I can see good and bad - no crime and no unemployment - great!No individuality or free expression, no choice - bad!
i went to the soviet union in august 79 with my parents (my mother had gone back to college to get a degree in russian) and stayed there for a month, visiting moscow, riga, vilnius and leningrad.
there was -substantial- poverty - old folks lined the entranceway of nearly every church we went to that the state allowed to stay open and hadn't converted into a museum or just closed, begging for change.
i'll never forget, as an 11 year old, meeting a woman who must've been 60 and looked 85,who was missing a leg and most of her teeth, begging in the entranceway of a church along with a herd of other folks, right next to the kremlin - the capital of the soviet union, in the middle of moscow. i gave her a 25 kopek piece i found on the street not an hour before and she started to cry, almost kissing my hand.
there were lines to buy -groceries- - 5 seperate stops at various kiosks to jump through all the ridiculous hoops and bureauo-crappy they had just to buy meat - it took folks over an hour. even the special places they allowed us to eat at would have folks pick the sausages off our plates when we were done eating because of the meat shortages. (the tried to keep us mostly isolated from the "real people", although in the month that we were there we got a chance to be exposed to a lot).
there was crime too, but when the government controls all forms of news and information dissemination, you don't hear about it (granted, crime was a lot less prevalent than it is now there). we had heard from one of our guides that someone had been murdered the night before we arrived in moscow right next to the hotel we were staying at (one of the finest hotes in moscow). furthermore, substantial crime was committed by officers of the government and police against the people, even on a petty level - not just the crime of oppression, but low level individuals depriving folks of their meager possessions and their freedom for "looking guilty". we saw a priest harrassed and physically threatened by members of what must have been the secret police just for greeting us by his church. (seriously).
frankly, i'd rather endure a little crime than be in a place where people's spirits were actively suppressed and stiffled to the point of suffocation. by the end of my trip i was having nightmares. i was meeting so many beautiful people, seeing so many beautiful places, and they were all so oppressed, it was getting to me pretty bad by the time we left.
we went with a bunch of students from the college my mother was attending - about 40 students and profs - and everyone gave a cheer when we took off from the leningrad airport for helsinki. it was like leaving prison - even at only 11, i could feel it.
