What foreigners think about Russia

[Arwenn]

This what you get when the radical left has everyone walking on eggshells, where normal conversation has been weaponized.

Political correctness definitely has had people walking on eggshells, no one being able to freely express what they think and having to choose words carefully for fear of offending someone. Some words now have a different meaning or connotation, & as we know, people have been ‘cancelled’ for tweets or posts from years ago because of that. I also think this inability to truly express how we feel is impacted by the way we communicate in the digital age. Nowadays, even a full stop in texts is considered a ‘micro-aggression’ or passive-aggressive.

But reading the romance novels gives an insight into a world where politeness & social etiquette were considered supreme & the making of one’s character, especially in certain classes and the aristocracy. Manners maketh man as some would say. This included not saying what one really thought/felt and ‘keeping a stiff upper lip’. So I have to wonder whether this goes much further back in the cultural West rather than being a relatively new phenomenon.

Perhaps the Russians being blunt these days is a result of having not had that luxury during the Soviet era. I don’t know enough of their cultural history to understand what their social norms were in the past. Free speech should be just that, the ability to express oneself without fear of offending someone. However, having a filter some of the time is necessary, strategic enclosure & all that. Just some of my musings!

 

[meadow_wind]

This is all very interesting...
I worked and am still friends with a Russian girl 10 years younger than me. Her mom moved to Paris because at 5 years old, my friend needed heart surgery from a specialized surgeon not available in Russia. They then moved to Montreal a few years later. The rest of her family is still in Russia.

I had the chance to hear many stories from her regarding real-life family stories, and some of her political views of Putin and Russia. It was all mostly negative... She would never go back to live in Russia. She says there are no economic opportunities there, full corruption at all levels, lack of everything, etc. Her grandfather got killed by mistake by the government during the communist war era: they knocked at his door, grabbed him, brought him somewhere to be shot, then later sent an apology letter to his wife saying "Sorry, we took the wrong person"... Speechless right? They were apparently doing this to anyone who dared "think" such as novelists, journalists, or whoever who got snitched by whoever else.

Today, she's a wealthy person living in Montreal, with a high salary, and she's into real estate (her mom and grandmother also owns a couple of units in France and Russia, so I would consider them as wealthy)

So anyhow, I find it very interesting to see all the angles about Russia and what people have to say about it. At the moment, I find China's culture and history very interesting, although I've always mostly had a negative opinion about it because of the communist regime (and many more shady things). However, my fascination with China goes back to as far as I can remember, something like 4 years old, I remember I wanted to have eyes like theirs, and I put scotch tape to try and make it hold