Licentiousness or freedom?
As everyone now knows for certain, our world is not perfect and therefore communism, as a way of organizing the world, is a utopia. The Bolsheviks, making a coup in November 1917, had many plans to reorganize Russian (and not only) society, but most of their ideas were either ahead of their time or were utopian in nature. In the article, I will not give ratings and comments - I will just outline the topic, since I understood it. Each of the readers, for sure, has his own opinion on this most interesting issue and can reflect it in the comments or like.
Athletes parade.
Dreams of Sexual Freedom
Plans to change the relationship between a man and a woman hovered in the minds of the revolutionaries, long before their finest hour. And I must admit, they had the most serious reasons. The position of women in society at that time was bad. Moreover, it was a global trend: in Europe and America, women gradually, but confidently won back the same rights as men …
In the 1920s, nudism began to spread around the world, and societies of opponents of clothing appeared in many European countries, as well as in the USA, Canada and New Zealand. But overseas nudists wanted only health and unity with nature, while the Soviet ones justified their nakedness politically.
The classic of revolutionaries Engels wrote that the family economy under socialism should become a part of social labor, and caring for children and their upbringing should become a public matter. The new revolutionary woman had to be independent, not to belong to her husband or parents, to be a full member of society. To do this, you need to get rid of unnecessary emotions, give up jealousy, respect the freedom of a man and his right to choose a sexual partner.
Promotional video:
J one of the decrees of the provincial Soviet power.
Keep it up, comrades
As soon as the main passions in the Civil War subsided, the Bolsheviks took up the emancipation of relations between a man and a woman. New citizens were offered the "Glass of Water" theory. Its author - Alexandra Kolontai, denied love and reduced the relationship of men and women to a sexual need, which should find satisfaction without any "conventions", as simple as quenching thirst. Having sex is as easy as drinking a glass of water.
According to her, every Soviet citizen could and should have satisfied his sexual needs with whom and when he pleases. But the citizen who refused him was considered a bourgeois and a living relic of tsarism (but what about the satisfaction of the citizens? Or was it considered that they did not care with whom?). This generally corresponded to the euphoria and impunity that reigned in the country of the Soviets. The first (as usual) responded young people and … officials.
Komsomolsk * paradise * - I wonder if the current generation of youth would refuse?
“Slogans like:“Wives, be friends with your husband’s lovers”or“A good wife chooses a suitable beloved for her husband herself, and the husband recommends his comrades to his wife”(E. Lavlinskaya. Memoirs. M., 1968). When the anniversary of the decree "On the Abolition of Marriage" was marked by a march of lesbians, Lenin reacted vividly and with enthusiasm: "Keep it up, comrades!"
Komsomol communes became commonplace at that time. In such a proletarian family 10-12 people voluntarily lived, leading a joint household and sex life. “Separation into permanent intimate couples was not allowed: disobeying communards were deprived of this honorary title. The birth of children was not welcomed, since their upbringing could distract young communards from building a bright future. If, nevertheless, the child was born, he was sent to a boarding school. Gradually, the sexual commune spread throughout all large cities of the country”(psychologist B. Besht).
Question: Is there a group of progressive youth in the photo or a shift in a brothel?
Kinks
In 1925, with the assistance of the People's Commissar of Health Semashko, a nudist society “Down with Shame” appeared in Moscow. Fighting against shame as a bourgeois prejudice, the participants went naked. Women only allowed themselves shoes and handbags for documents. Proletarian nudists not only took to the streets, but tried to live as usual: they went to work naked, and rested. However, the majority of citizens met such freedom with no understanding, and there were fights.
According to the statistics cited by A. Bunge in his article "Marriage and the Status of Women", published in Berlin in 1931, during the 1920s the number of rapes was constantly growing. The situation was aggravated by the unsuccessful fight against prostitution and the catastrophic spread of sexually transmitted diseases.
The bearer of this, Comrade Karaseev, is given the right to socialize in the city of Yekaterinodar 10 souls of girls aged from 16 to 20 years to whom Comrade Karaseev points out. Commander-in-Chief Ivaschev.
Some officials and social activists began to simply abuse their position and pervert the policy of “women's liberation”. We fought this in "manual mode". There were cases when Lenin personally telegraphed: “Check immediately, if it is confirmed, arrest the guilty, it is necessary to punish the scoundrels severely and quickly and notify the entire population. Wire the execution”(1919, V. I. Lenin and the Cheka). But how much can you correct in this mode….
Enough, played enough
When the euphoria has passed and negative feelings of permissiveness have accumulated among the masses, it is time to reverse the process. Now Lenin writes: "Although I am least of all gloomy ascetic, but to me the so-called new sex life seems to be a kind of good bourgeois house of tolerance." Clara Zetkin sadly quotes him in her diary: “This theory of a“glass of water”made our young people go berserk, outraged. She became the evil rock of many boys and girls. Its adherents argue that this is a Marxist theory. Thank you for such Marxism."
The new course: like a sickle over… old habits.
In 1926 the cheerful society “Down with shame” was dispersed: “… boys, onlookers followed in droves for the adherents of this naked order. Then the Moscow police received instructions - and the naked figures of women and men disappeared from the Moscow streets. (from the memoirs of the writer Shalamov).
In 1929 the genre of Soviet nude in photography and painting was “closed”. Control became stricter, freedoms narrowed. This was not only an ideological strong-willed decision, simple common sense led to this. In 1934, criminal penalties for homosexuality were reintroduced. In 1936, abortion was banned.
So in the USSR "there was no sex"
Sex education among young people was discontinued, and scientific work on this topic was curtailed. There came a time in the USSR when any citizen could proudly declare: "There is no sex in our country …"
Because of this, the Soviet person did not stop having sex. But the former boldness and ease with which the Komsomol members made love, gave way to a deep taboo on any public relations. The foreign word "sex" for the next fifty years will become almost a dirty word. All bad meanings will be put into it at once: same-sex relationships, perversions, adultery, debauchery in clothes and promiscuous relationships.