cher@ihuxi.UUCP (Mike Musing) (10/03/84)
<> oops, second try ... Just not to say dreck. I did not respond to Martillo's article because it was generally anti-leftist. No objections here. However, from my grandmother's tales and from my own experience (some 20 years in USSR) I would conclude that Soviet oppression is less severe then that of czars. Russian Jews generally greeted the czar's overthrow and even the Communist takeover (some 8 months later). Some subjective accounts of the Soviet life in the 20's and 30's indicate that there practically was no anti-semitism (on state level at least). Same conclusion can be made observing the abundance of Jews in high Communist Party positions during that period. My possible explanations are: revolutionary hype, non-russian origin of Stalin himself social rather then racial scapegoats (main) I do not think there were any pogroms, but I talked to some trustworthy people who claimed that they saw barracks in Siberia built in the area to which all Jewish population of the country was to be exiled. Stalin's death supposedly prevented the plan from being materialized. Anyway, everybody has some idea of what happened later. One area where there is more oppression is religion (some would say it is the main thing). Access to education, with all existing inequalities is easier (no max quotas). Getting the hell out of that country is HARDER. No geographical restrictions on settlement (yet). Overall, I stand behind my initial statement. Some other things Martillo said sounded unfounded to me. Like Ashkenazi desire to become French, German, etc. Like stating that Sefardic attitude is "more correct". But that's already much more typing then I intended to do. Uff. Mike Cherepov (aka Musing)
martillo@mit-athena.ARPA (Joaquim Martillo) (10/08/84)
I showed the articles on Czarist versus Soviet treatment of Jews to members of the Russian Jewish community in New York and Boston. If any one wants phone numbers, I can give via private mail. The results: Czarist Pogroms versus Yevsektsia and Stalinist Executions. In a typical czarist pogrom order of 20 people died. Over a similar time period the Yevsektsias or Stalin would order several hundred executions. Drafting of Children versus Removing children from unfit parents (because of Jewish identification) About equal numbers except that the Soviets have been more likely to execute or exile the parents to Siberia. Attending Universities Czarists and Soviets place restrictions on Jewish attendence at University. Destruction of the Jewish Community Czarists -- minor censorship of Jewish religious books. Soviet -- total destruction of the Jewish community by forbidding and making illegal any sort of Jewish education or Jewish observance. Emigration Under the Czarists Jews were always free to leave. Under the Soviets even when some Jews were permitted to leave, there were massive restrictions. Why do Mike Musing and David Rubin believe Ignorant VusVus Fairy Tales about the Czarists? Assimilated Ashkenazim consider restrictions on admittance to non-Jewish society a most terrible form of anti-semitism. In Czarist society a Jew was always a Jew even after conversion. The Soviets pay lip service to ideas of equality and universality of human society. The low common vulgar VusVus, who came to the USA before the 20s who knew nothing about Yahadut and therefore grovelled and had no pride, psychologically found czarist restrictions unbearable. Just a note on general (not related to Jews) Czarist and Soviet brutality. In the 19th century the Czarist empire was primitive and barabic yet less than 30 were executed by the government. Since the beginning of the Soviet Regime (less than one hundred years ago) on the order of 20 million people are estimated to have been murdered by the government. The hallmark of the VusVus is not letting reality interfere with his world view.