From: hubey@pilot.njin.net (Hubey)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.soviet
Subject: Re: Stereotypes of Soviet Peoples
Date: 5 Jan 93 00:40:42 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.

In article <Sorokin.47.726178402@ps1.iaee.tuwien.ac.at> Sorokin@ps1.iaee.tuwien.ac.at (Sorokin Zhenya) writes:

> It seems like I used a bad word. 

No problem. It's understood.


> Under "peaceful coexistence" I meant living within one (maybe 
> federative) country _without permanent attempts to desintegrate it_. To 
> achieve this, both peoples should be ready to obey to the same law, maybe 
> with just minor local differences. My claim is, that this is definitely 
> achievable (now, in the last decade of XXth century!) between peoples with 
> close religions and traditions. If traditions and/or religions are too 
> different, such coexistence becomes impossible, and some of the people have 
> to be overwhelmimngly dominant, i.e. define the life order. 

It's certainly possible for all the peoples of Russia to live under
the same laws and under the same government and within the delineated
borders.

I also agree that if the attitudes (including religious and tradition
based ones) of the people are very different it's a cause for problems
This would also include the case if some people wanted a communal
system and others want a privatized one (communism vs capitalism).


> My statement doesn't mean, that such willingness to coexistence is always 
> present, because there are a lot of other factors : historical, economical, 
> political. For example, I am afraid of a strong desintegration of different 
> regions of Russia, even populated by russians themselves because of current 
> political and economic situation.

Stability certainly has attractive features. I personally do not want
a disintegration of Russia because of the problems it would cause
for its peoples. But what really counts is what its peoples want.
If the inhabitants of the Siberian region want to split (even if
they're all Russians) because of the economic benefits which they
might think it will bring, then there's a problem. Either a war
will erupt to keep the union, or a long drawn out economic warfare
will ensue with (probably) both sides being the losers.

But there's always the other side of the coing. If stability comes
at a high cost--repression, unhappiness of large parts of the
population--maybe the union and this particular type of stability
are not so attractive. This will have to be decided by the
people themselves and not by outsiders.

> However, I cannot imagine open border of islamic Chechnya with democratic 
> Russia (of western type, as I hope) even if everything goes to its best.

I think there's some confusion here. If you mean an Iranian type
government by Islamic it's one case; if you mean people wanting to
go to the mosque to pray as Christians go to churches and Jews
go to synagagues, I don't see any problems.

I personally don't see the slightest possibility of any of
the peoples of Russia, after 70 years of official atheism, to
start up any fundamentalist-religious states. What probably
passes for religion is not much more than resistance to the
dominant ideology. Scharansky was not (as far as my readings
lead me to believe) a religious Jew. His resistance was more
against the state; for his ethnic identification and his desire
to go to Israel and live among his 'people'. 

The attitude expressed by some so-called Islamic fundamentalists
is really an effort by the priesthood to gain power that they
lost i.e. they have their eyes set on government. I don't
think they will succeed anywhere. Things could change, if the
secularists in these societies are thrown overboard by the
West, in its confusion. 


> Can you imagine Turkey participating in after-Maastricht EC?

I'm not sure I understand this. Turkey is not an Islamic state.
The power is still in hands of the secularists and over the
past 70 years they have periodically purged the religious
elements. Until quite recently (maybe even now) the Islamic
Brotherhood in even Arab countries like Egypt and Syria was outlawed.

I understand the concerns of the people but there's something
that's missing. There are very strong forces against the 
so-called Islamic movements in almost all the predominantly
Islamic countries. The main point is that people can practice
their religion but that the priests should stay away from
government. It should not surprise anyone that a constantly
recurring theme in the 'Islamic movement' in Turkey is that
Muslims are not free to practice Islam in Turkey. It sounds
strange but it's true. Proponents of Islamic values in Turkey
see themselves as an oppressed segment of society.

> Yes, and I began the discussion with "asiatic" life order, not with islamic 
> religion. Maybe it is only pure historic coincidence, that Islam is mostly 
> in Asia (and Africa). So, calling Chchnya "islamic" makes it implicitly 
> asian, and for Russia I always have to add word "democratic".

I don't know where Asia starts and it doesn't make much difference.
There's no law that says Asia must be undemocratic and there's
no law that says democracy is a hegemony of Europe. I want 
democracy for everyone, because it is 'the way' to go. And just
as there exist people in Russia who oppose it, there are people
in the Islamic countries who oppose it. Chechen resistance is
a nationalistic one; religion is only an excuse and at the same
time an idea that binds them together. This is not much
different than other people.


> Democratic Russia will not conduct a war, so the decision will be made by 
> Chechens (it has been made already). Totalitarian Russia will, and Chechens 
> will lose, but it is not even interesting (for me, it is frightening) to 
> discuss such opportunity.  

Most reasonable people oppose war and suffering. The Chechens are
only an example. I started this posting thread because I got upset
at the obscene racism of some of the posters. All anyone has to
do is to replace the word Chechen with 'black', 'hispanic',
'Jew' or 'American Indian' to see what it boils down to.

It was only about 50 years ago that some nitwits thought that
the world (and specifically some specific Europeans) would have
been better off, if certain peoples in Europe could be did not
exist. A few centuries ago, some others thought that they'd
be better off, if the 'savage' Indians could be taken care of.
For a few centuries, some people thought that blacks were of
'low intellectual caliber' and fit only to be slaves. 

I'm surprised that people are still posting this kind of
obscenity on tps without a murmur by others. Am I alone
in opposing this ?
-- 

	mark	

   hubey@amiga.montclair.edu         hubey@apollo.montclair.edu
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