From: mam18@jaguar.uofs.edu
Newsgroups: soc.culture.soviet
Subject: Re: Communism as a Russian guilt (racist conception)
Date: 22 Dec 92 16:55:42 GMT
Organization: University of Scranton

In article <102844@netnews.upenn.edu>, sergei@upenn5.hep.upenn.edu (Sergei Borodin) writes:
> In article <1992Dec20.122404.1@jaguar.uofs.edu> mam18@jaguar.uofs.edu writes:
> 
>>What do you know about 'otkazniks'?  I was one of them, and I should tell
>>you, that our main goal was to get positive opinion from the West, rather
>>then from Sovok's. 
> 
>   What I know won't allow me to qualify you as "one of them". "Otkazniks"
>   existed back in 60-80's, but not in 1989. They were people who were 
>   refused in exit to Israel.  In addition to that they got fired from 

You have a good knowledge of one tipe of "otkazniks" (let me call it
"refusenik", as it is called here), but not of all of them.  My situation
was under a category "bednye rodstvenniki", which was "created" by a stupid
law about some peace of paper from relatives, staying there, that I don't have
any financial obligations toward them.  This "law" was created after 1986, 
to stop at least a part of emigrants, because the autority couldn't use
their "old tricks" any more.  Sure, they didn't fire me from a job, for
I was a student in MGU, but my mother lost her job as soon as we put our
papers in process.

In my case, my "father" (whom I'd never seen, because my parents divorced
before my birthday) didn't want to sign any papers, that's why we received
refuse from OVIR to emigrate in Israel. 

>   jobs and were kept in this situation for several years. That was the 
>   price they paid. Your case is different. The fear you faced was 
>   15 days (at most) in jail for the disturbance of the society -
>   - "narushenie obschestvennogo porjadka".  But you right, you didn't
>   care of the opinion from "sovoks" since your "demonstration" was a 
>   back door to the American Embassy -- I remember looong lines, in fact,

The problem is that I spent a huge amount of time near the embassy in the
very lines you are talking about.  It was only a back door to the States, but
not to the embassy.  Is it enough to mention that our family spent 11 hours
in embassy, waiting for interview?

>   demonstration, in front of the Embassy building. Didn't want to stay in
>   the line, did you? In Russian it's called - "hitrozhopyi".
>   Now, the question - what the hell did you know back then that separates 
>   you from "Sovoks"?
> 

May be in Russia it calls "hitrozhopyi", but I don't feel myself one of 
them.  We got "vyzov" to Israel in the beginning of 1988 and emigrated in
Dec. 1990.  Pardon me, but in this Pennsylvanian hole I know some guy, who
worked in Stalin's camps, yet, he got the very same status as I did only 
because they had their interview on Aug.19, last year.  The worst think is,
that I know a lot of people, who are eventually friends of mine, who cannot
emigrate for 3-4 years, although they have relatives in the States.



>   So, ne primazyvajsja k slave.
> 

Ia ne pytaius' primazat'sia k slave, but I don't like your attitude toward
refuseniks.

>> I remember a demonstration near Lenin's library in
>>Moscow, which was surrounded by journalists from the States. 
> 
>   Incidently, I remember it too. Passed by in a car. What can I say,
>   stupid slogans - bunch of morons want to emigrate, da i hui s nimi.
>   No threat from police forces, though.
> 

Bullshit!  May there was no militia there, but there were "black berets", OMON.
A half of our group spent 5 days in prison.

>> Later, they
>>printed the names of us in some Chicago newspaper, and it definitely help
>>us to get status 'refugee' among the first in Dec.1990 (about 3 month after
>>they decided to close Italian-Austrian way).
> 
>   What a hero you are. But you see, the definition of "refugee" from the
>   point of view of the INS, and the definition of "otkaznik" differ so much,
>   that you're still not one of them. What you've done is refused to stay in
>   line in the US embassy, what to "otkazniks" were done is that they were
>   refused in the right to emigrate. 
> 
That's exactly my point.  I was refusenik, and it helped me to become refugee.
Just read carefully next time what people have to say and don't paraphrase
them.

Honestly, I don't really care, whether you consider me as one of refusenik or
not.  This is exactly the point why we didn't care about opinion of people
(like you, for instance).  Zhaba zadavila, tak i skazhi.

Oh yes, sure, it is easy now to blame me that I live here and that I got the
status back in 1990, yet I wonder, what would be your opinion, watching us
literally ESCAPING from the damn country, living behind everything that we 
ever had.  As a good example, I'd like to mention, that, out of 3 section with
mathematical books, which I had in my apartments, I brought here only one,
which was so small, that I could put it in my pocket.


>>Michael Martynov.
> 
>  S.B.

P.S.  One of the things, which I'll never forget the S.U., was the death of
my grandfather, who could live longer if he was here in 1989.  Unfortunately,
Soviet medicine has no idea how to fight blood-cancer, and he died less then
in a month after our interview in embassy...