From: dleschin@FEDS66.PRIME.COM (Dmitri Leschiner)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.soviet
Subject: Re: Shafarevich
Date: 9 Sep 92 01:10:00 GMT
Reply-To: "soc.culture.soviet via ListServ" <SCS-L@indycms.iupui.edu>

>Date:         Tue, 8 Sep 1992 09:27:18 GMT
>From: "Mikhail S. Verbitsky" <verbit@BRAUER.HARVARD.EDU>

>In article <18cag0INNmaa@agate.berkeley.edu> muh@physics1 (Yury M. Mukharsky)
> writes:

>>BTW, rape is either worst purnishable or second worst crime in
>>Russia (I'm not considering treason ..., just what is call crime in
>>common language).

>...and rapeman has a very big (more than 90%) chances to be
>heavily sexually abused in the jail. Usually, these criminals
>(mostly, who raped girls <18 years old, but not only) are
>turned to "petukhov" (the cock (bird :) in Russian). I'll explain shortly
>what it is: in each "zona" (Russian jail) there are about 1 "petukh"
>on 30 men; this means that he got raped about 10-20 times
>dayly. Everybody who is known as a homosexual is obligatory
>to be "petukh" (ie, to allow himself to be raped by anyone),
>but since there are not enough homosexuals in the "zona", people
>who got their terms for rape have a good chance to become ones.
>I am not a sensationalist: there is a serie of essays by
>Leonid Soloviev in the Neva magazine on the same theme (~1988).
>I have to add that I myself spent some time in jail (not
>in "zona", though) and from what people there were speaking
>I got that this is true.

>Misha.


Famous leader of Soviet people N.S.Khruschev had three worst enemies
of emerging bright future of communism while he was in charge of
soviet future. These were: "sectants" (i.e. believers in God),
"tuneyadets's" (i.e. unemployed) and "nasil'niki" (i.e. rapists).

Each of these three deeds was the heaviest crime, according the
soviet laws, and soviet authorities were restless in searching and
prosecuting these offenders and criminals throughout the Russia.

There was a famous wave of oppression of religion, starting with
1954 "statement (postanovlenie) of CC CPSU" on "faults in atheistic
and educational work"; also there were a lot of "tuneyadets" trials
(most famous of those is probably one on Josef Brodsky in 1964), and
also the highest term for rape was set, if I'm correct, to 12 years of
labour camp, almost as much as for murder of several people. The direc-
tive was sent to all local prosecutors and policemen, to search and
punish "rapists" without any mercy. "State plans" of number of rapists
found were established, and as always in SU, these plans were very high.

Needless to say, these plans were accomplished ahead of schedule and with
higher figures than were originally planned. The "rape" charge became as
much as powerful vehicle for everybody who wanted to get rid of relative
or neighbour, as earlier in Stalin's times, it was "anti-soviet talks" charge.

The witness of alleged victim was always unconditionally accepted as proof
of rape (actually, that practice is up to now pretty much the same in XXXR,
as far as I know).

Needless to say, more than 90% of alleged rapists were people who either
had fully consentual sex with alleged "victim" ("victims" were most often
recruited from women known for their, let's say, free sexual behaviour:
of course, they were most innocent and most suffering from sexual encounters:
well worth 12 years in camp!), either didn't try to have any sex with them
at all. Also couple of people were sent in labour camps for raping of their
wives (no kidding!!). Soviet goverment was very much concerned with moral
image of soviet man, the builder of communism: the chapter under this title
("Moral code of builder of communism") was even included into new (1962)
Program of CPSU.

Big placate with full text of "Moral code..." hang on the wall in each
hair-cut salon (not only there, of course). And number of rapists in labour
camps was consistenly increasing... What was happening with them there, is
explained in above post by Misha. I can only add that many of them was
young boys who happened dating girls whose parents didn't like them. The
easiest way to get rid of unwanted cavalier was to press girl to sign a paper
with a rape charge. Everything else was authomatic... Kind of feminists's
paradise, right, Patricia?


Dmitry