When I Was Young We Played Outside
https://softlot.ru/sn/fireplaces/what-tvs-were-in-the-ussr-kvn-and-others-soviet-tvs.html
For all of those people like me who grew up with Nintendo and television I am sure the above title had been said at one point or another by your parents. It would seem in this regard, the Soviet youth were hearing these decades in advance. According to this news article from the Digest of the Russian Press, people are complaining that their kids are spending too much time behind the television sets and indoors in general. Problems seemed to be arising such as children not developing enough friendships, not learning how to take care of crops/animals, and not doing enough ‘collective’ leisure. The Soviet mindset seems to resonate in the citizen base when people are complaining that people are not being led to do leisure activities together with their neighbors.
Perhaps it is for this reason that the wildly popular television show KVN was cancelled shortly after television sets became much more widespread (Source). People were getting cozy in their homes and the children were spending increasingly more time absorbing what was on the set. A show based on humor like KVN could create some problems for Soviet leaders because humor tends to be mixed with truths. Even if distant from sensitive policies, in the eyes of the Soviet party at least, with the rural community involved the humor was apparently a risk they refused to take. They had to keep the people in the collective mindset which they apparently had according to the above article.
While the party was weary of the new youth and the communication technology alongside it, the older generations seemed to look at the future of the youth fondly. Without displacements or full on physical war, the Soviet people had more time on their hands and turned their attention to apparently healthier alternatives than their western counterparts (Source). If this is the case then my parents definitely should have been thanking me for doing what I did rather than whatever alternatives they were said to have other than ‘playing outside.’ The way this is all presented especially since eventually Rock and Roll began to pick up in Soviet Russia was that the west corrupted the Soviet populace. This could explain some of the Russian unhappiness towards the west today along with another reason the Soviets collapsed, their people lost sight of the collective.
April 23, 2018 @ 12:12 pm
Eric, this was an interesting post! I like how you mentioned that many cultural influences were blamed on the West “corrupting” Soviet society. I think the party’s focus on having more “collective” pastimes shows their desire to control all aspects of society. Good work!
April 23, 2018 @ 3:07 pm
I enjoyed your focus on the collective. It is true that the collective was a central part of Soviet life and it makes sense why the government and entertainment industry tried to support the collect aspects of society over spending time alone inside. Do you think people need time to themselves? Could being too connected to everyone else lead to people losing their own personal identity?
April 23, 2018 @ 7:09 pm
Interesting post! It is particularly fascinating that there was such a focus on community activities and bonding. It stands in contrast to the individualism that is often encouraged in American culture and really puts an emphasis on some of the base differences in cultures. It does make you wonder if these community bonding activities were worrisome to the government for fear of massive dissent movements.
April 24, 2018 @ 12:49 am
The post really resonated with me, as my parents were always on me to go outside and be active. Needless to say I never really heeded their advice. I think its funny to think that some of the repercussions for too much TV were that people were becoming less involved in the collective. Whereas today, in the U.S. anyway, I would say that if you go outside and socialize in person then your no longer part of the collective. Who stay inside on their smartphones on social media.
April 24, 2018 @ 12:55 am
So many good insights here, and I love the photo of the 1957 TV (Rubin 102). I have to say that I think Soviet and American parents may have had common complaints about the adverse effects of “screen time.”
April 24, 2018 @ 1:08 am
I think this is a very interesting post! Especially when we connect it to our last discussion on the period of the thaw! It is interesting that the regime believed that this would detract from the “collectivist mindset”
April 24, 2018 @ 1:52 am
This was a really interesting post because you connected it with the era where the Soviet government was somewhat loosening its censoring of media outlets and published materials. I really liked how you focused on the importance of community bonding and the formation of friendships in your post, as it was something the children of that generation would have missed according to the government if they had been allowed to watch television all day.
April 24, 2018 @ 5:06 am
Older generations definitely love to compare themselves to the younger ones. While I can’t say I’m entirely surprised that the program got canceled, I do wonder if it actually did have some political critique, or if the government was just being paranoid?
April 24, 2018 @ 10:05 pm
You connection between the youth of Russia and the impending influence of the western does make sense. So does Russia today still encourage human interactions and relationships or since the rise of technology have they given up this Soviet Union ideology?