West Is Punk?!

Recently I was invited to take part in a panel discussion on US-Russia relations (reported on JRL 25 September 2012, item #36). Other contributors included Alexander Rahr, and his discourse ran roughly as one would expect from that source until I hit on this astonishing paragraph: 

 

"Russian society is not homogeneous. While two thirds have views that could be described as conservative and traditional, one third ­ mainly the educated new middle class ­ look at the Pussy Riot trial through Western eyes. These people want to live the way people do in Europe; Russia, with its 'special world view' is alien to them. The number of 'educated Westerners' is growing rapidly, and in the next generation, they will constitute the majority of Russians." 

 

This passage is simply replete with unwarranted presuppositions that call for at least three kinds of comments. 

 

1. First, Kollege Rahr posits a neat division of Russian society into two unequal parts. One third of it is "the educated new middle class" that sees "the Pussy Riot trial through Western eyes": it is anti-trial and pro-punk. Opposed to that are the other two thirds -- presumably non-middle class, uneducated, conservative, traditional, generally backward and thus anti-punk and pro-trial.

 

Of course, an opinion is just an opinion, and everyone is entitled to their own, however silly. But the esteemed panelist clearly makes here an assertion that purports to be a statement of fact complete with a numerical estimate: one third against two thirds.

 

Now, the question obviously arises ­ from what source did Rahr get his figures? What sociological research, polls etc. is that one-third-vs.-two-thirds proportion based on?

 

I am sorry if I missed something, but the only estimate (anecdotal, I presume) I've heard on Russian radio (VestiFM, if I remember rightly) was something like 95 percent anti-punk and five percent pro. Even that would hold only for the area within the Garden Ring in Moscow. Throughout the vastness of Russia any pro-punk sentiment would be infinitesimal and the "serve them right" attitude, overwhelming. One shudders to think what form disapproval of the female punks' conduct might have taken if they had tried their vicious prank not in Moscow's main cathedral but in some remote Cossack village church.

 

But why mention those nagaika-wielding Cossack gentlemen? I am not prepared to cede to Rahr even the educated middle class, new or old, not even Western-educated. I see myself as belonging in that class, and I do not know of anyone in my environment who would approve of, condone, or just turn a blind eye to sacrilege in temples, group sex in public places, or any such goings-on that Herr Rahr himself would call Unfug, I am sure. Our view is that anyone who incites hatred in society is a danger to it and should thus be isolated, in full compliance with existing law, and no amount of talk about aesthetic self-expression or freedom of speech will alter these basic facts. 

 

2. Point two concerns those "Western eyes," the West's attitude toward the whole ruckus. My impression is that Western hysteria over it is only explainable in the context of the Cold War, take two, currently waged against Russia. Certain Western politicians and media grab at any weapon, however sleazy, with which to poke at Putin and Russia. I just cannot believe that any congregation, especially of the more fundamentalist variety, say, somewhere in Midwest would put up with anything like the punk outrage in the Christ the Savior cathedral. 

 

Alexander Rahr points out that "in the Protestant churches of Europe, rock concerts and dances are allowed..." Hooray for them. As a former denizen of Russia, however, Rahr should recall the Russian proverb ­ v chuzhoy monastyr' so svoim ustavom ne suysya "do not barge into other people's monastery with your own statutes." What's acceptable in a Protestant church in the West is simply not done in an Orthodox Church in Russia. Period. Like we say here, "the people will not understand it."

 

And anyway, the argument about concerts in Protestant churches is simply irrelevant. We are not talking about an organized concert in a church or anywhere else. What we have here is a bunch of sluts, whose principal claim to fame was indulging in group copulation in public, sneaking into a House of God dressed in clownish costumes and balaclavas, jerking their arms and legs in a lousy parody of the cancan, raucously yelling some obscene lines aimed at the country's president, then scampering away before they could be caught, or trying to. 

 

How a Western congregation would react to this could only be established experimentally, only I do not believe anything of the sort would be allowed to happen in civilized society, not even in a Protestant church.  Hooligans are hooligans the world over, and they are treated everywhere roughly along the same lines.

 

Actually, Mike Whitney played out a kind of Gedankenexperiment ­ what would have happened if the female punks had tried their stunt "in St. Patrick's Cathedral or a major Jewish synagogue in downtown Manhattan." He is sure "they would have been tasered, pepper-sprayed, bludgeoned and dragged off in chains by a small army of New York's finest... They'd probably all still be in the hospital today. You don't mess with NYPD!"  

 

Well, apparently Moscow police fell down on the job, as they behaved with unwonted meekness on this occasion. Their one excuse is that nobody could have expected anything so brazen and outrageous to occur in this holy of holies of Russia.  Nothing of the sort is sure to happen there in the future, especially in light of the Duma deliberating harsher punishment for injuring religious feelings, etc. ­ with the hearty approval of the populace. 

 

3. Point three concerns Rahr's prediction that "educated Westerners" to whom Russia's "special world view" is alien will soon "constitute the majority of Russians." In fact, he predicts the demise of a distinct Russian civilization as a blend of European and Oriental civilizational features. Well, he is not the first one to do so, nor will he be the last, and all such clairvoyants can safely mouth their inanities, for their own demise will occur long before the one they predict.

 

The first thing that comes to one's mind as one hears these prophesies is Russia's thousand-year-long history. Over a whole millennium Russia has known political, economic, social, cultural and every other imaginable kind of influence from a diversity of quarters ­ Norse, Byzantine, Mongol, Catholic of the Polish variety, European in Petrine and post-Petrine times, this last perhaps the strongest influence, even to the point of Russia's imperial family and most of the bureaucracy being actually of German extraction. This was followed by a period, still fresh in many memories, when an ideology and social order that were European (to wit, Marxist) in origin were enforced with Oriental ruthlessness, yet eternal Russia has thrown off this latest imposition, it has emerged from it little changed at its core and is intent on preserving its uniqueness.

 

To assume that such a society will change its basic nature practically overnight, from one generation to the next, thanks to a bit of Western education for the country's new bourgeoisie is simply inexcusable in a thinker of any standing. This prophesy about the inexorable onslaught of the punk-condoning Western world view destined to engulf all of Russian society in a few years is nothing but a fanciful projection of the manners and mores prevailing in the writer's own milieu onto a totally unsuitable societal structure. 

 

Rahr's assumption is (and he actually says so) that Russia's "special world view" and the Western view of the world are sort of antipodes alien to each other. Well, this is patently not true or only half or less than half true. 

 

In my own contribution to the panel discussion I dwelled extensively on the situation dubbed conflict of civilizations, which I took to be the disparity between the Western world with its post-modernist values and ways and the more traditionalist societies, including Muslim, Christian, Buddhist or plain ethical Atheist or Agnostic. Given more space, I would have surely tried to balance the picture by pointing out that by no means does the whole of the Western world hold those post-modernist views (another panelist filled in that gap by stating that some 40 percent of America's population are best described as fundamentalist).

 

Then again, the assertion that Russian and European cultures are antipodal or completely alien to each other can only be made if one ignores certain obvious facts of their interpenetration. Russian classical literature clearly forms part and parcel of European culture, the two mutually influencing and enriching each other over centuries. 

 

More pertinently to the present issue, I would say that a young person steeped in Russian culture and  literature will not be likely to fall prey to punk "culture" destructive of all that is civilized in man ­ and I will reiterate the obvious, that punk "culture" and European culture are no synonyms nor ever likely to be such.

 

Apart from these general considerations, there are the easily observable facts of social life in Russia that show this drastic change and loss of Russia's civilizational identity from one generation to another to be sheer fantasy. In Russia that same new, Western-educated bourgeoisie cited by Rahr hedges its bets, so to speak, regarding afterlife by massively endowing churches, monasteries, and all kinds of restoration works of religious nature. In Tatarstan there have been complaints about every Tatar who comes into serious money being bent on building a mosque, so that there are not enough mullahs to serve there or enough faithful to attend. Much the same goes on in the Buryat and Kalmyk societies of the Buddhist persuasion.

 

Then there are also atheists like myself, of course (though I prefer to describe myself positively as a Humanist rather than negatively as an A-theist). From what I observe in my relations, friends, acquaintances or readers of my published stuff [1] (and these include masses of what is, or is going to be, Rahr's next generation), the contingency of these people going punk is not only remote but actually out of the question. This despite the fact that they are mostly steeped in European/Russian culture, are practically entirely English-speaking, and probably live more online than off, Western-style. 

 

It does not take a giant mental effort to see why punk is anathema to them. All human beings are carriers of what I like to call the common decency instinct. It is embedded in all religions and is perhaps most aptly encapsulated in the Golden Rule of ethics, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you ­ or else" (this last is my addition). Under this rule, one does not insult other people. If one does, the "or else" stipulation comes into force, and the trio that has been called on Russian TV "the three shalavy" (something like "crazy c*nts," which is merely a version of the female punks' self-appellation) are now on the receiving end of that legal addendum to the ethical rule.

 

Let me conclude with a fairly obvious generality. Man is part beast, part ­ very precariously ­ human, and the beastly part sometimes surfaces in man even to the point when it becomes a social, or rather a-social, phenomenon like punk. There is nothing new about it ­ just recall the antics of kynics in Ancient Greece and elsewhere, or read Suetonius' De Vita Caesarum. 

 

Proponents of this ethic of absolute permissiveness ("it is forbidden to forbid," "repress nothing") should bear in mind, though, that their high jinks may ­ and actually did in the past ­ lead by easy stages to a pretty dire reaction. In Russia, cases have been recorded of individuals born and baptized Orthodox Christians embracing Islam of the most virulent variety. 

 

It is important to take measures to avert that highly undesirable outcome. In Russia, sufficient numbers of sober-minded individuals see the danger and act accordingly, despite well-paid howls within and outside the country about infraction of human rights. Russian society at large believes that the whole issue of human rights is irrelevant in cases of baboon behavior. Baboons should be treated like baboons ­ humanely yet firmly.