Said one underground artist, quoted in "To see Russia’s secret antiwar art: Meet at a bus stop. At dark. Phones off." (WaPo).
"We were afraid if we had an exhibition the police would come and arrest us, so we decided to be underground. It’s like turning the lock back to the Soviet years."
I'd like to understand more about "this Russian complex of being a small person." Is it mainly the opposite of individualism?
This isn't something that is easy to google. Wikipedia has an article "Little Russian identity," which is something else. And I found many articles about the physical smallness of Vladimir Putin, such as "Vladimir Putin and the rise of the 'short kings'/Critics suggest Russian leader has 'Napoleon complex' but numerous world leaders match his stature" (The Week) and, from 2018, "Putin, a Little Man Still Trying to Prove His Bigness" (The New Yorker)("'He walks like someone who thinks, How do I walk like a cool guy?' a seasoned Russia expert told me...).
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55 comments:
You're a tiny person compared to Human Resources. You can say screw them but you will get fired.
It does affect your self-image whether you defy them on that point or not.
"Phones off."
Secret squirrel tip, just don't bring the phone period. At a minimum if you must bring a phone, put it in a farraday cage far far from your ultimate destination. Just because your phone is off does not mean it can't be tracked. The provider will update last known location data using a timing signal sync when it is powered back on, which can still be used with decent accuracy to geofence an area of probable locations you were in.
Don't. Bring. It. Leave it someplace, on, where you could logically be expected to be spending time.
I don't think it follows from body size or being Russian. I think it follows from the needs common across arctic cultures -- one must be prepared and 'in order' to survive through a single winter. This applies everywhere with harsh and long winters: Japan, China, Russia, Scandinavia, the northern US Midwest, and Canada.
Northerners must stay indoors, have appropriate clothes, and lay down food and heating fuel to survive. As such, they tend to conform, team up, and press for mandatory/universal social policies. Individualism works through a long winter only if you do everything by yourself. It's possible, but much harder than in warmer regions.
See very old political science discussions of the differences between polar, temperate, and tropical economies and social systems.
Wow. Are you being deliberately obtuse here?
I didn't read the article (because it's WaPo), But it seems quite clear from the quote that the "small person" has nothing to do with Putin's physical stature. It has everything to do with being subject to a government with the power to crush you.
"You’re a tiny person opposed to a huge country and it treats you as a tool to serve its purpose. You’re supposed to follow the rules and keep quiet and if you’re different, they’ll crush you."
Secret antiwar art: Meet at a bus stop. At dark. Phones off.
Enough about America under the Biden administration!
so, where do you go; to see the Ukraine's secret anti war art?
"Wow. Are you being deliberately obtuse here? I didn't read the article (because it's WaPo), But it seems quite clear from the quote that the "small person" has nothing to do with Putin's physical stature. It has everything to do with being subject to a government with the power to crush you."
Are *you* obtuse?! Obviously, that last paragraph is about something being hard to google, which is proved by showing the way the search brings up irrelevant things.
Come on. Try harder.
I can understand the basic idea, but I want depth on the Russianness of this idea. I'd like to compare it to some things that are going on in the U.S. right now, but it was too hard to whip up quickly as a kicker in this post.
Ugh. Hey, I have an idea for a comment. Let's assume the blogger is an idiot.
Seriously, *you* try to find an article about how Russians feel as though they need to be a "small person." Is it just the common idea that if you stick out, you'll be targeted or is there something distinctively Russian going on?
There are aspects of the Russian character, some fascinating, some depressing, and it's always desirable to tie them all together. A cultural unified field theory or theory of everything.
Russians like to maintain a "near abroad" because they are afraid of invasion (with good reason). Russians like strong leaders, even at the cost of tyranny (again, perhaps the history of invasion explains it). The world is big and dangerous and threatening, which would naturally make them feel small and vulnerable.
Can this history of invasion also explain their nihilism, their tendency to self-destruction? There are plenty of examples in Dostoevsky of people willing to destroy themselves or be destroyed over fine points of honor and we all know about their crazy dissolute lifestyles.
I am no expert, but I believe I would start with the Russian phrase for "small person" (Маленький человек) and see what Googling that turns up.
There happens to be a whole Wikipedia article about that 2-word phrase, but it's in Russian, which I can't read. But running the page through Google Translate yields enough to make me think we are close to what you were looking for.
"Little man" is a type of literary hero that appeared in Russian literature with the advent of realism, that is, in the 20-30s of the XIX century.
....
A small person is a person of low social status and origin, not gifted with outstanding abilities, not distinguished by strength of character. Both Pushkin and Gogol, creating the image of a little man, wanted to remind readers who are accustomed to admiring romantic heroes that the most ordinary person is also a person worthy of sympathy, attention, support.
....
In modern Russian literature, the theme of the little man is continued, for example, in the stories of Tatyana Tolstaya "Peters" and Marina Stepnova "Antoinette".
I associate the idea with Asian culture. If it is Russian too, I'm guessing it is linked specifically to the experience with communism and is not deeply rooted in Russian history. I don't see that idea in older Russian literature.
Ann Althouse said...
I can understand the basic idea, but I want depth on the Russianness of this idea. I'd like to compare it to some things that are going on in the U.S. right now, but it was too hard to whip up quickly as a kicker in this post.
This is going on all over the world right now. This is the natural state of human society. Human social contracts throughout history reflect 2 basic biological drives:
1. Most people want to have a few offspring, keep them safe, and take the safe path towards survival.
2. Another set of people are drawn to positions of power in the social hierarchy. They tend to be goal oriented, male, and not particularly moral.
Countries all over the world have a Putin in charge. But like prides of lions sometimes a group of males gets together to take over a pride and share the power.
You also need to address the ways that females seek power in these social contracts.
They do it through high status males.
Women in the US who want power have to service a powerful democrat male. If you try to get power any other way the Regime will destroy you. The examples are obvious.
Hillary Clinton, Kamala Harris. Mediocre women at best who serviced men to get ahead. This happens at every level of the party. Look how interns and staffers are routinely treated.
Then look at how women who rise on their own merits are treated. Condoleeza Rice. Sarah Palin. Kari Lake.
Ann herself was able to vote for an obviously corrupt sociopath like Hillary Clinton, but looks at women like Sarah Palin and people like her with contempt.
This is all biologically driven.
Isnt zelensky short
"this Russian complex of being a small person."
Isn't that just flying under the radar? A Russian might go with "the nail that sticks out gets the hammer." That's a common sentiment just about anywhere.
Coincidentally, a year ago, I got banned for life from a sub-Reddit for the same thing. I politely opined that the enthusiasm about supporting Ukraine was being used by the Biden administration as a distraction from other news.
"We were afraid if we had an exhibition the police would come and arrest us, so we decided to be underground. It’s like turning the lock back to the Soviet years,”
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn might be sympathetic to their complaints, but he wouldn't see the parallels.
""This process of fear, this Russian complex of being a small person, is a state of mind. We grew up with it and we’re always afraid. You’re a tiny person...""
These things are all driven by pressures place on the individual.
It is clear that the Regime and it's supporters have been emulating Russia and China for a long time.
That is because this is the normal state of human society throughout history. Social contracts have always had a basic tribal tendency that is rooted in the deepest fear humans have: being cast out of the tribe. For millions of years being cast out of the tribe meant death.
And particularly amoral and goal oriented individuals will use this fear to cow larger groups of people that just want to survive and have a few offspring. This is the most powerful fundamental driver of human social contracts in history.
Casting out or persecuting a dissenter has a powerful effect on the vast majority of people who naturally cower and seek safety.
The J6 protesters are being persecuted to shut up enemies of the Regime just like dissenters in Russia. In China dissenters are organ donors. This is the normal state of human society.
The United States is the outlier and it takes courage not generally present in the populace to maintain that status.
Were venturing into an area that russia ukraine and sweden have contested for about 400 years
"This process of fear, this Russian complex of being a small person, is a state of mind. We grew up with it and we’re always afraid. You’re a tiny person..."
It's embarrassing when Russians haven't read Tolstoy or Dostoyevsky.
What you're diagnosing isn't a Russian problem at all, but a "victim of socialism" problem.
Imported from a German, I believe.
If you want to go all Russian patriot you might expunge the foreign ideas from your land and read your own writers.
I wonder if this "small person" of Russia is the opposite of the metaphorical "tall poppy". (As in: be a small person, not the tall poppy that will get cut down.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tall_poppy_syndrome
Also sounds similar to the Scandanavian social norms satirized as the "Law of Jante" (which I remember reading about at this blog about 3 years ago IIRC): " You are not to think you're anyone special, or that you're better than us."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_Jante
I'd further connect it to the chilling effect of cancel culture as illustrated in this article that I just read yesterday (linked from the Volokh Conspiracy as E. Volokh is the co-founder/co-editor or something of this journal):
http://journaloffreespeechlaw.org/kelly.pdf
Well, time to see if I can find my old copy of Hedrick Smith's "The Russians" and see if he addressed this. I'm betting yes. (Sigh. And then maybe read his "The New Russians"? As a cold war era kid, like most of us here, I was once briefly happy to think that I could live the rest of my life without needing to try to understand the Russian psyche.)
left-wing or authoritarian government (e.g. democratic/dictatorial duality)
The reason that America was not founded as a democracy was that the founders acknowledged history and established a republic under a Constitution designed to mitigate authoritarian progress.
I don't think David Remnick or Adam Gopnik really ought to get into dick measuring and contests with anybody.
Isn't that what got Jeffrey Toobin fired?
Tolstoy was so spiritually confident he tried to help out the oppressed people of India.
A lawyer named Gandhi was impressed and he ditched his suit and found his mission.
"Small person" = "little guy."
Old Dem Party: "for the little guy."
New Dem Party: "little guy, all your right are belong to us."
Unlike most men on the internet, I am not 6-2 and over. I'm exactly median height 5-10. So I can mock both the shrimps and the Giraffs. The whole "Napolenic Complex" is just Bullshit. If small dicators are "compensating" what are median height and tall dictators doing?
As for antiwar activists in Russia having to "Hide in darkness', in Ukraine they are being thrown in jail, exiled, or press-ganged into the army. An anti-war activist in Germany was arrested.
In the USA, the censorship is more subtle. You can speak out, but you won't get access in the MSM> And if you stage an antiwar Rally it wont be covered.
The Libeal elite in the USA, does two things when you stage a large rally taking a position they doesn't like. Fist, it might send antifa storm troopers to attack your rally and turn it into a shit show. Second, they'll just ignore and not report it. Remember all those Prolife marches? They'd get 100,000 people in DC and zero news coverage in the MSM. But when the Covington Kids at a prolife rally were supposedly mean to an Indian activist, it got wall to wall coverage.
Yes, Pushkin's "The Bronze Horseman" and Gogol's "The Overcoat," little men undone by the powerful, the cruel, the predatory, and the weather. But doesn't almost every country have a "little man" tradition? There's probably more of it in Dickens than in Dostoevsky or Tolstoy. Chesterton and Orwell. O. Henry, Jack London, John Steinbeck. The theme of little men crushed by Big Cities, Big Business and Big Government Bureaucracy is a staple in modern literature and popular culture. Russians may have that feeling now, but the theme is certainly not unique to them.
There may be a feeling that Russia has been betrayed, denied its true role, and disgraced, a feeling similar to that which defeated and weakened powers often have. There are real reasons for that feeling, though it may lead to scapegoating and justify rash, unjust actions.
"Enough about America under the Biden administration!"
Enough about America.
(I corrected and improved your half-witticism.)
A class-disordered ideology. Notably diversity that denies individual dignity, individual conscience, intrinsic value, normalizes color blocs (e.g. "people of color"), color quotas, affirmative discrimination under a twilight faith, ethical religion, liberal ideology, brayed by mortal gods, goddesses, and experts to the people who receive bennies for babies (e.g. one-child) or "burdens" (e.g. selective-child).
The J6 protesters are being persecuted to shut up enemies of the Regime just like dissenters in Russia. In China dissenters are organ donors. This is the normal state of human society.
The United States is the outlier and it takes courage not generally present in the populace to maintain that status.
Yes. Under this corrupt regime, and by that I mean the Democrat Party, the individual is being squeezed into a smaller and smaller box. Everyone is becoming tribal. The family is being destroyed but small families are learning to cope with corruption. To help deal with the future, everyone should read Dalrymple's "The uses of corruption"
Think of all the counterfeit vaccination cards in circulation.
The Russians as a nation have always been paranoid, and with good reason. The Russians as a people were literally serfs a little more than 100 years ago.
The importance and value of the individual has still not taken hold in Russia.
(By the way, this is the 95th anniversary of the day the Bolshevik Party became the Communist Party)
"Small person" = "little guy."
Old Dem Party: "for the little guy."
New Dem Party: "little guy, all your right are belong to us."
Justice Blackmun and the Little People
in Ukraine they are being thrown in jail, exiled, or press-ganged into the army
Under an apartheid regime, no less. A model of the democratic/dictatorial duality.
But when the Covington Kids at a prolife rally were supposedly mean to an Indian activist, it got wall to wall coverage.
DIEversity and leverage. Bennies for babies, too. Let us bray.
If you have fantasies about a "strong man" in charge (Stalin/Putin etc), that might be part of Russian culture
Jackie Chan once said that Chinese people like strong authorities
American culture is disdainful of authority
the idea that Americans revere their government is laughable
it's always been laughable
Washington, Lincoln, Roosevelt, Reagan, Obama
pick your light-bringer and every one of them has a sizable number of antagonists in the USA
If Nikki Haley is our first female president
millions of Americans will hate her and women will be the loudest haters around
that's the way we roll
alpha male is a fantasy
and an atheist fantasy at that
if you believe in God, you believe in middle-management
A lot of commentary to the effect that "the Russians are paranoid because they got invaded."
As if that was a distinction in Europe! Of all places in the world.
Shallow analysis, if it can be called that.
"Enough about America under the Biden administration!"
Enough about America.
(I corrected and improved your half-witticism.)
aita?
Robert Cook said...
"Enough about America under the Biden administration!"
Enough about America.
(I corrected and improved your half-witticism.)
Cook comes in with his usual 90 IQ surface level bullshit.
You support authoritarianism. A social contract where a centralized authority distributes wealth and capital "equally" is an authoritarian construct. There is nothing fair about it.
This is the central difference between a free society where the power resides in the individual or in the governing body.
The United States was founded on a truly revolutionary concept of individual rights which is antithetic to Cook's desire for power. So Cook derides the US at every possible opportunity.
The only thing that makes Cook mad is his tribe is not the authoritarian power. Cook longs for the ability to make things fair and crush dissent just like all authoritarians.
"Are *you* obtuse?! Obviously, that last paragraph is about something being hard to google, which is proved by showing the way the search brings up irrelevant things.
Come on. Try harder."
I guess I am obtuse. I don't get why you think that the "Russianness" of the idea of being very small because of the crushing power of government is unique or important here, or why it would have anything to do with Putin's physical stature. Or why the difficulty of finding something like your own odd take on this on Google is anything but a confirmation that you are missing the point.
Or why anyone should care about your own particular odd take.
Your steadfast commitment to free speech is the most admirable thing about you, and your blog. I salute you for it.
This seems to trivialize the issue--at a time when the crushing of dissent is perhaps the primary concern not only in this country, but worldwide. It is certainly mine.
Ask Russians why they feel small against government, politicians, and life.
https://www.youtube.com/@1420channel/videos
https://www.youtube.com/@survey_headshot/videos
There are many such channels based in Russia and the affiliated states.
Remnick who wrote that hagiography of obama who papered over the whole sale theft under yeltsin
Here you go.
Russia never had an enlightenment they had a short reform under alexander 2nd
Gary Shteyngart's 2014 memoir, "Little Failure," gets its title from his Russian mother's nickname for him.
And then there's Hans Fallada's 1932 novel, "Little Man, What Now?," a product of the period when Nazism was ascending in Germany.
https://movieposters.ha.com/itm/movie-posters/drama/little-man-what-now-universal-1934-title-lobby-card-11-x-14-drama/a/161801-51238.s
There's zero evidence the Russians are "paranoid". And if they are, they have a right to be. Cf: Hitler, Napoleon, Ghenghis Kahn, etc.
And what is the USA's excuse? Other than Pearl Harbor and 911, we haven't been attacked by anyone. Yet, we have paranoid warmongers running around saying "Putin is the next Hilter" "If we don't stop him in Ukraine, he'll CONQUER THE WORLD!!". And if they're not jabbing about "The next Hilter", our american elite is talking about the Chicoms. Seems they're out to CONQUER THE WORLD too.
We have troops all over the Goddamn Globe. Why are we occupying Syria? Why did the JCS sabotage Trump when he wanted USA troops out of Africa? These paranoids were always claiming these troops/bases were VITAL for our NATIONAL SECURITY.
Seemingly every spot on Planet earth is VITAL for our security. That is Paranoid my friends.
Not long after the USSR broke up, I spent several months in what’s now Russia, just long enough to think that I’ve seen something of this “small person” attitude. A couple of examples: 1) One day, joking with my Russian language teacher I said, “You’re the greatest Russian teacher ever!” She dropped her eyes and in all seriousness replied, “Such accolades are not for me.” 2) More than once, while doing business with someone, they would let me stumble along in my execrable Russian until it became obvious that we couldn’t get done what we needed to do. Then the Russian person would switch to English, and we would get the job done. When I asked, “Why didn’t you tell me you spoke English so well?” they would reply, “Oh, no. My English is terrible.” I found it hard to compliment a Russian, ever.
A lot of this probably comes from the difference between a hyper-individualistic culture where we’re all special and a communal culture where each person is a mere cell within the body politic.
In the mid-90s I worked for a company in a formerly Communist country, not Russia but Slavic. My boss had been a high level official in the local party. A number of people in town told me that he was "big animal". Maybe that's the opposite of a small person.
"Russia never had an enlightenment."
Peter the Great certainly thought he was bringing light--and in some ways he was; some of his successors had more or less enlightened intentions from time to time, but fear of outsiders and revolution grew, especially after the Decembrist fiasco, and by 1840 Russia was the sprawling prisonhouse of nations we all know and love--more in need of an Enlightenment than any major country in Europe.
As usual.
Those artists in Russia oppose the war and they are afraid. They should be more like Ukrainian nationalists: in Kiev nobody opposes the war, so nobody has to be afraid of anything!
"I'd like to understand more about "this Russian complex of being a small person." Is it mainly the opposite of individualism? This isn't something that is easy to google."
It is very easy to Google, just search for 'little man Russian lit'.
'Small person', forsooth! what are they doing to the English language?
“I wanted to find out then and quickly whether I was a louse like everybody else or a man. Whether I can step over barriers or not, whether I dare stoop to pick up or not, whether I am a trembling wretch or whether I have the right...”
― Dostoyevsky, Crime and Punishment, Roskolnikov monologue
A lot of this probably comes from the difference between a hyper-individualistic culture where we’re all special and a communal culture where each person is a mere cell within the body politic.
More of it comes from a system that expects you to your abilities without compensation for either effort or ability.
And what is the USA's excuse? Other than Pearl Harbor and 911, we haven't been attacked by anyone.
Various Indian Wars
French and Indian War
War of 1812
Attack by Pancho Villa
World War II (the Philippines and Guam were American territory)
So Russia has been invaded once in the last century, by someone Stalin had foolishly allied himself with, twice in the last two centuries - wait, that's wrong, in the last 211 years - and both invasions failed, but they're still justified in their fear of invasion.
How many of Russia's dozens of neighbors, past and present - hard to count with all the border changes! - have NOT been invaded by Russia at least once in the same time period? At least one of them was invaded three times in a quarter-century: Poland in 1920, 1939, and 1944. You could say that in 1944 the Russians were fighting the Germans, not the Poles, so it doesn't count. If they had just passed through on their way to sacking Berlin, that would be so, but in fact they kept Poland and oppressed the Hell out of it, so it counts. Anyone who thinks Russia has any legitimate fear of invasion by anyone except maybe China is misguided and wrong - to put it politely.
Also, Russians who oppose the war are not just "afraid": a lot of them are serving jail terms for mentioning Russian atrocities on social media, silently leaving flowers at the statue of a Ukrainian poet, or holding up a piece of paper saying 'Peace' or even a blank piece of paper in a public square. The standard term for these 'crimes' seems to be nine years.
As for Ukrainians who oppose the war, here's a January Counterpunch interview in Kyiv with Ukrainian pacifist Yurii Sheliazhenko, whose organization has 10 members. The interviewer is from CodePink - always a sign of quality. (Note: I didn't say good quality.) He doesn't seem to fear arrest, just Russian bombs, and his main complaint is that "our calls are mostly ignored or treated with contempt". In another story, he gives an interview in broad daylight in front of the Ukrainian parliament. And yet some people here pretend that Ukrainians are not allowed to protest, and Russians are: the exact opposite of the truth.
I wonder if it is class-based - - so many were in the serf/peasant class and could never hope to leave it. And didn't Stalin, talking of the masses, say that the death of one man was a tragedy, but the death of millions was merely a statistic? Imagine being a Russian, dismissed as a statistic.
It is drizzly, gray and chilly outside, so why not settle by the heater and belabor an obvious point?
No, not the 'global warming' humbug (sorry, 'climate change'). I propose to ruminate for a while on degradation of the glorious English language.
Apparently, the confusion that led to creation of this blog-post was caused by WaPo reporter translating Russian artist reference to old Russian expression 'little man' as a 'small person', making it sound as if it refers to mere description of physical attributes. It is literally not possible for any person of culture in Russia to speak that way, because the 'complex of a little man' is a cornerstone of cultural vernacular over there. Also, the artists described in the article are obviously engaged in the real-life high dramatic performance, with secret rendezvous, conspiratorial shenanigans and so on. They would be bound to speak the language of high drama and suspense. The phrase they'd use would be "маленький человек" or 'small man' in English. Web search for 'little man Russia' produces an avalanche of pertinent cultural links, while 'small person Russia' produces confusing results dealing with basic physical traits. Even Ann got confused (or was she leading us on? not easy to tell with that 'person' sometimes).
In Russian 'человек' means Human being, without gender distinction. Russian Man or Woman equally can proudly state, "Я человек!" (I am Human being!). Also, Russian Man or Woman equally can despondently mutter, "Я маленький человек" (I am only a little Human being). Of course, English language has certain limitations in that regard, so English speakers developed this somewhat ambiguous 'understanding' that sometimes 'Man' means all Human beings, regardless of Gender and sometimes not, depending on the context. Anyway, that device took root and became integral part of English cultural tradition for a long time.
So how it came about that highly developed cultural reference in Russian tradition was made sound as mere physical and profane in English translation used in WaPo article? I submit it has to do with abysmal ignorance of modern English reporters, aggravated by their blind servitude to PC talk (yeah, hardly news). 'Little man' expression has a long history in English language, referring not just to Russian literature, but the image of worldwide import applied to all Human beings regardless of gender. You can find 'little man' concept in cultural heritage of all cultures that have developed literary traditions. Nowadays, however, it is reflexively regarded as disreputable by young English speakers and they try to avoid using it, substituting confusing constructions as 'small person', thus reducing glorious English cultural traditions to mere description of corporal attributes.
Anyway, how's the weather in your vicinity?
The Finnish hero Kullervo explains to his sister (neither know at the time) that his family is neither a great one nor an insignificant one. An instance of a wider Scandinavian/Northern propensity for the middle position?
Candide, thanks for the Russian language and culture lessons. The ignorance of the young of foreign languages and cultural contexts is no joke.
It makes me wonder how the title "Little Big Man" would be rendered? What would be the cultural stumbling blocks going in that direction?
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