Sorry I forgot to check if that link worked before I posted this, but it’s fixed now. The article is titled “Which of them is the Stilyaga?” and the author gives four examples. The first is the stereotypical stilyaga, dressed flamboyantly, the second is a man who comes to work tipsy, the third believes he is better than his peers without actually being better than them, and the third is willing to abandon his pregnant girlfriend so he wouldn’t have to be a father. The author goes into a lot more detail than that, but that’s the basic idea anyway.
Author: smaloney
Comment on Styling with Stilyaga by smaloney
Woah now, no one said zoot suits are bad suits just look at Jim Carrey in The Mask, it’s a classic look.
Comment on Styling with Stilyaga by smaloney
Honestly it’s pretty similar to how early rockers and punk rockers were treated in America, they weren’t a threat to anybody but they were visually different and easily distinguished in a crowd. They were accused of being poor workers, irresponisble, pretty much anything that wasn’t positive for a Communist. Jazz was also considered to be the music of the bourgeoisie and if that wasn’t bad enough it was American culture that the stilyaga were trying to emulate during the Cold War. It could have been anyone of these reasons or all of them combined, just the term stilyaga became a blanket term for a social deviant.
Comment on A Dog Called Laika by smaloney
I wonder how they tried to justify the death of Laika, did they try to claim it was an accident or just a necessary casualty in the space race? Either way it’s pretty messed up that they sent up Laika with practically no chance for making it back to Earth alive.
Comment on Freedom from the Gulags by smaloney
I’m actually surprised that a book detailing the Gulags came out so quickly, especially from a firsthand account, let alone that it was published in the Soviet Union. Do you think this was allowed as a way to further enforce de-Stalinization, showing that this sort of punishment wouldn’t happen under Khrushchev’s rule?
Comment on The New Boss by smaloney
That’s really interesting that Beria being accused of focusing on his career and work was considered anti-Communist. With the whole point of Communism being that everyone works together for the betterment of society as a whole, it seems like a pretty flimsy excuse for calling him an anti-Communist.
Comment on They Did Nazi That Coming… by smaloney
Awesome post, the title was definitely the main reason I checked it out but it was a great read through and through. Very informative and a compelling read, thanks for making this.
Comment on Factory Evacuees by smaloney
Interesting stuff, when I usually think of war I think of the soldiers fighting in it, not the civilians who are affected by it. And I wonder if these industrial evacuees were sent to other existing factories or if they had to make new factories further east to accomodate all the workers and meet the demands made by the war effort.
Comment on Modern System of Force Employment Explanation? by smaloney
The Wehrmacht definitely had incredible tactics for winning individual battles, what they lacked was a comprehensive strategy for winning the war as a whole. They defeated the French and British in France, then they turn their attention to the Soviet Union before dealing with the British in a peaceful or warlike manner. Then when they invade the Soviet Union they don’t set up a dual invasion with the Japanese, even though they had the Tripartite Pact. Just a whole slew of problems going on with the invasion of the Soviet Union.
Comment on Soviet Shock Workers and Stakhavonites by smaloney
Honestly I wasn’t even thinking about the Kulaks when I made this, when I was reading about the shock workers and especially the Stakhanovites it made me think of some American folk heroes. Mainly John Henry and Paul Bunyan who were workers who outperformed new machines. But these Stakhanovites were working with machines to produce more instead of competing with the machine itself.
