A comment turns into a post

Sean has a post about the Virginia Tech tragedy as seen through the eyes of Russian commentators. I was going to just post a long comment, but decided to put it here instead. Sean first feels the need to defend against "what others might think of the notion of the Russians judging us." Heck, we feel comfortable judging them all the time, so why shouldn't they have the right to judge us? Doesn't mean we necessarily have to listen...

Anyway, here's the meat of Sean's post:

What is the Russian media saying about Virginia Tech? Boris Kaimakov of RIA Novosti wrote that most Russian media outlets are pointing to the “unlimited arms trade in the United States” while more socially savvy commentators are pointing to the “ tremendous psychological pressure in the U.S. - and in all developed countries.” Interestingly, Kaimakov surveys the opinions of Russian bloggers on the issue. The entries he quotes present an interesting picture of America. In regard to one unidentified blogger, Kaimakov writes:

An urge to break the law is present in almost every subconscious mind. Reaction equals action, so the urge is at its strongest and ugliest in America, with its unquestioned supremacy of the law. Though the South Korean student killer's message has not been completely decoded yet, his sensational "Blame them, not me" shows what he thought of the American public. "America might have proclaimed freedoms, but its rules of the game are overly strict, and one feels it even as a toddler," is one remark from a Russian blog. Many blogs say innermost human emotions clash with political correctness to cause inevitable rampages - a view born of young anarchism and social protest. "They've robbed us of the right to anger," a Russian blogger quotes an American friend of his.

To others the massacre pointed directly to one of the harsh contradictions of American life. As a blogger named dr_fedor writes:

There is an alarming contradiction in American life. On the one hand, socialization, in its many forms, is a permanent and very aggressive demand. Political correctness is one of such forms. We Russians come down on it, though it is the least of all evils - if an evil at all. On the other hand, there is cutthroat competition. It is encouraged in every group while the community does not feel responsible enough for its individual members. What we have as the result is, first, huge problems bred by giving up coercive socialization and, second, doubtful emotional reward voluntary socialization brings. Some people protest, which is natural - and there is never a shortage of weapons. Then, the extent of one's madness alone determines the outcome.

Most Russian experts echoed their international counterparts. The root of American violence is proliferation of guns combined with mental illness.

"In my opinion, these repeated cases of completely unprovoked shootings in the United States reflect some sort of a systematic collapse of American legislation, particularly involving the right to own guns," said Sergei Oznobishchev, the director of the Russian institute for strategic evaluation and analysis. Adding, “American civilization is so ubiquitous and overwhelming that it simply depresses ordinary people," he said. "When combined with the constitutional right to bear arms conceived by the Founding Fathers of the American Constitution, the results can be disastrous.”

Viktor Kremenyuk, a deputy director of the Institute of U.S. Canada Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences dismissed the notion that firearms were easily acquired in the US, but concurred with Oznobishchev psychological analysis. "Modern society has a lot of stresses and strains, and immature minds and souls often cannot bear up under them, and as a result breakdowns happen, followed by tragedy."

I have seen some even less charitable things on Russian blogs. And one incredulous comment asking (I'm paraphrasing) "what, they don't require a medical statement of sanity to buy a gun?" Which is quite a good question. Responding to it would first require explaining how in the U.S. this is a state-law issue, but that's tangential.

Sadly, it looks like no one in the U.S. is going to try to make something good come out of this tragedy by opening up a serious discussion about stronger gun control. One interesting angle to think about, though, is that one of the arguments against gun control, aside from the whole Constitutional issue, is the concept of not giving the government a monopoly on the use/instruments of force. Probably not so relevant nowadays, but it meant a lot to people back when we had just gotten out from under the Brits, and it's something to consider when thinking about the situation in Russia, where the government does seem have a monopoly on just about all instruments of both physical force and opinion-making.

Anyway, I agree with Sean that this is a particularly American sort of tragedy. What do I think of "Russians judging us" on these types of social tragedies? Not very much, to be honest. I am sure lots of people will use this as an excuse to point out how bad things in America are whenever Americans attempt (individually or on the level of official statements) to criticize anything in Russia. As a related example, I've already seen blog comments from people responding to criticism of the Moldovan public education system by talking about the sorry state of public education in the U.S., and of course this type of debate (A: "Russia is not a democracy" B: "The U.S. is not a democracy either" (then B uses arguments formulated and propounded by people taking advantage of free speech in America to bolster his point)) is common at English-language Russia blogs. Not the most constructive way to have a discussion, but it's something that I guess one comes to expect as an American. What bothers me much more is that Russian officials are already using this tragedy cynically to tell the U.S. to mind its own business with respect to human rights issues in Russia (see Gryzlov's remarks below). Classy.

But getting back to the point about not paying too much attention to Russian media commentators' take on what happens in the US - I saw an article from a Russian commentator (actually, writing for Novoe Russkoe Slovo here in the U.S.) recently talking about the Don Imus scandal that translated "nappy-headed" as something having to do with diapers - using, of course, the British translation for the word "nappy," missing completely the racial overtones of the word as used in the U.S., and shredding the article's credibility in one fell swoop. This particular article - headlined "American Ugliness" - was especially troubling because the guy was apparently writing it in the U.S. but couldn't be troubled to get the racial nuances of the story right. To me, it was a cautionary note to all who attempt to comment on the nuances of other cultures from afar (American pontificators on Russia included) - know what you're talking about, or keep your mouth shut.

Anyway, here's how the Washington Post reported Gryzlov's comments:

"This is a tragedy and we express our condolences," Boris Gryzlov, speaker of Russia's lower house of parliament, told journalists. Referring to a recent U.S. State Department report criticizing the Kremlin, he added, "The situation where a country dictates rules of behavior to other countries, but cannot keep its own people in order, does raise questions."