Man your historical revisionism is almost endless at hexbear.

I grew up in a navy/embassy family, so moved around every 3-5 years onto new postings. At an embassy posting in Stockholm, it was common for the attaché-community to pair newly arrived families with someone who had been there for a while. My mum thus got paired with a newly arrived Soviet wife-of-an-attaché to show her the ropes of diplomat life. This lady was on her first posting (it was quite common for Soviet embassy staff to have a LOT of newcomers for fear that they would get to used to western life style and seek asylum) and she was showing this lady where to do shopping in Stockholm. I was joining as I was too small to be left at home on my own.

So we walk into this supermarket and the Soviet lady sort of walks in, stops for a second, then walks through the one-way gates and stops again. And then she bursts into tears.

Diplomat life is hard on partners - so tears in the opening days aren’t that uncommon. My mum pulls her to the side and starts saying the usual (“I remember when we started”, “it’ll get better” bla bla) and the Soviet lady says basically “you don’t understand! I’ve never, ever seen so much choice and food and my life”.

She wasn’t crying because she had left home. She was crying because she was realising how fucked up home was - and remember this is someone who was sent out as a diplomat so reasonably well connected at home.

The West had a reason for its exceptionalism back then. Compared to many places it still does. In others, of course, we need to wake the fuck up - China is a great example, where there is definitely no cause for a feeling of exceptionalism. Russia, oh boy, yes we can still feel exceptional.

Go on then, dismiss me with your hexbear memes and be gone.

Link to this comment, made by a chauvinstic lemmy.one dork: https://lemm.ee/comment/4290117