How Far are Some Myth from Reality

I was writing couple of articles about Cold War era propaganda as well as how middle eastern stereotypes from reality.

However, these are not the only examples of such phenomena. In fact, they are not so many exceptions so much as the rule. Most of the world has only distorted idea of what life is some place far away. I will make several examples.

The further one is from the actual thing, the more distorted the idea becomes. To the point of not resembling the actual thing at all.

First is Gorbachev. Americans condensed the whole idea into a simple narrative. USSR was totalitarian and un-free. Then came savior Gorbachev who decided to bring freedom. He started all sorts of famous glasnost and perestroika things. Words a lot better known in the US than in Russia. However, some evil hardliners did not like that, so they decided to stage a coup and overthrow Gorbi to return things back to how it was before him. However, hardliners lost, and freedom won. Hollywood style happy end.

If you take this narrative as basis of reality, then any criticism of Gorbi will sound like support for totalitarianism. That is far from truth.

That sounds more like Hollywood movie plot. In fact, it even has plot holes in that. For example, who stopped the coup. Some people made actual documentaries that span many hours trying to explain gaps in the narrative. However, they will not be able to explain anything so long as they stick to this overreaching narrative.

It one would oversimplify collapse of USSR in Russia; they would go with something from Looney Tunes: a character enters a house, closes the door and the entire structure just falls on their head. While some do blame Gorbi for destroying the house, others do point out that house was flimsy to begin with. 

Here Gorbi is not a visionary innovator, but a helpless victim of circumstances. Many however do blame him for not figuring out how to fix the economy and everything really during his 6 years in power.

That, however, shows just how far what people think about Russia is from reality. I actually do wonder what people think about other aspects of Russia. I only been inside of it, so I only know how it is for real, not what an average European or American think about the country.

I know the stereotypes of bears in Russia. I personally never seen a bear.

Then there is one about how beautiful Russian woman are. That one is often repeated in Russia as well. They do start using make up, earrings, high heels, follow fashion and such things from 14 years old something, but other than that... 

Also, there are more women than men in the country, in my graduation year we had literary twice as many girls as there were guys. So, half of the girls will remain single even if every single guy will get a gf. Of course, some guys will emigrate out of Russia, others will become gay or alcoholics, so the actual number of potential suitors are even lower. I guess girls want a head start to avoid losing out on relationship prospects.

There is patriotism and support for military and toughness stereotype. Also, there is a stereotype that Russians do not like the West and Western way of life. In reality, 2 out of 3 want to emigrate to the West. Some Russian brands, aimed at domestic market, deliberately pretend to be German, Italian or British (Tervolina, Ralph Ringer and Camelots). Also, people sometimes deliberately break their arms to avoid being drafted into military. No more than 10% of draftable people end up in military, the rest escape it one way or another, typically by getting a medical disability.