#re-Sovietization

[ink-the-artist]

Bon Voyage

[universal-casey]

I couldn’t help myself. The idea hit like a truck. Russian Empire is lemon

[zimwy]

its afternoon walk time but like this for a starter from the winter soldier specifically when i come back. :-)

[s-dei]

Nemmy x Dr. Livesey meme 💫=💀

[lord-bajromi]

Ne çdo stine (Viktor Gjika, 1980)

[ponyatowski]

so ive been to london for the (kindof) very first time as a conscious human being and man it is like. i can’t articulate all the feelings ive been having but its making me REALLY emo because Wow heres a city that seemingly works!

[jude-harley]

unbelievable they're actually talking about class society

[dear-sophie]

Promises: August

[doodle1234noddle]

idk continue this

this is AI generated BTW

—

The night had grown heavy and silent — just the way Soviet liked it. He sat hunched at his old oak desk, spectacles perched low on his nose, ink-stained fingers drumming absentmindedly beside a half-finished letter. The lamplight hissed softly in the corner, the only sound in a room that smelled faintly of old paper and burnt tea.

He hadn’t heard the footsteps. That bothered him, later. How many decades had he trained himself to catch the smallest stir? And yet — perhaps age, perhaps fatigue — tonight, his senses failed him.

It was the faintest pressure at first. A shift in the air behind him — the brush of warmth, a shadow taller than him where none should be. By the time he stilled his pen, it was already too late.

A soft, thick breath ghosted against the back of his neck. Then another. Then the unmistakable weight of a broad chest pressing up to his back, an arm looping firmly around his middle.

“…Papa…” The word was half-breathed, half-mumbled, a drunk’s lazy attempt at affection — and a predator’s purr all at once.

Soviet froze. Ink bled from his nib, soaking the paper uselessly. He didn’t move, didn’t speak, hoping — absurdly — that if he stayed still, Russian Empire might just… drift back out like a passing draft.

No such luck.

Russian Empire leaned in further. He smelled of cheap vodka and sweat, and underneath that, something earthy and warm — the smell of a well-fed hound too large to push away. His nose nudged just behind Soviet’s ear, sniffing slowly, greedily, as if to memorize every inch of him.

“…Smells nice… Always nice…” His words tangled together, drooling out as his free hand slid up Soviet’s chest, finding the buttons of his uniform coat and fumbling clumsily at them.

Soviet’s jaw tensed. “Stop that,” he said, his voice as flat as a knife’s edge. He grabbed at the wandering hand — tried to pry it loose — but Russian Empire only laughed under his breath, breathy and drunk and disturbingly content.

“Too soft… Papa’s gotten soft… so easy to hold…” He pressed closer. Soviet could feel him, every inch — the heat, the firm weight, the unmistakable rut of hips aligning flush against the small of his back.

A tiny sound escaped Soviet’s throat — part growl, part disbelief. He shoved backward with his elbow, but it was like trying to push a tree trunk. Russian Empire barely rocked back; instead, he purred low in his chest, as if the struggle excited him further.

“Don’t fight… you’re warm… want it… want you…” The words vibrated through Soviet’s spine, wet lips pressing to his neck now, sloppy kisses that burned with humiliation more than heat.

He felt it, then — the slow, unmistakable grind of Russian Empire’s hips rolling forward. The desk edge dug into Soviet’s thighs as he stiffened under the drunken assault.

“Enough!” he barked, trying to twist free — but Russian Empire only groaned happily and squeezed tighter, grinding again, slow and hungry, breathing faster now.

“You’re mine… always mine… Papa… Papa…”

The word, repeated so sweetly, so filthily, made bile rise in Soviet’s throat. His fingers scrabbled at the desk for anything — a pen, a paperweight — anything to use. He found nothing.

Another rut of hips, harder this time. Soviet bit back a grunt, sweat prickling at his hairline. His own breath betrayed him — fast, ragged — not from desire but from the sheer indignity of being pinned so easily by his own son.

Summoning every shred of resolve, Soviet braced his foot against the desk leg, coiled tight, then shoved backward with all the strength his aging body had left. It startled Russian Empire just enough: the bigger man wavered, drunk balance tipping. Soviet elbowed him sharply in the gut.

A muffled yelp — a clumsy hand grabbed at empty air — and Soviet tore himself free, nearly toppling a chair in his escape.

Behind him, Russian Empire staggered a step, swaying on unsteady legs, blinking slow and dreamy, lips parted in a drunken grin.

“Papa… come back… not finished…”

But Soviet didn’t wait to hear the rest. He slammed out the door so hard the lamp flickered, bolted it behind him, and leaned against the hallway wall — panting, heart rattling like a war drum, face twisted in fury and embarrassment both.

—

continue this however you please.

NSFW or not, make sure to tag me in your post.

this is just for fun,

[queerofthecastle]

As someone who grew up in the US and has had... the education provided to someone who grew up in the US, I find new things to learn about and question every day. While I've never used the sickle & hammer iconography, I've also never actively questioned its use before. I appreciate posts like this a lot because they help me learn to be better

That said, if anyone has reading recommendations on the Soviet Union, I'd love them

It needs to be more taboo for people to use traditional marxist symbolism, especially the kinds of symbols associated with the USSR.

The kinds of human rights abuses that mainstream Marxism engaged in are horrific, and not worthy of glorification.

The outright denial of Marxist atrocities common on the far left is shocking and astounding.

[humsbugs]

your fics with RE and Soviet lowkey eat away at my brain

hehe they're flesh eating amoebas :3

[schlock-luster-video]

On October 14, 2007, Battleship Potemkin was re-released in London, England.

[funamblrist]

the collapse of the ussr was principally caused by its many contradictions, and the failure of the soviet state to reproduce itself: the contradiction between the level of productive forces and the level of socialisation; the contradiction between a 'whole' society supposedly without class contradictions, and the class societies of the remaining world. so long as the latter existed, the ussr couldn't escape ALL class contradictions, despite stalin and his successors recognising that the 'traditional' role of the dotp had been fulfilled. economically, the ussr failed to a) move from extensive production to intensive production; and b) achieve the abundance of resources required to prevent the re-emergence of classes. material scarcity and the division of labour allowed for individual interests to develop among certain strata -- people who saw the potential to 'move up' if the system changed -- in absence of class interests. all these things and more weren't enough to destroy the ussr on their own but, enabled by political actors like yakovlev, were instrumental in its socio-economic breakdown.

i don't think broad gestures towards 'revisionism' are particularly useful in understanding the soviet failure, especially when there are better works out there now (e.g. zubok's collapse) for us to study.

if you believe that correct theory leads to good outcomes and incorrect theory to bad outcomes

why didnt the USSR prevail? what were they missing?

to a certain degree the USSR was a victim of circumstance - being the first socialist state it was both navigating uncharted waters, as well as holding the attention of the entire bourgeois world - but it did also have a number of theoretical failings which exacerbated and induced issues. we say of stalin's administration that he was 70% correct and 30% incorrect, not that everything done was right! one of the greatest failings of the USSR was its handling of the national question, and its resulting commandism; an issue of the same type as the one that killed Che in Bolivia. obviously the domestic issue of revisionism overtaking the party was the ultimate cause of the downfall of the soviet union, but the cause of said revisionism was the objective situation that the USSR was in - the desperate attempts to undermine the non-aligned movement, the wrong notion of 'peaceful coexistence' the ussr promulgated, etc were all reactions to the fact that the USSR had, like it or not, locked itself into an irreversible nuclear standoff with the USA that it knew it could not actually follow through on. if you want to know what the ussr was missing, look to the state carrying on the torch. the PRC diverged significantly on the questions that destroyed the USSR, and it survived as a result. the USSR tried to divide the world between itself and the US, the PRC instead integrates itself into the entire world; the USSR tried to export revolution and build a dependent bloc, the PRC refuses to interfere in the self-development of other nations; the USSR established the principle of mutually assured destruction, and the PRC stated 'we are against it, but we are not afraid of it.'

[lifewithaview]

Lev Lobov in Battle Beyond the Sun (1959)

Original title: Nebo zovyot

Battle Beyond the Sun is the English-dubbed and re-edited U.S. version of Nebo Zovyot, a 1959 Soviet science fiction film directed by Mikhail Karyukov and Aleksandr Kozyr. It tells of the "space race" of two future nations competing to become the first to land a spacecraft on the planet Mars.

*Released (by Roger Corman) in the USA as "Battle Beyond the Sun". This version was recut and also added new footage directed by a young Francis Ford Coppola (He was 20 years old). In this version, of course, all Soviet propaganda has been dropped.

[deep-space-netwerk]

So Venus is my favorite planet in the solar system - everything about it is just so weird.

It has this extraordinarily dense atmosphere that by all accounts shouldn't exist - Venus is close enough to the sun (and therefore hot enough) that the atmosphere should have literally evaporated away, just like Mercury's. We think Earth manages to keep its atmosphere by virtue of our magnetic field, but Venus doesn't even have that going for it. While Venus is probably volcanically active, it definitely doesn't have an internal magnetic dynamo, so whatever form of volcanism it has going on is very different from ours. And, it spins backwards! For some reason!!

But, for as many mysteries as Venus has, the United States really hasn't spent much time investigating it. The Soviet Union, on the other hand, sent no less than 16 probes to Venus between 1961 and 1984 as part of the Venera program - most of them looked like this!

The Soviet Union had a very different approach to space than the United States. NASA missions are typically extremely risk averse, and the spacecraft we launch are generally very expensive one-offs that have only one chance to succeed or fail.

It's lead to some really amazing science, but to put it into perspective, the Mars Opportunity rover only had to survive on Mars for 90 days for the mission to be declared a complete success. That thing lasted 15 years. I love the Opportunity rover as much as any self-respecting NASA engineer, but how much extra time and money did we spend that we didn't technically "need" to for it to last 60x longer than required?

Anyway, all to say, the Soviet Union took a more incremental approach, where failures were far less devastating. The Venera 9 through 14 probes were designed to land on the surface of Venus, and survive long enough to take a picture with two cameras - not an easy task, but a fairly straightforward goal compared to NASA standards. They had…mixed results.

Venera 9 managed to take a picture with one camera, but the other one's lens cap didn't deploy.

Venera 10 also managed to take a picture with one camera, but again the other lens cap didn't deploy.

Venera 11 took no pictures - neither lens cap deployed this time.

Venera 12 also took no pictures - because again, neither lens cap deployed.

Lotta problems with lens caps.

For Venera 13 and 14, in addition to the cameras they sent a device to sample the Venusian "soil". Upon landing, the arm was supposed to swing down and analyze the surface it touched - it was a simple mechanism that couldn't be re-deployed or adjusted after the first go.

This time, both lens caps FINALLY ejected perfectly, and we were treated to these marvelous, eerie pictures of the Venus landscape:

However, when the Venera 14 soil sampler arm deployed, instead of sampling the Venus surface, it managed to swing down and land perfectly on….an ejected lens cap.

[doyoulikethissong-poll]

Jeff Pescetto - DuckTales 1987

DuckTales is an American animated television series produced by Walt Disney Television Animation, and ran for a total of 100 episodes over four seasons. Based upon Uncle Scrooge and other Duck universe comic books created by Carl Barks, the show follows Scrooge McDuck, his three grandnephews Huey, Dewey, and Louie, and close friends of the group, on various adventures, most of which either involve seeking out treasure or thwarting the efforts of villains seeking to steal Scrooge's fortune or his Number One Dime. DuckTales aired in more than 100 countries in 25 different languages. It was the first American cartoon broadcast in the former Soviet Union after the Cold War. In Hungary, those born in the early-to-mid 80s are known as "the DuckTales generation".

The DuckTales Theme was written and composed by Mark Mueller, an ASCAP award-winning pop music songwriter, and sung by Jeff Pescetto. For DuckTales the Movie: Treasure of the Lost Lamp, a longer instrumental version of the song was created. For the 2017 revival, Mueller re-arranged the music and lyrics slightly, and the song was re-recorded by Felicia Barton. Disney was looking for a theme song for their new animated series, and wanted a sense of adventure and excitement, a tune that would complement the technicolor energy of the show itself. Most importantly, Disney's music executives explained, they were after a poppy, radio song - not a "cartoon song". Mueller's agent recommended that he shouldn't get his hopes up, but luckily, he had just scored his first hit; Heart's "Nothin’ at All". It was on the strength, and airplay, of that track, that he was able to obtain a meeting with Disney. Mueller was paid "a whopping $1,250" for the song, he says. "And that was only if Disney used the song on the show and it actually aired. Which, fortunately, it did."

Mueller is regularly astonished by the pervasiveness of his own creation. "When people find out what I do for a living, they’ll always ask if they'd know one of my songs," he says. "Sometimes they won't know my pop hits." (For one, Mueller co-wrote Jennifer Paige's 1998 hit "Crush".) "But almost everywhere I've gone, people know DuckTales. The reach of it is so mind-blowing." Jeff Pescetto, the theme's original singer, has said; "I was playing with my band at a club. A group of guys from England walked up and said, 'We heard your voice and knew right away that it was the guy who sings the DuckTales theme song.' They were so excited to meet me. I just couldn't believe they recognized my voice."

"DuckTales" received a total of 87,9% yes votes!