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.And this makes it muchfurther from reality than an abstract painting, as the abstract paintinghonestly proclaims that it has nothing to do with reality.Why does socialist realism turn out so unrealistic? To understandthat, we need to return to our description of the two methods.Thevertical method allows you to compare your situation today with that ofyesterday or tomorrow.You live in real time, here and now.As there istime, you can see reality as it is, express your feelings as they are.Thehorizontal method calls for comparing your situation with the situation ofothers.This comparison is determined by the situation of others, and theprotagonist is suddenly not in the picture.Take the totalitarian novel as an example.The totalitarian novel is anovel without a hero, a novel where the main protagonist is themysterious  them.Suppose there is a novel in which Johnny saves agirl.If he saves the girl because he is a brave person, then this is not asocialist realist novel.But if he saves her because the Party taught himhow to be brave, because he wanted to become worthy of joining, thenthis is socialist realism.The Party does not need to be mentioned, but ithas to be the reality, the thing without which this bravery would not havebeen possible.A person is determined by others and thus ceases to exist.Since youcannot become just like someone else, there is no personal time, nopersonal place, no personal past or future.In the world the way it should192Russia As It Is: Transformation of a Lose/Lose Societyhave been, hungry peasants gorge on food and sing happy songs.Theresult is socialist realism  the form of art that is the furthest from reality,and from art.ANIMATE AND INANIMATE IDEASA person lives in the world not by himself, but in contact with others; infact, most of a person s world is his contacts with other humans.Withoutthese contacts a human baby simply does not become a human being.People exchange thoughts and ideas, but these ideas should only serve asmaterial for subsequent rethinking, contemplation, and adaptation, andthis is something that cannot be overemphasized.The goal should be not just to get information from the outside world(every animal that has a brain has this skill) but to interpret andincorporate this information, make it your own, a part of your personalworld, a topic of your inner dialogue.Only then will this information bealive, will it in some form become a part of a living being.There is another way of incorporating an idea into your life, and thisway is truly dangerous.The idea can be incorporated  as is , withoutrethinking, without personal commentary, without the necessary changeand adaptation.If an idea is incorporated in such a manner, it will turninto a bullet inside a live human body, it will become an inanimate partof a living being, a building block of an inanimate Social Self.It shouldbe noted that in this case it would be absolutely unimportant whether thisis a  right idea or not.Human beings need food, but if a sandwich gets into a humanstomach in precisely the same state as it was on the plate, it will kill you:a sandwich must get to the stomach in small pieces, well chewed-up, andmoistened with saliva.Ideas must enter human minds in a similarfashion.There is nothing bad in reading Lenin if we can critically study thetext, agreeing with some ideas and rejecting others.But when anideology requires that we accept Lenin s writings uncritically as theultimate and complete truth, if it requires that we reject and modify ourown thoughts and views, then the writings of Lenin, who never doubtedthat he was right, turn into the functional equivalent of a bullet enteringour bodies.193Matthew MalyWe should not take in any idea without critically examining it;moreover, we should resolve that the process of critical examination ofan idea will never  officially end, that is, there will never be aproclamation of this idea s absolute veracity and its unconditionalacceptance.The idea must become a natural part of our internal dialogue,and must develop, grow, and change together with us.Doubt is what every idea, every thought feeds on.Once a thought iswritten on paper, it is endangered because paper is far too permanent fora thought and a written text is not easily susceptible to change.Thismeans that a written thought needs to be revived by being read critically.If that is not done, every thought turns into a slogan or cliché, becomesinanimate.Literacy and print were highly beneficial advances.But in the sixtiesand seventies our entire planet was on the brink of an ideological warthat could have destroyed all life on Earth.It took humankind enormoushuman and financial resources to defeat horrible ideologies utterlyincompatible with human life.At a certain point in time, first the fascistand then the communist ideology appeared to be winning the struggle forworld domination [ Pobierz caÅ‚ość w formacie PDF ]