Talk:Orphans in the Soviet Union

A fact from Orphans in the Soviet Union appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 23 May 2012 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows: Did you know... that various turmoils in the history of the Soviet Union left millions of homeless children roaming the country? A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2012/May. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Orphans in the Soviet Union.

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Wikipedia software failed to show correctly my changes since the first version. Therefore I created an intermediate verison to see the actual diff here. - Altenmann >t 18:56, 19 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I removed a number of pieces I concluded unnecessary. Most of the cases I hope the reason is clear from edit summarfy. However one case deserves explanation, since the reason may be unclear for a modern, especially Western reader.

Full context:

There were no official orders to discriminate against children of enemies of the people.Yet orphanage staff often beat, underfed, and abused such pupils. Any misbehavior was understood as the product of a counter-revolutionary upbringing, and punished harshly. Treating children like budding criminals had several effects. In some cases, guilt inspired orphans to prove their loyalty. But a 1938 document reveals that officials misinterpreted even acts of allegiance, "To mask their counter-revolutionary actions [pupils of Nizhnii-Isetski children's home] became members of the Komsomol.

I am sure this text is taken from the source, but it just as well reflects the author's misunderstanding of the circumstances. And the circumstances were the unprecendented, huge number of show trials and "kangaroo courts" in the Soviet state based on tolally concocted sets of accusations, of treason, sabotage, and whats not. Within this paranoia various groups of people were routinely accused of conspiracy. And within this atmosphere a number of cliches emerged. In particular, when the accused were the members of the Soviet establisment (members of the Communist Party, Komsomol, Soviet trade unions, etc.) the verdict included a standard phrasing to the end that "these scoundrels sneakily infested our Party and Soviet organs blablaba", peppered with liberal amounts of pejoratives.

In view of the above, while formally correct, the stricken phrase creates a somewhat distorted picture of causes and effects: the fact that orphans became komsomol members per se was neutral. However depending on the future fate of the person in question, this fact was colored differently. As long as the person was out of the focus of the "sleepless eye" of cheka/nkvd/kgb, he was praised an example of a new, "reforged" member of the "growing rows of the builders of Communism". But as soon as he fell under the Soviet juggernaut, all his actions were interpreted turned upside out: all his selfless devotion to the "Communist cause" was nothing but treacherous disguise of (thusly doubly dangerous) enemies of the people.

I will be happy to explain any other of my deletions, if reasonably questioned. - Altenmann >t 17:17, 19 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

There are several places in the text which do not catch an eye of an unsuspecting reader, yet they are tips of the pieces of Soviet life deserving a larger note. One of them is "North Caucausus railroad" randomly mentioned en passant. I slighly tweaked the sentence, to increase the prominince/relevance, but it still deserves expansion in context of the current article. This is a note to myself, to get back to it when I lay my hands on good sources. Ask me if puzzled, and I will give an informal explanation. - Altenmann >t 17:27, 19 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Another phrase is "adults caught in occupied zones did not pass their criminality on to their children". You may or may not be wondering what was the particular criminality of the "adults caught in occupied zones". (and the inquisitive some may even be wondering, "occupied by whom?".) - Altenmann >t 17:45, 19 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The page isn't about orphans, it's about street children. Please compare the interwiki and the prase Most ‘orphans’ actually had parents, but left their families due to abuse or lack of security. Xx236 (talk) 07:42, 15 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The children living in the street after the Civil War were often orphans. The father may not have come back from WWI or was killed in the Civil War, and the mother could have found death through disease, a hostile group in the civil war, famine, or, in a rural area, even a neighbour who wanted the land and knew that the child could not defend the property. They turned into street kids; how else could they have found food?

I came here to say that it is not just a 'traditional Russian proverb, "an apple never falls far from the tree".' It is often used in Germany, too = Der Apfel fällt nicht weit vom Stamm. 2001:8003:A070:7F00:C8C7:3BC7:60CE:1F42 (talk) 05:08, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I moved the article back to the original title: the article is not only about the topic of street children. Please let me now if there are any concerns. K.e.coffman (talk) 03:49, 20 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The article is not only about the topic of orphans. Xx236 (talk) 09:32, 23 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Kucherenko, Soviet Street Children and the Second World War : Welfare and Social Control Under Stalin
• http://soviethistory.msu.edu/1921-2/homeless-children/
• https://www.jstor.org/stable/24652707
• http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09668138808411734

Xx236 (talk) 09:36, 23 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

In 2009 the page was described as "Did you know that various turmoils in the history of the Soviet Union left millions of homeless children roaming the country?" . Xx236 (talk) 12:30, 23 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps we could agree on the definition first. I used what appears in the article on Street children:

• many practitioners and policymakers use UNICEF’s concept of boys and girls, aged under 18 years, for whom "the street" (including unoccupied dwellings and wasteland) has become home and/or their source of livelihood, and who are inadequately protected or supervised.

K.e.coffman (talk) 03:46, 24 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Russian sources use the name беспризорность, more general Детская беспризорность и безнадзорность в СССР. I believe that the Russians understand the problem. I'm not an expert in English to select a translation, street children seems O.K.

To accept the Soviet solution of the problem we should know conditions in orphanages/camps, eg. the mortality there. The Soviet standard image of educational camps is presented in a book by Makarenko, a teacher. Accounts of pupils would be useful. Some Polish orphans surived the WWII in Soviet orphanages, left the SU and described the orphanages, but I don't know such descriptions. There existed orphanages for Polish childen [1]. Rubén Gallego described his life in orphanages.

I don't know how many street children were orphans.

Some boys were adopted by army units (Сын полка), English

camp followers isn't the same. Sometimes German units adopted Soviet boys.Xx236 (talk) 08:09, 25 May 2017 (UTC)[reply

]

I noticed that the section called "Abandoned children, 1918–1930" is directly stolen (word for word) from chapter two of "And Now My Soul Is Hardened." I don't have the time to correct this now but I thought someone should know. Thanks. -8.41.27.80 (talk) 21:39, 1 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

 Fixed — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 16:58, 23 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

This needs copy edited for neutrality, and generally groups all Besprizornye into one group, implying one shared experience rather than individuality. Quotes could be paraphrased to remove the “poor little children” tone that is heavily used here. BuggS8263 (talk) 18:54, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]