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Power and insight Svetlana Alexievich. Photograph: Reuters

In conversations with Svetlana Alexievich, it quickly becomes apparent that she is more comfortable listening than she is talking. Thats hardly surprising: the Belarusian writer has spent decades in listening mode. Alexievich, now 69, put in thousands of hours with her tape recorder across the lands of the former Soviet Union, collecting and collating stories from ordinary people. She wove those tales into elegant books of such power and insight, that in 2015 she received the Nobel prize for literature.

In todays Russia, Alexievichs work is a Rorschach test for political beliefs: among the beleaguered, liberal opposition, she is frequently seen as the conscience of the nation, a uniquely incisive commentator on the disappointments and complexities of the post-Soviet condition. Mainstream opinion sees her as a turncoat whose books degrade Russia and Russians.

When I meet her in a cosy basement caf in her home city of Minsk, the entrance nestled in an amphitheatre of imposing, late-Soviet apartment blocks, she has just returned from a book tour of South Korea, and is about to embark on a trip to Moscow. Its tiring to have the attention on yourself; I want to closet myself away and start writing properly again, she says, looking visibly wearied by the travel and spotlight. Alexievich reluctantly agreed to deliver a talk about a book she wrote more than three decades ago, The Unwomanly Face of War, which has been republished in a new English translation this month. It was written in the early 1980s, and for many years she could not find a publisher, but during the soul-searching of the late-Soviet perestroika period, it tapped into the zeitgeist of reflection and critical thinking, and was published in a print run of 2m, briefly turning Alexievich into a household name. Later, the merciless flashlight Alexievich shone on to the Soviet war experience became less welcome in Russia. Since the Nobel win, her work has found a new international audience, giving her a second stint of fame 30 years after the first.

The original inspiration for the book was an article Alexievich read in the local Minsk press during the 1970s, about a retirement party for the accountant at a local car factory, a decorated sniper who had killed 75 Germans during the war. After that first interview, she began to seek out female war veterans across the Soviet Union. A million Soviet women served at the front, but they were absent from the official war narrative. Before this book, the only female character in our war literature was the nurse who improved the life of some heroic lieutenant, she says. But these women were steeped in the filth of war as deeply as the men.

It took a long time, Alexievich concedes, to get the women to stop speaking in rehearsed platitudes. Many were embarrassed about the reality of their war memories. They would say, OK, well tell you, but you have to write it differently, more heroically. After a frank interview with a woman who served as the medical assistant to a tank battalion, Alexievich recounts, she sent the transcript as promised and received a package through the post in response, full of newspaper clippings about wartime feats and most of the interview text crossed out in pen. More than once afterward I met with these two truths that live in the same human being, Alexievich writes. Ones own truth, driven underground, and the common one, filled with the spirit of the time.

The book touches on topics that were taboo during the Soviet period and have once again been excised from Putins Russia: the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, by which Stalin and Hitler carved up Europe, the executions of deserters and the psychological effects of war for years to come. Her subjects recall sweaty nightmares, grinding teeth, short tempers and an inability to see forests without thinking of twisted bodies in shallow graves.

In modern Russia, Putin has turned the war victory into a national building block of almost religious significance, and questioning the black-and-white history of glorious victory is considered heresy. This makes the testimony of the women in Alexievichs book, most of whom are now dead, feel all the more important today. There is no lack of heroism in the book; the feats and the bravery and the enormous burden that fell on the shoulders of these women shine from every page. But she does not erase the horror from the story, either. In the end, the book is a far more powerful testament to the extraordinary price paid by the Soviet people to defeat Nazi Germany than the sight of intercontinental missiles rolling across Red Square on 9 May, or the endless bombastic war films shown on Russian television.

After The Unwomanly Face of War, Alexievich wrote books that dealt with the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl and the Soviet incursion into Afghanistan, two tragedies that accompanied the death throes of the Soviet Union, both of them simultaneously causes and symptoms of its impending collapse.

More recently, she published the doorstop-sized Second-Hand Time, which reads as a requiem for the Soviet era. It chronicles the shock and the existential void that characterised the 1990s after the Soviet Union disintegrated, and helps explain the appeal of Putins promises to bring pride back to a wounded, post-imperial nation.

Nobody thought the Soviet Union would collapse, it was a shock for everyone, she says. Everyone had to adapt to a new and painful reality as the rules, behavioural codes and everyday language of the Soviet experience dissolved almost overnight. Taken together, Alexievichs books remain perhaps the single most impressive document of the late Soviet Union and its aftermath. Alexievich became a harsh critic of Alexander Lukashenko, the authoritarian president of newly independent Belarus. She left the country as a protest, and spent 11 years living in exile in various European countries, returning only a few years ago. When youre on the barricades, all you can see is a target, not a human, which is what a writer should see. From the point of view of art, the butcher and the victim are equal as people. You need to see the people.

Lukashenko has made it clear he is no fan of Alexievichs work, and while the Nobel prize has given her some security, her books have not been published in Belarus, and she is de facto banned from making public appearances. As a writer of Ukrainian and Belarusian heritage, but who writes essentially about the whole post-Soviet space, she is confused about modern Russia. She is unsure whether to say we or they when she speaks about Russians. Where she is more certain is in her opinions of Putin and the current political climate. We thought wed leave communism behind and everything would turn out fine. But it turns out you cant leave this and become free, because these people dont understand what freedom is.

She has repeatedly criticised the Russian annexation of Crimea and intervention in east Ukraine, which has led to a falling-out with many Russian friends, she says. She never quite knows how conversations will go when she visits Moscow. She recalls a recent visit when she entered the apartment of an old acquaintance: I had just walked in the door and taken my coat off, when she sits me down and says, Svetochka, so that everything is clear, let me just say that Crimea isnt ours. Its like a password! Thank God, I told her.

During her trip to Moscow, she gives a talk at Gogol Centre, an edgy theatre space known for its outspoken director and controversial productions. The lecture is rambling and in places barely coherent, but receives multiple rounds of applause from an audience eager to display their liberalism and disdain for Putins militarism. The questions are mainly gushing odes to her work.

Shortly after, she grants an interview to a Russian news agency. This time, the questions are rude and provocative, and a flustered Alexievich appears to suggest she understands the motivations of the murderers of a pro-Russian journalist in Kiev, and appears uneasy and unsure of herself. The Russian-language internet explodes with debates over the scandal.

She has two new projects she wants to finish: one about love, which will look at 100 relationships from the perspective of the man and the woman involved, and a second book about the process of ageing. It is something she has been thinking about, as she approaches her 70th birthday.

In youth, we dont think much about it and then suddenly all these questions arrive, she says. After a little more than an hour of discussion, her already quiet voice has become almost inaudible, and she seems tired and distracted. What was the point of life, why did all of that happen?

Not wanting to outstay my welcome any further, I turn off my recorder and thank her for the interview, assuming she will make a speedy beeline for the exit. Excellent, she says, immediately brightening. Shall we have some lunch? Surprised, I stay, and we talk for another hour. Now its mainly her asking the questions: about my views on Russia but also Donald Trump, the European far right and the Queen. Ever the listener, Alexievich is much more at ease asking the questions than answering them.

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Svetlana Alexievich: 'After communism we thought everything would ... - The Guardian

It might come as a shock to Susan Stamper Brown (Trumps Warsaw speech truly inspiring, Times-Standard, July 13, Page A4) that not only are liberals opposed to oppressive communism and the slaughter of Jews by the Nazis, but we are also opposed to jihad. We are also for freedom, our country and probably more in favor of family, because we view family to include LGBT parents and children as well as single parents and families extended through divorce and remarriage. When it comes to God I and many liberals do differ. The God in the constitution is a specific one, Natures God. For thousands of years all over the planet every nation, every tribe had different deities they worshipped. Susan thinks I and every American should believe that just one god is the real deity and although that deity created the whole universe, it only spoke to a handful of people in the Middle East long, long ago. And if we dont believe in her deity we must be deep into lunacy. Susan was very impressed with Trumps speech and for that she need not thank the president but rather his speechwriter. Now if someone could teach the Donald to read his speeches a little faster and a lot more convincingly, but there may not be enough time. Sad.

Larry DePuy, Eureka

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Over the next few months well profile some women in our region doing things... a little differently. These are women with unique perspectives, in new roles, or simply approaching life along the road less-traveled. Like many other women, they are changing the lives of people around them in positive ways. This is the first in the WMRA series 'Women of Interest'.

St. Mark Lutheran Church in Charlottesville welcomed a new pastor in May. Viktoria Parvin is only the second female pastor to serve the church, and as WMRAs Sefe Emokpae reports, her hope is that she wont be the last.

(Church singing)

Its Sunday morning and service is just beginning.

(Pastor Parvin speaking)

Viktoria Parvin is pastor here at St. Mark Lutheran.

VIKTORIA PARVIN: This is a very open congregation, I would say. They are reconciling in Christ. They are openly saying that what holds us together is more powerful than what separates us.

What might separate Parvin from the average member of the congregation here is a lot. Born in the seventies in Communist Hungary, Parvins path to religion to was neither easy nor conventional.

PARVIN: One of my grandmothers would take me to church especially at Christmas. We would sneak out and go to the local church at midnight, it was actually a midnight mass.

Parvin says though her grandmother was the first to introduce her to faith it was her non-religious father who unwittingly led her to the church with a Bible.

PARVIN: My father had a lot of books and I just happened to find it and read it. Something was very powerful about it and I reached out and started to ask people about God. My parents would say some people believe in God and I would say, 'Does God exist and they would say, 'Well, for some people.

Parvin soon became immersed in the church, participating in youth programs, church camps, and Sunday School. She called it an exciting time.

PARVIN: It was almost feeling like being rebellious by sneaking out and not telling everyone that I'm going on Sunday morning to Sunday school in the Catholic Church and in the Lutheran Church.

But simmering under the surface was a call to something greater.

PARVIN: It is a feeling of something different than you ever heard before or experienced before.

Parvin enrolled in seminary school and embarked on the path to becoming the pastor she is today.

PARVIN: I think the biggest step was just finding a woman role model who would say to me, 'have you thought about being a pastor? It is just something that if you don't have a role model around you, you never even try to imagine it or come up with the idea yourself.

But the path, she says, wasnt always easy.

PARVIN: When I first time applied to the seminary in Hungary, Budapest, I remember they advertised in the school as 'we prefer men.' My bishop said to me, I'm not sure how long you would have to wait because congregations are not prepared, most of them, for female ministers, so, they are asking me for male ministers, so what can I do? And that really made me realize, well, education is not enough, having the call is not enough, there's more fight that had to be done.

And fight, she would. Parvin would eventually land her first role as an intern at a church in upstate New York followed by two congregations in southern Illinois. As the first female pastor there, she recalls the difficulty in her sense of isolation.

PARVIN: I felt really alone and people would say you don't look like a pastor which I understood what they meant was I wasn't a man. I had to kind of push and prove myself. I used to wear my collar everywhere so that I would be identified.

(singing in church)

Now in Charlottesville, Parvin is the second female pastor St. Mark Lutheran has seen.

TOM HECMANCZUK : I find her to be very dedicated. Her faith is very strong and she has a good way of presenting her faith to others.

Congregation member and usher Tom Hecmanczuk has been with the church for the better part of 17 years and praises Parvin for bringing her own unique set of gifts and skills to the table.

HECMANCZUK: I think she's very inclusive. She wants to be a part of this community and make sure we stay involved and dedicated to the community as well as the church here itself.

Parvin says she hopes to set an example for the next generation of pastors, male and female alike, and views her role as a grand responsibility.

PARVIN: I see it as a very important opportunity. God is always surprising us with new things and I see those struggles that we have especially at this time that we are separated, as not only challenges but opportunities to prove our faith and to show who we are.

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New Pastor in Charlottesville, Born Under Communism - WMRA Public Radio

(Image: Lauren Walker / Truthout)

Donald Trump's campaign and presidency have ushered in a tide of blatantly racist, classist, sexist and politically repressive nostalgia, encapsulated by his ominous slogan, "Make America Great Again." As Trump and his Republican allies work to dismantle civil, voting, reproductive and immigration rights, another vestige of the past -- anti-communism -- has begun to reappear.

Fox News is but one purveyor of this ideology. As commentator after commentator sees it, communism stifles the spark that promotes competition and human advancement. In fact, any positive mention of communism is quickly and repeatedly condemned. For example, when MIT Press published a book calledCommunism for Kids, in April, newscasters immediately made it headline news, denouncing the text as "propaganda and revisionist theory" and lampooned the idea that capitalism causes misery among a swath of the population.

The network, of course, is far from alone.

Michael Savage's "The Savage Nation" ontalkstreamlive.orgroutinely lambastes CNN's Wolf Blitzer and Jake Tapper, calling them "mouthpieces of the far left, part [and] parcel of Pravda or Izvestia." Similarly, Glenn Beck's Mercury Radio Arts has aired a four-part series called "The Truth About Communism." "The difference between Communism and the Hitler faith was very slight," Beck rails. "The Communists of the Reichstag voted almost uniformly with the Nazis; they voted in lock step. The slogan for the Communists and the Reichstag, first brown, then red."

The communism Beck conjures is rife with deprivation, want and well-worn stereotypes and is likely motivated by the millions who voted for socialist Bernie Sanders -- no communist he, but that does not seem to matter. The series began in March and gave Beck a platform to warn that "communism" may be making a comeback. To support this thesis, he apparently dusted off a 1950s playbook full of warnings. "You can't own land or make money from owning land," he says of communism. "No matter how hard you worked to acquire your property or how many generations have owned it, your land is no longer yours."

He has also pontificated that communism zaps human motivation, since "everything belongs to the collective." In Beck-world, money is the sole motivator of creativity and innovation (a conclusion that is certainly worth debating) and since communism threatens money as we know it, he argues that it poses an enormous danger to everything red-blooded Americans should hold dear.

Then there's Breitbart News, where anti-Castro commentary is a regular feature. Trump, himself, has both feet firmly planted on this bandwagon, recently telling fans in Miami's little Havana that "we will not be silenced in the face of Communist oppression any longer." Indeed, he fulfilled a campaign promise by directing the Treasury Department to end the US-Cuba people-to-people tourism program. Under the administration's new rules, the only people who will be allowed to visit Cuba are those traveling with pre-approved sponsoring groups. What's more, Trump has repeatedly labeled Cuba a security threat to the US, charging that the tiny island has shipped weapons to North Korea. He has also criticized the country for granting asylum to Assata Shakur, who he calls a "cop killer." His call for Shakur's extradition has gotten significant play on right-wing radio and in conservative print publications and blogs.

And let's not forget May Day. Ilya Somin is a professor of law at George Mason University, home of the Koch-funded Mercatus Center. Mercatus exists to "bridge the gap between academic ideas and real-world problems," and not only promotes capitalism as the best possible economic system, but trains scholars to value rivalry in business and oppose all manner of regulations -- including licensure of businesses. Somin is a close ally of the Mercatus faculty and has the Center's support for his campaign to turn May Day into "International Victims of Communism Day." "We appropriately have a Holocaust Memorial Day," he wrote in aWashington Posteditorial. "It is equally appropriate to commemorate the victims of the 20th century's other great totalitarian tyranny."

California Legislators Declare "Communism Has No Place in California

Anti-communist grumblings have also grown sharper in state legislatures.

Several months ago, Rob Bonta, a Democratic California Assembly member, introduced AB22, a bill to remove a nearly 70-year-old statute that makes it illegal for members of the Communist Party (CP) to work in that state's government. He called the law a violation of the First Amendment right to free speech and association, and pointed out that a 1960 Supreme Court decision made employment bans based on CP membership -- or membership in other organizations that advocate revolutionary change -- unconstitutional.

Despite this, conservatives quickly mobilized to oppose the bill. Led by Republican Janet Nguyen, the first Vietnamese American state senator in the country,opponents declaredthat "communism has no place in California." They further dubbed the bill "an outrageous piece of legislation which inadvertently hurt the Vietnamese-American community and countless veterans who have fought to defeat communism."

Others, including Southern California Assembly member Randy Voepel, chimed in to declare communists in North Korea and China an ongoing threat to US safety.

Bonta eventually withdrew the bill, and apologized for his lack of sensitivity. He did not respond to Truthout's request for an interview.

Anti-Communism Rises in Brooklyn

Brooklyn's tony Park Slope neighborhood is the site of a different kind of Red Scare. It's where Jill Bloomberg, the principal of Park Slope Collegiate (PSC), along with her assistant principal, a paraprofessional and two teachers, are being investigated by the New York City Department of Education for allegedly belonging to a communist organization.

Park Slope Collegiate is a sixth-to-twelfth grade public school, one of four programs co-located in what was once the massive John Jay High School. Bloomberg became PSC's principal in 2004 and has tried to promote the school'smissionas a "truly integrated school -- racially, ethnically, economically, and academically."

Throughout her tenure, Bloomberg has been an outspoken advocate for racial justice. She has denounced the use of metal detectors and called out inequities in resource allocations and funding. For example, one of the schools in the John Jay building, Millennium High, is largely white, mirroring the upscale neighborhood in which it is located. (In contrast, PSC is 79 percent African American and Latinx.) When Millennium was given $115,255 for coaches and sports teams during the 2014-15 academic year, Bloomberg took notice -- first asking Millennium to allow students from the other schools in the building to join its teams; when the request was rebuffed, she demanded parity for all John Jay programs. As she pointed out, the inequity was blatant: the three other programs combined received just $41,045 for athletics.

The situation got even worse the following year, 2016, when Millennium received funds for 17 teams, including fencing, baseball, basketball and table tennis. Meanwhile, only four teams existed at the three other schools; after Bloomberg and others protested this imbalance, five track teams were added, but the total stillpaled in comparisonto Millennium.

"Jill is all about the students," Patrick Lloyd, the parent of a PSC student, told Truthout. "She is very professional. In fact, she does all the things people in academic circles talk about as being important. If students are fighting, she promotes conversations to resolve the issue. She knows every kid by name and knows where he or she is supposed to be at all times. She also does something a lot of other people don't do. She fights back [against injustice] and encourages the students to fight back."

No one knows for sure what put Bloomberg and PSC on the radar of the school district's Office of the Special Commissioner of Investigation (OSI).

Michael Aciman, deputy press secretary for New York City's Department of Education (DOE), told me by email that, "Ms. Bloomberg has been a strong advocate for her school community, and the recent concerns she's raised regarding the John Jay campus have nothing to do with the current investigation. OSI has an obligation to review and investigate all reports of misconduct that it receives, and the complaint against Ms. Bloomberg contains allegations that, if true, would be a violation of several Chancellor's regulations."

What are the allegations? I ask. What regulations has Bloomberg been accused of violating? Who made the complaints? "Due to the ongoing investigation, we cannot confirm additional details," Aciman wrote.

Furthermore, no one seems to know how long an investigation can take or whether the five-month-long brouhaha is near completion. "OSI sent someone to the school building on March 2," Bloomberg explained. "He said I was the subject of an OSI investigation, but that was all he'd tell me. The investigator then asked to speak to the assistant principal and in speaking to her, indicated that they were investigating whether two teachers and I are members of the Progressive Labor Party (PLP) and are recruiting students to attend meetings and events."

Bloomberg emphasizes that she is not in the PLP, but also makes clear that membership in such an organization would not be incompatible with teaching. She acknowledges that she has been vocal in protesting racism and encouraging the students to speak out against discrimination. For example, when PSC's girls' volleyball team was mistreated by security guards at another school, the team -- backed by Bloomberg -- held public protests. This resulted in both media coverage and a public apology from the offending security personnel.

This was not Bloomberg's first brush with DOE authority. After Eric Garner's 2014 murder by police, PSC staff organized an assembly to discuss what had happened. "The superintendent told me that I needed to take a position of neutrality on this, but we can't be neutral when it comes to racism. The DOE itself should not be neutral about racism," Bloomberg said.

Patrick Lloyd agrees, which is why he wanted his daughter to attend PSC in the first place. He's still glad she's enrolled there. At the same time, he is appalled that students were pulled out of class and questioned throughout the spring semester -- without parental permission -- about whether they've been encouraged to attend protests, meetings or study groups. "My daughter was absent the day the investigators came to talk to her. When I heard about this, I wrote [the Department of Education] a cease-and-desist letter stating that they cannot speak to my child without my permission," Lloyd said. A number of parents have since drafted similar missives.

Student Amanda Lee, a rising senior and captain of the girls' volleyball team, calls the investigation ridiculous. "The only time I ever heard the word communism in school was in 10th grade global studies," she told Truthout, shaking her head in disbelief. "The teacher was talking about capitalism and communism and was very pro-capitalist. He said communism was bad and told us that if we had a pair of sneakers, we'd have to share them with our friends. That was it. If I didn't research communism on my own, I wouldn't know anything else about it."

Indeed, the situation playing out in Park Slope represents a type of Red Scare that goes far beyond the verbal prattle of far-right talk shows. It also reminds us that we can't expect the Democratic Party to protect us from this type of ideological posturing. "In a Democratic city, with a Democratic mayor and a Democratic Department of Education head, this situation reeks of McCarthyism," Patrick Lloyd concludes. "It's a good lesson, reminding us that even when we elect Democratic officials to a run a city, there can still be witch hunts."

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Red Scare Redux 2017: From Right-Wing Radio to Brooklyn - Truth-Out

Many of those old enough to remember the Cold War are shocked by Donald Trumps embrace of the Russians and Vladimir Putin. Once World War II was over, Russia under Joseph Stalin continued to retain control of Europe from East Germany onward. The goal was to establish the USSR as an alternative to the capitalistic democracies to the West.

In Stalins Union of Soviet Socialist Republics religion was oppressed in favor of the primacy of the state, which was run by a despotic premier. The tenets of the Bible were replaced by the works of Marx and Lenin. The private right to own property was displaced by the communist doctrine that all means of production belonged to the state.

Smaller countries of Eastern Europe lacked the military capacity to resist annexation into the USSR, but the U.S. maintained its authority over West Germany after World War II. The Russians built a wall between West and East Germany to prevent western ideas from crossing the dividing line and corrupting the indoctrination of communism.

The Russians established an effective secret service, the KGB, to spy on citizens thought to be enemies of the state, as well as foreign countries. The KGB was known to have little reluctance to execute enemies of the state in sophisticated ways that would not reveal the identity of the assassin.

In the early days of the conflict between communism and western capitalism and democracy, the U.S. behaved as though it was at war with the USSR, even though there was no direct battle line and no shots were fired. Some analysts have asserted that the Korean War and the Vietnam War were fought to restrain the spread of communism in Asia.

The House Un-American Activities Committee was established primarily to protect the U.S. against internal terrorism, but it went much farther than that. HUAC was behind Red Scare campaigns that branded journalists, scholars and filmmakers as treasonous, thus ruining their professional reputations.

Even though HUAC was abolished in 1975, profound opposition to Russian communism persisted, especially among conservatives. On March 8, 1983, President Reagan gave a memorable speech in which he branded Russia an evil empire. He cautioned the western world not to turn away from the struggle between right and wrong and good and evil.

Then in 1987, Reagan visited Berlin and famously said Mr. Gorbachev tear down this wall. Two years later Germans began dismantling the wall. And in 1990, Poland broke from Russian domination. Other countries in the USSR then began to break away. While the Cold War theoretically ended in 1990, the philosophical conflict between the Russian brand of communism and western capitalism still persists.

Clearly, Trumps connection is not philosophical. He has already demonstrated a willingness to desecrate a major economic principle of the presidency, that the office will operate for the benefit of the republic and not to increase the presidents wealth. But given Reagans legacy, why have conservatives also abandoned that principle?

One wonders what else is for sale?

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Trump and the Russians: An unholy alliance - BayStateBanner