When you think Soviet-style totalitarianism, what comes to mind? Is the image of the Gulag, of Stalin, or is it rather the image of Khrushchev and the absolute omnipotence of the panel block living arrangements? This is really important – how do you visualise totalitarianism? Not the different totalitarian regimes, as that can lead to associations of particular countries, cities, etc. Totalitarianism as such. What is the first thing that you see?
For people, who have experienced life under such regimes, the question is different as it would be oriented towards sensations, concrete memories, aesthetic feel – How does it feel to have lived under totalitarianism? But for those of us, who were either born after the Fall of the Berlin Wall and/or outside of the Iron Curtain, this question is meaningless. It has no reality. We can only diligently try to pick up the pebbles of the…
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