I think that considering that people in the NK or the USSR were/are happy because they were "ordered" to to be, is a bit of oversimplification. It adds to the stereotype that people in so called dictatorships are nothing but scared sheep, which is sad. I do not agree that people in the late USSR were terribly oppressed or scared. The ideological press was there, and people believed in things that could seem naive or wrong now, but they were not brainless drones.
Lol. Your link reminds me the story from my childhood. When Brezhnev died I was 5 y.o. kid in kindergarden. That day our governess hanged his big photo on the wall in a black frame and ordered us "to sit still and don't make any noise". I accidentally laughed later that day and was put in a corner for this.
Lol. I can believe that. It was not state policy to make little boys sad, though, it's your 'governess' had weird ideas about what was appropriate in a day like this. Особый подвид "тетка дубовая". )))

I remember an episode a few years after Brezhnev's death. I was in the 1st or 2nd grade and me and my friend told popular jokes ("anecdotes") about late Brezhnev (including classics about "письки сосиськи" and "кому сиськи" ). We were laughing loudly and were making quite a racket. And then it turned out that our teacher (a stern and scary one) was withing earshot the whole time, she was literally behind our backs. I remember being scared that she'd berate us (the jokes were both political and vulgar), or would tell my parents about that, or would give me a bad mark or something. She pretended she had not heard anything. Go figure... (and she was very "ideologically correct").