Thread: Article: The Russian Mindset

Dammit!
Deb, that's all wrong (well, truth be told, almost all but still...)

Behaviours You May Find Puzzling
Russians can seem very rude and that they rarely smile in public.
Russians aren't rude at all unless they are forced to be rude.
Please, tell me what is considered to be rude? What made the author think so? Not saying "please"? Something else? I'd like to see a short review on this topic.

We rarely smile in public (well, it depends what you think is rare)
We don't smile all the time, that's the truth. A smile is either a sign of my own emotions towards a person I'm talking with, or a courtesy smile.
They can easily be differentiated from one another and personally I don't like these fake smiles you see when you come to an office and the girl smiling at you.
She's not my good old friend, nor have I have done anything good or hillarious to give me a smile but she's already smiling. This isn't good. She may express the attitude in some other way, like through intonations or a faint smile, not a real one. I always smile at small babies, they're sooooo sweet, they already deserved my smile by the sole fact that they are existing

70 years of history taught people not to trust anybody and to guard their own territory.
Bullsh!t

Just recall the famous Soviet poster "Ne Boltai" (Do not Chatter)
Bullsh!t Bullsh!t, wrong translation. It's "Don't blab out (secrets)".

There is also an inherited notion from "village Russia" that people who smile for no reason must be simpletons
No! The original saying is "Смех без причины - признак дурачины". Laughter, not smiling, you know!

They are often not used to people being polite and nice to them
They are used to it. In Russia every day we say hello to all the acquaintances we meet, when entering a public room, etc.
Otherwise we may be considered rude.

Russians seem to have very different concept of what it means to stand in a line. They tend to be pushy while getting on public transport and in the metro you will find that people try to get on while others are still trying to get off.
Well, this depends on the person. If someone in Russia will try to be pushy at me when getting into a bus the very next second he will learn to fly

Houses entrances, rest rooms and some other public areas may not be well cared for.
Depends on the owner. It's not common.

People - both men and women - still drink beer in pubic. While this is not publicly frowned upon...
This is not publicly frowned upon. If it were, we wouldn't drink beer in public. We don't drink either vodka or wine in public. Only beer.

Something like that.
The article seems to be aimed at creating a negative image of a Russian. F!ck it!

Originally Posted by Medved

Dammit!
Deb, that's all wrong (well, truth be told, almost all but still...)

Behaviours You May Find Puzzling
Russians can seem very rude and that they rarely smile in public.
Russians aren't rude at all unless they are forced to be rude.
Please, tell me what is considered to be rude? What made the author think so? Not saying "please"? Something else? I'd like to see a short review on this topic.

I think the author was writing mainly to an audience of English-speaking ex-pats who have no experience with Russian culture. I agree, a lot of his conjectures about why Russians smile less than Americans, or stand close, etc, are crap. I never thought it was "rooted in the oppressive Soviet past."

However, I have heard from other Americans before that they think Russians are "rude." I never thought Russians were rude personally, so I asked people why they made this observation and from what I can gather, it's just a cultural misunderstanding on the part of (mostly) Americans. Americans do not tend to be as direct as Russians are, and they will mistake directness for rudeness.

Americans and other English-language speakers seem more passive to me. For example, if they want a drink of water they will say, "Would you please get me a drink of water?" Whereas a Russian would probably just say "I need water" or "I want water."

I think sometimes we misunderstand each other precisely because of cultural differences. Americans say "I'm sorry" all the time and I've heard from lots of Russians that this makes us seem insincere, but in America it is considered proper and polite.

Generally, I think reading motives into the behavior of foreigners is a bad idea. What might be perceived as "rude" in one culture is honesty/directness in another, and what might be perceived as "insincere" in one culture is politeness/kindness in another.

I agree, the author is reaching a bit and sounds like yet another westerner trying too hard to psychoanalyze Russian behavior. I think a lot of the behaviors he is describing are not a direct result of Soviet times, but reach back far further than that and are not wrong or a sign of oppression but just cultural.