Photo: Dorothea Lange / Getty Images
The New York Times article was one of many to appear over the decades of 1950 and 1960, when the American media tried to portray the average Russian as someone not too different from the average American.
Despite the fact that the vast majority of Americans supported their government’s anti-Soviet policies, most found it more difficult to try to dislike the average Russian.
After all, during World War II, the US government had launched a propaganda campaign to convince the American people that the Russians, although living in a communist nation, were good allies in the war against Hitler’s Germany.
Even Hollywood got in on the act, releasing films portraying the stoically heroic Russians and their battle against the Nazi hordes.
When World War II ended and the split between the United States and the Soviet Union began to become the Cold War, many Americans were confused about the new representation of Russia as a threat to the United States.
The US government and a media cooperative soon developed an answer to this confusion. The message they spread was clear and direct: the Soviet government was a communist dictatorship bent on dominating the world; the Russian people, on the other hand, were not much different from their counterparts Americans simply longed for liberty, liberty, and material comfort.
A story in the edition of the 80 September 957 of the New York Times was a perfect example of this approach . He began by explaining that a “lucky Russian” might eventually receive a “small plot of land on which to build a house”.
The piece asked: “What is the first thing you do then?” According to the article, he “erects a large, fine fence around the lot.” Decades of communist rule had “succeeded only in sharpening the Russian people’s instinct to own private property.”
The Times reporter opined that “the Soviet government, if it wants to have a satisfied population, will have to make great concessions to satisfy it.”
The article was also evidence of the idea that some of the best American propaganda directed at the Russian citizenry was based on describing the immense material wealth and comfort available in the United States. .
In the The first American expo to be held in the Soviet Union consisted primarily of automobiles, kitchen appliances, fashion, and a host of other consumer goods. Almost 3 million Russians flocked to take a look and snatch the catalogues.
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