A Soviet grandmother pulls a small boy out of the yard and stands him in the food line, because two people in line means two rations of sugar. That is Dr. Yuri Yarim-Agaev's memory of what he calls a happy childhood in Moscow, the third generation born under communism, when rationing of flour and sugar had become so ordinary that nobody thought about alternatives. As Sasha Gong says, in the mind of the people none existed, and hope was not scarce, it was zero. Then she reads the ration card she grew up with in China: rice, about 25 pounds for an adult a month; cooking oil, one small bottle; meat, 0.6 pounds a month; tofu, four pieces. Everything else was rationed too. And then the line that turns the room: the Chinese envied the Soviets. Two pounds of sugar? You are kidding me.
Yarim-Agaev takes it back a generation, to the famine in Ukraine under Stalin, to the food shortages that returned when Gorbachev came to power, and to the regions of the Soviet Union where people never saw meat even in large cities, while Moscow was supplied like a special place. Oviedo Frasina answers for Romania, a country with farmland that could have fed Europe, and explains why the shelves were empty anyway: his cat and his dog love him because he feeds them, and if he controls how much food and water they get, that is how much love he gets back. It was never about the shortage. It was about who controlled the food, so that nobody protested and nobody spoke.
Panelists: Dr. Yuri Yarim-Agaev (Soviet Union), Sasha Gong (China) and Oviedo Frasina (Romania), from the Surviving Communism panel on The Jenny Beth Show with Jenny Beth Martin.
In this segment:
• Two in line, two rations of sugar
• By the third generation, nobody imagined an alternative
• The ration card: rice, oil, meat, tofu
• Why the Chinese envied the Soviets
• Famine, Gorbachev's shortages and no meat outside Moscow
• Romania could have fed Europe
• The cat and the dog: who controls the food controls the people
Share this episode with someone under 30 who thinks socialism sounds fair. Then make your plan to vote for liberty and constitutional government on November 3, and help get out the vote at iwillsaveamerica.com.
Watch the full Surviving Communism panel on The Jenny Beth Show channel, and subscribe for daily analysis from Tea Party Patriots Action.
jennybethshow.com
teapartypatriots.org
iwillsaveamerica.com
00:00 — A grandmother takes a boy to the Soviet food line for a second ration of sugar
00:38 — By the third generation, nobody thought about alternatives
01:11 — Zero hope, and the Chinese ration numbers
01:28 — 25 pounds of rice, a small bottle of oil, 0.6 pounds of meat, four pieces of tofu
02:05 — Famine under communism: Ukraine, Gorbachev's shortages, no meat outside Moscow
03:20 — Romania could have fed Europe; a cat, a dog, and who controls the food
#JennyBethShow #RationCard #SurvivingCommunism #Communism #Socialism #SashaGong #YuriYarimAgaev #SovietUnion #China #TeaPartyPatriotsAction