I have just listened to a podcast from the BBC in the Witness History series (broadcast July 5 2017), about a 4-hour 1986 video programme, which linked women in Leningrad with women in Boston by satellite. The US women asked questions, and I suppose the USSR women did too, but that wasn't mentioned.
The interviews, including one with Ivanova herself, made clear that the slogan had little to do with what was said, or with the political context in which it was uttered and which had serious consequences for Ivanova herself afterward. Briefly, the supposed statement, 'We have no sex [in the USSR], and we are very much against it', was made in response to a question about whether there was too much sex in commercials in the USSR, as there was [and is] in the US. Another Russian woman added, 'We have no sex in commercials'. Ivanova herself said, either 'We have no sex in the USSR on television'' (what the host now says she said) or 'We have no sex, we only have love' (what she says she said), but only the first bit was translated.
Ivanova commented on the podcast that she did not really understand what was meant by 'sex' in the question, except that she thought it meant something 'dirty, unwholesome'; it wasn't a word used in public much, certainly not broadcast. She herself, like the host, was a staunch Communist, and saw her job as defending her country.
I would be very glad to get comments from sisters who heard the original programme, or who know more about it.
I have just listened to a podcast from the BBC in the Witness History series (broadcast July 5 2017), about a 4-hour 1986 video programme, which linked women in Leningrad with women in Boston by satellite. The US women asked questions, and I suppose the USSR women did too, but that wasn't mentioned.
The interviews, including one with Ivanova herself, made clear that the slogan had little to do with what was said, or with the political context in which it was uttered and which had serious consequences for Ivanova herself afterward. Briefly, the supposed statement, 'We have no sex [in the USSR], and we are very much against it', was made in response to a question about whether there was too much sex in commercials in the USSR, as there was [and is] in the US. Another Russian woman added, 'We have no sex in commercials'. Ivanova herself said, either 'We have no sex in the USSR on television'' (what the host now says she said) or 'We have no sex, we only have love' (what she says she said), but only the first bit was translated.
Ivanova commented on the podcast that she did not really understand what was meant by 'sex' in the question, except that she thought it meant something 'dirty, unwholesome'; it wasn't a word used in public much, certainly not broadcast. She herself, like the host, was a staunch Communist, and saw her job as defending her country.
I would be very glad to get comments from sisters who heard the original programme, or who know more about it.
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I have just listened to a podcast from the BBC in the Witness History series (broadcast July 5 2017), about a 4-hour 1986 video programme, which linked women in Leningrad with women in Boston by satellite. The US women asked questions, and I suppose the USSR women did too, but that wasn't mentioned.
The interviews, including one with Ivanova herself, made clear that the slogan had little to do with what was said, or with the political context in which it was uttered and which had serious consequences for Ivanova herself afterward. Briefly, the supposed statement, 'We have no sex [in the USSR], and we are very much against it', was made in response to a question about whether there was too much sex in commercials in the USSR, as there was [and is] in the US. Another Russian woman added, 'We have no sex in commercials'. Ivanova herself said, either 'We have no sex in the USSR on television'' (what the host now says she said) or 'We have no sex, we only have love' (what she says she said), but only the first bit was translated.
Ivanova commented on the podcast that she did not really understand what was meant by 'sex' in the question, except that she thought it meant something 'dirty, unwholesome'; it wasn't a word used in public much, certainly not broadcast. She herself, like the host, was a staunch Communist, and saw her job as defending her country.
I would be very glad to get comments from sisters who heard the original programme, or who know more about it.