Political Uses of Joy

~ Clarissa

In 1935, Stalin made a public speech where he said his famous phrase, “Life has become better, comrades. Life has become more joyful.” This moment marks the beginning of a full-scale campaign of terror that lasted until Stalin’s death, and it was accompanied by appeals to joy at every stage.

You were supposed to be joyful, beaming, ecstatic. Absence of constantly burbling joy was evidence that you were an enemy who did not appreciate the extraordinary advances achieved by the Stalinist regime. People started trying to outcompete each other in feverish demonstrations of joy. Humorous cartoons became popular that mocked moping weaklings who were unable to experience true Socialist joy. These were in need of being removed from the society of ecstatic achievement and transformation.

People often imagine Stalinism as grey, somber, miserable, with everybody shaking with terror. But it wasn’t like that at all. Our great-grandpatents remembered the 1930s as a time of endless picnics with colleagues, parades with colleagues, outings with colleagues, celebrations with colleagues. Soviet joy was collectivized. Trying to be joyful with your family was considered bourgeois and unprogressive.

Joy was obligatory. No personal tragedy could free you even temporarily from participating in collective celebrations. What, your grandma died and that’s why you don’t want to party? Are you valuing your bourgeois feelings more than the luminous achievements of the proletariat in its struggle against Western imperialism? You must be a spy!

People didn’t feel terror during Stalinism. “Grammy, were you scared back in 1937?” I asked my great-grandmother when the atrocities of the purges became widely discussed.

Grammy was visibly confused. “But why would I be afraid? I wasn’t an enemy,” she said.

She remained a faithful Stalinist until her death in 1993. “We had nothing,” she would reminisce. “One dress, one pair of shoes.  But we were so happy. You, youngsters, have no idea how to be this joyful anymore.”

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Published by Clarissa

14 thoughts on “Political Uses of Joy”

    1. Of course, because they were certain that only spies and enemies were punished. It’s the same with the supporters of cancel culture today. They know it won’t happen to them because they don’t deserve it. And it only happens to people who do deserve it.

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    2. “Did people believe that they were at no risk”

      I’ll repeat from an article I read years ago. The author’s mother had been an enthusiastic communist in Poland after WWII. When she was arrested she had no idea why, but she didn’t blame the party. She told herself she must have done something wrong because the party doesn’t make mistakes like that.

      Years later, she would meet with friends and they would fondly(!) reminisce and laugh about the tortures they endured while under arrest (none of them knew why they’d been arrested none of them blamed the party).

      Along with stupidity the human ability to rationalize away uncomfortable ideas really has no limits….

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      1. Exactly. Other Communists rationalized their arrest and torture by convincing themselves that it was part of a secret plan that in some mysterious way would bring about world revolution.

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  3. I think we’re very close to Clarissa declaring that “joy is khamas” now.

    For someone who supposedly has joy in her life outside of the blog, you spend such an inordinate amount of time condemning it — just because those you despise have embraced it.

    Come on, chill out, relax. Touch grass. Joy is good.

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    1. Perhaps it takes an experience of real joy to recognize when it is being faked. And that’s why this campaign will be a success – real joy is hard to come by nowadays so people can’t tell the difference.

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