#24 | December 18-29, 1997  

by Genghis Goldberg

Tired of having dirty fingers waved in your face by pretentious moralizing types with goatees? Read on! Morality isn't as cut and dry as they think- and if you prepare yourself adequately, you can keep their hands at their sides for good by proving that to them.

We're all here in Russia for one reason: to make money and careers. We don't- can't, in fact- be distracted by moral issues. We don't have the time. The only thing is, we need to talk up that morality from time to time to keep the money coming in. How? we'll show you. But first, a little background:

"The clear lesson of the Sakharov fast," wrote the Washington Post on December 23, 1981, "is that criticism from the West makes a difference. It is easy for the ordinary American citizen to feel powerless against the Kremlin. Sometimes it even seems as though Western attention makes matters worse. Yet exiled Russians all say the same thing: the individuals on whose behalf there is constant pressure may be helped."

The Washington Post really dug human rights issues in 1981 and 1982. In fact, between May and August of 1982, the Post wrote no less than 25 articles about hunger strikes against the treatment of Afghan peoples by the Soviet army.

You don't get that kind of attention for human rights issues in Russia anymore. The only thing in recent history that even came close was coverage of a bill, proposed by communist legislators, which would have restricted freedom of religion in this country. In that case, the United States at least made a show of doing the right thing: U.S. Ambassador James Collins took time out from his lobbying activities on behalf of American cable companies to say that the United States was prepared to "speak out against religious discrimination." It was a necessary but also prudent move for the Clinton administration: there are, after all, a lot of Christian voters back home.

Still, for the most part, the editorial furor over that bill was faux-outrage, propelled by nostalgia for the old villains, the communists. In fact, most of our editorial writing now is no longer about human rights, but about economics.

Nearly sixteen years after it pulled our heartstrings for hunger-striking scientists, pleading with us to do all we can to help oppressed Afghans, that same Washington Post, which has been sleepwalking its way through the Chechen war, six years of police brutality in Russia's cities, Russia's total failure to prosecute contract killings, its loss of press freedom, brutal prison overcrowding and inhumane prison conditions, widespread non-payment of salaries, and other obvious human rights abuses- after all that, it offered the following editorial by Leonid Gozman:

"After 5 1/2 years of reforms, we live in a different country. Three generations of Soviet people grew up standing in lines. People didn't talk about 'to buy' but 'to get.' Either butter or bread was missing.

People used to come hundreds and thousands of kilometers to Moscow to buy sausage. So as not to waste 10 to 15 hours a week standing in lines, my mother, who is a highly qualified doctor, gave free consultations to the salesgirls in neighboring stores.

"There are no lines now. The choice of goods is no worse than in any other European country. And it is not only 'new Russians' who buy them- they cannot eat all the bananas and kiwi fruit. A few years ago, the price of a regular VCR was equivalent to the two-year salary of a qualified engineer. Now it is accessible to all. And we do not- thank God - need any more humanitarian aid.

"We went through a period when inflation was more than 20 percent per month. Now the ruble has stabilized, and the Russian economy is experiencing an inflow of money. In the past year alone, the volume of foreign investment has tripled. If this is not success, what is? It was Chubais, by the way, who was handling financial stabilization."

Okay, well, whatever. It's not like we're new to any of this. After all, the majority of the American press in 1983 let Ronald Reagan get away with describing Mobutu Sese Seko, the brutal paranoid dictator of Zaire, as a "voice of good sense and good will." A few years later, President Bush described him as "one of our most valued friends," and nobody even blinked.

Mobutu was a revolting human being, said to be hated even by his closest aides, a man so terrified of his own people that he spent the majority of his time in France, but he was an anti-communist, which was about all the United States cared about back then, so he had our backing.

Today communism is dead, and we have a bigger problem: Gozman's kiwis. Who will let us sell them? And at what price? Inquiring minds at the eXile want to know!

"The new moral relativism," said Alexander Tkachenko, head of the Moscow office of International PEN, who has been following the recent Vitukhnovskaya drug case (see Mark Ames's column) "is based on one supposition, that economics is more important than human rights. I personally believe that everything begins with human rights, that this is the first priority, that it is a necessary precondition for prosperity. But the majority of people in charge these days believe otherwise."

The Washington Post, Sylvester Stallone, Tom Clancy and the rest cried foul when basic freedoms were denied in Russia before the era of perestroika. But will they care if it happens in a market economy? "You don't care in China, why would you care here?" said Tkachenko. "Here the foundation has been laid for an unfree population but a free economy. It's doubtful that there would be much protest if that came about. It's all relative."

Some people, it seems, just can't take a joke. They should have known back then we were kidding.

We here at the eXile know better. Here's our in-depth guide on when to care, when not to care, and how in any case to make the most out of pretending to take either position:

1. Go with the flow.
Freak out about human rights abuses only when the country in question has not sought aid from the I.M.F. and the World Bank. Remember, there is a limited amount of human-rights news coverage, a limited amount of airtime, none of which you want to waste on market-cooperative countries like Indonesia, China, and Mexico. Focus instead on villains like Serbia and Belarus, covertly playing up racial-ethnic stereotypes, i.e. "Not only do they have high tariffs, they look like vampires!" If you're lucky, some of those countries will be run by brutal cretins like Lukashenko, who will allow you the opportunity to be sincerely horrified and self-interestedly calculating at the same time. After all, you can only complain about one country at a time, right?

2. Never hesitate to remind doubters that prosperity will bring an instant end to human-rights abuses.
A great way around complaints about human-rights problems is the whole poverty issue, which, skillfully managed, can be turned around on your rhetorical opponents. High-horse types will complain about corporate chiefs who use unpaid, unfree and overworked labor to enrich themselves. Don't fall for their trap. Remind them instead that without those corporate chiefs, there'd be no industry at all- and then just imagine how poor everyone would be! Lefty types always think they have the poverty market cornered, but actually it's an issue that's there for the taking, if you play it smart.

3. We're all grown-ups here.
So the cops in Moscow beat up a few people- so what? What did Russians expect- a Rose Bowl parade with a goddamn friendship float? The "We're all grown-ups and we live in a tough world" argument terrifies the average moralizing human-rights defender, since a lot of them went to college and have not, in fact, ever lived in a tough world. That you never have either is a fact you don't have to reveal. Plus you make a lot of money, while they don't, which convinces them deep down that you really do know more about life than they do. There's no such thing as playing this card too often- it never fails. A really great line to add to this one, which is almost guaranteed to end the conversation in your favor, is this: "Yeah, I thought like that when I was a sophomore too."

4. Demand free and fair elections whenever your market access is threatened.
This is a great one to use because your type of person, the free-marketeer, generally has a better claim to the whole free-election issue than lefty types your opponent may be associated with, just because they also happen to be sending the human-rights flag up the pole for their own reasons. After all, all of those lefty intellectuals totally bought that one-party "vanguard of the elite" deal way back when, while you knew better.

Quote the U.S. constitution a lot, it scares most of these types (who are generally secretly uncomfortable with parts of it, particularly the right-to-bear-arms bit). Carry a gun, call constantly for lower taxes like the founding fathers, play up that act. Then, when some socialist/protectionist yo-yo in the third world wins an election, claim it was unfair and press for international intervention. In extreme cases, like with Karadzic, you might even get Marines involved and have new elections held. But when a really good guy like Boris Yeltsin completely fudges a big election, speak confidently about "progress toward democracy." Again, you own this territory, morally. Trotsky/Stalin blew up in the face of those whiny types, and they've been pretty timid about libertarian issues ever since.

The really great thing about this, the thing that you know compromises your opponents the most, is the fact that they really cared about their ideals at one point. They even wore their facial hair like the Guevara/Trotsky types they idolized. But you never did that with the Shah. That was just business. Remind them what hysterical rhetorical drivers they are and were, then lean back and show how calm you are at the wheel.

5. Get Down to Brass Tacks.
The things you want are pretty simple. You want stable local currencies, you want a total end to state subsidies, you want everyone exposed to market risk and world prices, and you want low tariffs. On the other hand, currency/security markets are not, unfortunately, totally risk-free. There are "corrections" from time to time. You can't afford to lose too much, so you need to convince people that taxpayer bailouts of foreign currencies, like that recent IMF thing in Korea, are necessary.

This, of course, is the tricky part. You're all for market risk on the one hand, and kind of not all that for it on the other. Putting this over on your practiced whiner is pretty tough, but the ordinary doubter, who isn't educated about these things but is just working on instinct which tells him something about all of this smells a little weird, well, he can be convinced by straight talking. Just take him aside and put it to him bluntly. "Look, if a whole bunch of miners in southern Russia get laid off, it doesn't hurt you," you can say. "But if the ruble collapses, we're all fucked. The Dow Jones will plummet. Our own companies will be frantically laying people off to raise their share prices. So we've got to keep that currency alive at all costs."

If he starts trying to make distinctions between currencies and stocks and bonds, just cut him off abruptly and tell him, in no uncertain terms, that he has no idea what he's talking about. He'll believe you- trust us.

And in general, don't let him think about any of this too much- buy him a drink, start talking about girls, do whatever you have to do to distract him, then drop the matter entirely. The important thing is to get that "ring-around-the-collar" fear in his head that his fate is somehow tied to the ruble, or the peso, or whatever. If he's dumb and horny enough, he'll buy it.

6. Dress nicely and wash, wash, wash.
Have you ever seen a Burson-Marsteller consultant? He looks great! A Red Cross first aid worker wouldn't hesitate to dress a wound with his socks. Now, ever take a close look at those human rights workers? They're a mess! They stay up all night, battling grave moral and professional doubts, neglecting their teeth, reading Dostoyevsky and Achebe, wandering their apartments in their briefs, smoking Camels, muttering "Shit! Fuck!" and making messes of their personal lives.

These people are not prepared to debate you on the rights and wrongs of the world. They can't even deal with their laundry, much less decide the fate of nations. Remind them of that. Most of them are too young to remember the Peace Corps of the Kennedy era, before it became cool to dress like a pig. They think that the difference in appearance is somehow connected to the difference in ideology- and will be suitably cowering and unsure of themselves as a result. Anyway, follow simple dental care procedure, wash your hair regularly, and use a good moisturizer. Thanks to economic reform, a wide selection of them are now available here in Moscow.

Moral relativism isn't as hard as it sounds. The only really difficult part is selling your newfound enthusiasm for it to your girlfriend, wife, or parents. On the other hand, if you were never really all that charming growing up, turning into a full-fledged two-faced swine now may actually be a psychological boon to you. Your mother will recall happy memories of you that never actually occurred. And your significant others will spend more time trying to find in themselves the reason for your moral collapse then they will in searching out someone new. Chicks really dig guys who used to read poetry but now talk about defending the ruble. They feel like they have to repair your tortured soul. Let 'em try! They might even do the dishes, too.

As our own governments have proven over the years, public morality is an act, and those who are deftest at playing their roles come out on top. Privatized Russia is turning into a great battleground for actors in morality plays. Don't come up short. Read the eXile- and learn how to stay a winner!