"Woman plus..." Russian Society: Two Homosexual Subcultures

Russian Society: Two Homosexual Subcultures
by O. Zdravomyslova and M. Arutyunyan, based on an international sociological survey

When the 1917 proletarian revolution declared Russian women free and the gender conflict extinct, it simply rechanneled this conflict into people's subconscious. Bringing it back to the conscious level was both useless (no reasonable consequences would be effected) and sometimes harmful in that period. Today, when Russian people have to define and redefine their social identity continuously (opposition v. establishment; communists v. democrats; internationalists v. national patriots; and so forth), the conflict between male and female is continuing to escape public attention.
The vast male majority of modern Russians support paradigms which are a bizarre combination of sexes' equality postulates with patriarchal models of behavior. Even more important is that many women readily share these paradigms which, in turn, results in the gender conflict latent development under the coverage of illusory consensus between sexes. Comparative analyses of a number of surveys that were undertaken in 1991-94 in several Central European countries, East and West Germany, and Russia, however, yield clear evidence of severe and profound gender contradictions existing in Russia. Data obtained with those surveys may be easily interpreted to illustrate the gender conflict profiles at various levels of social, personal and family relations.

Actual and Aspired Influence Levels

Men's and women's outlooks on the latter influence in the family do not differ significantly from country to country, as illustrated in the Table 1.

Table 1. Perceived and aspired levels of women's influence in family (average %).

Nation	West Germany		East Germany		Poland		Russia		Hungary
Sex	F	M	F	M	F	M	F	M	F	M
Perceived	68	70	65	65	71	69	82	73	79	77
Aspired	66	65	59	61	68	66	70	68	75	75

While Russian women tend to estimate their role in family life higher than their foreign counterparts and much higher than men, these gaps are far less striking than those observed in responses to questions about women's influence in professional and political life (see Tables 2 and 3).

Table 2. Perceived and aspired levels of women's influence in respondent's profession (average %).

Nation	West Germany		East Germany		Poland		Russia		Hungary
Sex	F	M	F	M	F	M	F	M	F	M
Perceived	34	33	28	29	41	38	48	46	48	47
Aspired	54	50	51	48	54	46	52	43	42	41

Table 3. Perceived and aspired levels of women's influence in political life (average %).

Nation	West Germany		East Germany		Poland		Russia		Hungary
Sex	F	M	F	M	F	M	F	M	F	M
Perceived	28	29	18	20	28	28	26	24	24	27
Aspired	54	49	46	43	48	37	40	27	34	35

Three types of influence profiles are distinct: gender agreement on equality basis (East and West Germany); gender agreement on traditional basis (Hungary); and gender disagreement (Poland and Russia).

In case of equality-based gender agreement profile, both men and women aspire to increase women's influence in professional and political areas to as high as 50% (with the highest ratio in West Germany) and to decrease their influence in families (with East Germany leading). The noticeable fact is that in East Germany both men and women evaluate actual professional influence of women at very low levels. However, real-life data of women's professional occupation indicate on possibility of underestimation. Probably, this effect is a reflection of overall feminization of the East Germany population. Even in nations of this type, however, one should not speak of gender equality in family relations: in this area women still dominate.

In Hungary, on the contrary, both men and women are eager to reduce women's role in professional life. Hungarians seem to be quite happy with the 'family matriarchy': women would not give up their strong dominance over their families, and men would not aspire to rule households. The political sphere is the only one where both genders would admit women's participation to a somewhat larger extent; however, 34-35% influence level is obviously not enough to remove men from the political throne.

In Poland and, most of all, in Russia, the situation is the one of profound disagreement between sexes: women aspire to much larger share of the social pie than men would allot to them. This problem is most visible in Russia where women aspire to dominate over men in professional affairs, while men would want to reduce their current level of influence in this area. As for politics, Russian men are definitely against female participation in this area - this fact is emphasized through comparison with responses in other nations. On the other hand, Russian women would lay off the family burden in a more aggressive manner than their husbands expect. As shown in Table 1, wives aspire to reduce their influence upon family by 12%, while men are ready to take 5% only. This may result in nobody's responsibilities in families where a woman 'shake them off' and a man is not ready to 'catch'. These data are indicative of strong opposition between genders in Russia. Seemingly, it has already reached its 'acute' phase; at the same time, it has not yet manifested itself in any visible public activities or influential political movements. Restricted by deeply rooted behavior models and feeling guilty for having to realize their projections in the alien 'masculine' world, Russian women make up for it by ruling all by themselves in their traditional realm - the family (see Tables 4, 5 and 6).

Table 4. Women's perception of their spouses' involvement in hous ekeeping and raising children (average %).

Nation	West Germany	East Germany	Poland	Russia	Hungary
House	26	33	40	53	32
Children	38	37	43	56	39

Table 5. Women's satisfaction with their spouses' involvement in housekeeping (average %).

Nation	West Germany	East Germany	Poland	Russia	Hungary
Dissatisfied	25,6	18,3	24,1	27,8	19,4
Satisfied	55,8	56,8	54,2	46,1	58,9

Table 6. Women's satisfaction with their spouses' involvement in raising children (average %).

Nation	West Germany	East Germany	Poland	Russia	Hungary
Dissatisfied	13.6	13.3	20.2	29.7	14.3
Satisfied	66.3	67.4	61.0	46.7	63.9

The indicative fact is that Russian women rate their husbands' participation in housekeeping and raising children surprisingly high if compared with other nations - above 50%. No doubt, Russian women tend to exaggerate their husbands' role in the household, since men's prevalence in this area is not supported with objective data and common sense. At the same time, the level of wives' satisfaction with their husbands participation in both housekeeping and raising children is the lowest among the nations surveyed. Purely traditional (Hungary) or purely egalitarian (Germany) grounds seem to be better suited for family happiness than their bizarre mixture that seem to prevail in Russian spouses' minds.

Perceived Experience of Gender Interactions

That relations between genders are rather tense is clearly reflected in answers of male and female Russian respondents to a single question, 'How would you describe your experience with the opposite sex?' followed by eleven statements. Each statement was evaluated by respondents against the five-level scale ranging from 'positively no' to 'positively yes' (see Tables 7 and 8).

Table 7. Female respondents' perception of their personal experience with men and women (%).

Statement	Men		Women
Statement	Yes	No	Yes	No
Understand me	31,4	43,1	74,7	10,2
Deserve to be trusted	24,3	49,0	61,5	17,6
May serve models for me	11,8	72,1	30,3	44,7
May cause my adoration	14,5	61,9	28,1	47,9
Largely motivate me to live	30,0	52,9	16,8	64,8
Are providers of practical support	43,9	34,0	52,2	26,5
Are providers of emotional support	41,1	34,0	52,4	28,7
Are my competitors at work	7,6	86,3	19,8	62,7
Are my personal competitors	5,5	88,2	12,4	73,3
Conflict with me	6,3	80,2	29,1	52,9
Stimulate my professional growth	12,5	76,4	15,8	73,2

Respondents: 471 to 479 married women. Uncertain responses excluded.

Table 8. Male respondents' perception of their personal experience with men and women (%).

Statement	Men		Women
Statement	Yes	No	Yes	No
Understand me	77,2	6,9	48,9	22,9
Deserve to be trusted	57,4	19,1	39,6	32,6
May serve models for me	51,6	25,0	3,2	76,6
May cause my adoration	21,3	54,3	41,7	35,3
Largely motivate me to live	28,4	46,8	45,4	30,5
Are providers of practical support	73,9	9,1	23,6	58,6
Are providers of emotional support	43,0	33,9	45,9	29,2
Are my competitors at work	57,4	19,7	6,4	85,0
Are my personal competitors	26,9	50,5	10,1	78,6
Conflict with me	39,9	39,4	14,5	69,0
Stimulate my professional growth	47,3	31,2	10,2	78,1

Respondents: 185 to 189 married men. Uncertain responses excluded.

Proposed statements may be roughly grouped into five categories. The first group comprises understanding, trust, emotional support and conflicts and thus describes emotional aspects of personal relations. The second group describes professional and business relations through categories of professional growth and competition of colleagues. The third group of judgements describes social interactions: practical assistance, competition of individuals. The fourth group is composed of adoration and model for replication attitudes. Finally, the fifth 'group' probes the only posture: "men/women motivate me to do what I do". The latter is to investigate the spread of a traditional paradigm placing masked (and sometimes unmasked) sexual interplay at the center of all human activities.

Obtained responses are clearly indicative of the high level of gender segregation in respondents' personal and social interactions.

Female respondents obviously prefer their own sex in their attitudes to all statements in the first group, while male respondents - in their answers to three questions out of four: the exclusion is the emotional support attitudes. As for the second and the third groups of statements, both men and women tend to apply all the judgements therein to their own gender. The same is true of women's attitudes in the fourth group: adoration and respect are caused primarily by female models.

Men are somewhat more diverse in their choice: they tend to adore some women as well as men (though models of their own sex prevail). "Motivation" statement is the only one where respondents of either sex have demonstrated their preference of their opposites. However, only every other man and every third woman feel motivated by representatives of the other sex.

Though somewhat exaggerative, the only conclusion comes to mind: respondents represent two homosexual subcultures that have little in common from either spiritual or social point of view. What other interpretation can one render to explain the fact that most people turn for trust, understanding, respect and values (including negative) for persons of the same sex? On the other hand, all interactions between sexes are largely based on men being 'adored' with, and 'motivated' and 'supported' by women, and women in need of some practical and emotional support by their partners. In this connection, the visibl e paradox in respondents' minds is how they dare aspire for 'emotional support' without 'understanding' and 'trust'.

Russian gender profiles' peculiarities are most visible when it comes to comparison with other nations. Being limited in space, we restrict ourselves to analyze only those variables that illustrate Russians as being something definitely unique when compared against international benchmarks.

Russian men are world leaders in sports of failing to make women trust in them, rely on their practical support and even adore them. At the same time, they are much more inclined (if compared to machos in other nations) to find mutual trust and understanding in other men (for example, the homosexual 'understanding' statement is supported by 77% Russian male respondents against 49% in West Germany), follow their life model, adore them (21% in Russia v. 8% in W. Germany), grow professionally with their assistance; at the same time, they are the first to compete in their private lives (Russia - 27%; West Germany - 20%; Poland - 14%) and enter conflicts (Russia - 40%; West Germany - 27%; Poland - 18%).

On the other hand, Russian women are as oriented towards their own sex as Russian men are. In this respect they are also international leaders. Russian women's responses indicative of their critical and even hostile attitude towards men are far more frequent than they are in other nations covered with the survey.

Russian women understand each other better than their Polish, German or Hungarian counterparts (Russia - 75%; West Germany - 61%; Hungary - 21%); trust each other (Russia - 62%; West Germany - 35%); adore each other (Russia - 28%; West Germany -16 %; Poland - 24%).

Russian women uphold the opinion that their male compatriots' capacity to motivate them is rather feeble. Up to 53% of Russian women simply deny it (in Hungary - 45%; West Germany - 27%; Poland - 39%).

The interesting fact is that the vast majority of Russian women somehow manage to combine the above-described personal hostility towards men with avoiding conflicts with them. For instance, 80% of female respondents deny that they have conflicts with men, and 68% do it categorically (Hungary -42%; West Germany - 30%; Poland - 58%). The underlying reason is obvious: while gender contradictions are clearly manifested in objective analyses of their responses, women themselves hardly realize them, at least as a part of their personal experience.

Lack of conscious awareness of multiple gender conflicts and competition of sexes both in private life (while rates of satisfaction with marriage in Russia are extremely low: 65% of female respondents are satisfied with their marriage against almost 85% i n Germany) and professional sphere, which is the result of mutual mistrust and alienation of genders, leads to furthering the gap. Tensions between the real life and paradigms (as well as between contradictory paradigms that coexist in Russian minds) grow in intensity. As the result, mutual gender hostility accumulates on subconscious level. Feminist concepts and movements have failed to implant in Russia, which is easily explainable with the lack of conscious awareness of controversial gender stereotypes that determine both personal and social behavior of Russian citizens. The discussed data, however, should make readers aware that the most aggressive type of feminism may develop in Russia in response to this lag, and the probability of such development is strikingly high.