[LAF] Fwd: [smygo] A Brief History of Peasant Tolstoyans

[Volodya]

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Joy Wood wrote:
>  v interesting.  btw, what is the meaning of "kulaks"?

Literally кулак (kulak) means the "fist". It was the term used by
revolutionaries to refer to peasant farmers who used hired labour (probably
implying that they held the profits in their fist and shared nothing, i.e.
hoarding the wealth). Of course Bolsheviki has decided to use the term for
wealthy peasants whether or not they used hired labour, and "dekulak" them by
confiscating their food, land, and everything else, and breaking their families
up by sending their families to Siberia. There were multiple waves of this,
first was almost directly after the revolution, and was mostly done by the
peasants themselves, who knew who was exploiting them; but later Bolsheviki
simply needed the food and money to sustain the huge army and bureaucracy
apparatus that they have created, and peasantry was never too much in the
Bolshevik ideals which gave the perfect excuse to go and take their stuff.

In other way, kulak is a negative power word, with some groups attempting to
change its meaning to suit their goals.

A little bit of trivia: I don't really know to what extent it is true, since in
my family memories to get changed to fit the desired effect; but from what i
understand my grandfather's family (mother's father) went through the process of
being accused of being kulaks. This happened because in their family they had
disproportionate number of sons (to daughters). Because of that they managed to
grow more (granted that the sexism of males working the fields, while women
doing housework had something to do with this). Even though there was no hired
labour involved, the family was broken apart.

Also i think many Mahnovites were subjected to persecution because of
(accusations of) being or because of (accusations of) collaborating with kulaks.

                        - Volodya

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