In Search of Russia's Strong Sex

In an interview with Novye Izvestiya, Russian actress Alla Demidova recalled visiting the home of Vladimir [“Volodya”] Vysotsky, with whom she had acted in The Cherry Orchard and Hamlet {see RL, February 1998}. Demidova was met at the door by Vysotsky’s wife, Marina Vladi, who was holding a drill. Marina, Demidova asked, slightly confused, what are you doing?

“I’m putting in nails in the bathroom,” Vladi replied.

“But what about Volodya?”

“Oh, Volodya, he’s lying around on the couch like a Russian muzhik.”

Then there is this story, as told by writer Karem Rashem: “The greatest soldier in the history of Russia was General Gorbatov. In his youth, he swore that he would speak only the truth under any circumstances until his death. When he was told before the war: tomorrow you will go out and announce before the regiment that your division commander is an enemy of the people, he went out and said: my division commander is not an enemy of the people. And he was sent to the gulag.”

These two sketches illustrate the conflicting images of Russian men in today’s society. Tough, high-minded muzhiks or weak brats, spoiled by their women? In films and in fiction, you will find both pictures. And perhaps both are accurate. Certainly, the image of Russian men has changed since the Second World War, along with women’s expectations. So what does this image look like today?

From Hero to Anti-Hero

Time was, there was a simple answer to the question “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Many Russian boys would have said “a soldier.” Their role models – Vasily Gubanov, Alexei Batalov, Vyacheslav Tikhonov – were actors in World War II movies playing soldiers or spies. They were tough and stoic, their principles were uncompromising and they were willing to lay down their lives for the motherland without question.

Karem Rashem, a proponent of traditional military values, said he still believes in this image of the soldier. “Why is the army maintained?” he asked rhetorically. “To strengthen the state, of course. An officer is its main support, its example of honor and dignity. Therefore, metaphorically speaking, his readiness to fight must be displayed everywhere and serve as an example for the entire male population of our country.” In Rashem’s opinion, a soldier is equated with a real man: “...the greatness of a soldier, of a real man, cannot exist without bondage, without sacred duties to his family, business and country.”

Not surprisingly, young Russian men these days balk at such enormous responsibilities. To be expected to be a pillar of support to country and family, to carry the world on your shoulders – all of this is a bit too much to stomach. The army has been thoroughly discredited by the fiascoes in Afghanistan and Chechnya, and today’s “heroes” of popular culture are much more likely to be successful young mobsters. According to the Editor-in-Chief of the Russian Edition of Men’s Health, Ilya Bezouglyi, “the macho image has become stronger since perestroika, when this new class of mobsters appeared. It’s a new, very visible slice of society – these bad guys who don’t try to hide that they are bad guys ... A lot of Russian men from the middle class, lower middle class, they just look at these guys and they find that they are very attractive.”

Of course, to young men who are struggling to get by, the lives of New Russian gangsters look like pure glamour. These “heroes” are in their 20s or, at most, 30s, they sport maroon jackets, drive Mercedes or BMWs and fling their money around in flashy nightclubs and on fancy girls. Who cares how they came by it! Several years ago, Bezouglyi said, it was all the rage for ordinary guys to dress up like mobsters and even adopt their mannerisms. And to some extent, this holds true to this day. No wonder traditionalists like Rashem are bemoaning the state of contemporary Russian morals.

New Style

But, thankfully, gangsters are not the only ideal Russian guys are striving for. For one thing, according to Yuliya Menshova, host of the popular TV talk show Ya Sama (On My Own), the image of a “real man” in Russia is no longer as categorical as it used to be. A middle class is springing up {see RL, November 1997}, she said, made up largely of young, urban males with a Western outlook and money to spend. As Bezouglyi noted: “a new population of Russian males has appeared during the last ten years ... there are enough young, ambitious, relatively successful career-oriented Russian males – professionals and young businessmen who care about their health, don’t want to be like their parents. They want to live longer, they want to look better, and they care about things like grooming, health, sex, career, success... they’re kind of tired of experimenting with their health and they’re tired of all these extremes they’ve had to face. They’re striving for a normal, stable, quiet life.”

With such men, as with their gangster brothers, image is key. They buy up grooming products – cologne, aftershave, deodorant – like there’s no tomorrow and spend a large proportion of their income on clothing (according to Bezouglyi, proportionally much more than Americans). “Russia is still a semi-Asian country,” he said, “and image still means a lot here. They still try to show off, they still try to look better than they are, they’re a bit more expansive ...”

Presidential Press Secretary Sergei Yastrzhembsky is an example of one who has perfected his image. Known as a snappy dresser, his suits are impeccable, his tie collection impressive (it is said that his ties do not repeat themselves more often than once every three months). Looking at him, the words “refined” and “sophisticated” leap to mind. Yastrzhembsky is a connoisseur of wine and French cooking, as well as a long-time tennis player. He is also quick on his toes in the political arena and has been credited with smoothing over Yeltsin’s gaffes and repairing the presidential image on many an occasion. In a poll taken last December, Yastrzhembsky’s personal image-making showed its results: he was voted 19th among Russia’s most influential political players – two notches above the Defense Minister.

Still, image is often reserved to clothes and grooming. Working out has yet to catch on in a big way, even though gym chains like Gold’s and World Class are becoming increasingly popular among New Russians. Your average Ivan, on the other hand, is more likely to kick a soccer ball around with his friends on a Saturday, if he engages in any kind of exercise at all.

What Women Want

When it comes to women’s expectations, Menshova feels that there is a world of difference between the image and the truth: “It’s no longer the case,” she said, “that the man must earn money in order to be called a real man, it is no longer necessary to be the best, strong, to cope with all difficulties – things that women used to lay on men’s shoulders.” Now, she said, if a woman earns money, then inwardly, that woman is not terribly worried if her man is not the “locomotive of the family.”

Outwardly, though, it’s a different story. For, Menshova argued, women are not yet risking to express these thoughts out loud: “Nominally, the image remains the same, women still support the outward feeling that such a man is important to them, while inside, in essence, they have long been at peace with an equal situation – I earn money, my husband earns money, maybe I earn more than he does.”

Menshova herself thinks of her father, Vladimir Menshov – director of the 1981 Oscar winner Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears, as embodying many of the traits of a “real Russian man.” “He is very active, inventive, he takes the initiative, makes decisions ... With him, it is fun and interesting ... In this, his character coincides with the ideal of a man. The dream of Russian women, then and now, is Gosha in Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears. Papa shares many of Gosha’s characteristics.” In the film, Gosha is a jack-of-all-trades, by turns a gallant cavalier, an accomplished cook and the right guy to have around in a fight. In his own way, he is both macho and caring.

In the realm of romance, Moscow journalist Alla Pavlova listed spiritual conversations and walks under the moon as big turn-ons. She also had some rather sarcastic advice to give to potential suitors (evidently caused by bad date experiences in the past!): carry more money in your pocket than the cost of a metro token, don’t expect to charm a woman while drunk, forget about your deep passion for computers or cars. And, oh yeah, don’t forget to use deodorant.

In an interview with Komsomolskaya Pravda, feminist icon Maria Arbatova talked about the kind of man she finds sexually attractive: “Apart from his appearance, he must be a personality. I like realized men and not crybabies. As soon as a man begins to talk about how hard life is, all my erogenous zones atrophy.”

But progressive women like Menshova and Arbatova hardly speak for all of Russia. For their social and economic positions give them the kind of freedom that most lack. As Bezouglyi put it, the majority of Russian women “are still very much dependent on their boyfriends or husbands. It’s still like in the States back in the ‘50s – they want to stay home, they’re sick and tired of working in an aggressive environment full of sexual harassment, accidents, so they expect a lot of support from men. It’s kind of hard to be a man in Russia these days because you not only have to be responsible for your family, financially and emotionally, you also very often find yourself being the only one who brings the money home, and women do expect that ... And, as anywhere else in the world, they expect men to be giving and sharing and emotional, but very tough at the same time.”

“Of course,” he added, “Russian females never pay on dates, never. Even women with high incomes ... have told me that they sometimes offer to pay for themselves. But if a guy actually accepts this offer, forget it, they will never meet him again.”

More Girls Than Boys

Russia has always suffered from a shortage of men (currently men make up only 47% of the total population). After the Second World War, in which 27 million Soviets were killed and the bulk of the casualties were male, this shortage was especially acute. There was even a popular song in the 1960s that went: na desyat devchyonok po statistike devyat rebyat (“according to statistics, there are only nine boys for ten girls”). In many ways, this “deficit” has placed Russian men in an enviable position. Not only are they sought after, they also have more choice. And yet, as Alexander Vorobyov, Editor-in-Chief of Medved (Bear) magazine, said: “when there are more women than men, a man has less stimulus to ‘win his girl.’ Although this is still a question of a man’s ambition.”

The deficit of men has other consequences as well. “We’re kind of spoiled here,” Bezouglyi admitted wryly. “People in the States, they watch their mouth much more, they behave themselves, political correctness, all that. Over here, a man is still a man, and it’s much easier to be a man here. You can be a total male chauvinist pig here and feel perfectly fine. It’s very accepted – by women too.” Promiscuity among men is also quite accepted, if not outright admired. Many Russians, for instance, cannot understand what all the fuss is about when it comes to President Bill Clinton’s ongoing sex scandals. Attitudes range from “Big deal!” to “Way to go, Bill!”

So, in many ways, Russia remains a traditional society. There is still the notion of men’s work (outside the home) and women’s work (taking care of the home, including everything from child care, to cooking, to – it appears – putting in nails in the bathroom), and a woman is expected to cope with these tasks whether or not she has a job outside the home.

One of the most visible of Russia’s new generation of leaders – former Vice-premier Boris Nemtsov (38) – confessed in his book Provincial that he is lost in the kitchen and lives on omelets when his wife is away. And Vladimir Ardzhevanidze, Europe’s Tae Kwan Do champion, who is half-Russian, half-Georgian, told Ya Sama magazine outright: “A woman should know her place. She should know her woman’s business ... When I come home from work, everything should be tidied up and she should be waiting for me.” A man, on the other hand, “is a hunter in life. He must achieve a woman ...”

On the positive side, Russian men do believe in romantic gestures in their “pursuit” of women – from little things like extending a hand to help a woman off a bus, to gifts of flowers, chocolates or perfume. To many Western women, these gestures are a welcome surprise. But Menshova has her own view on the matter. “It is a question of upbringing ... I would not say that Russian men are particularly romantic because, in most cases, flowers, helping with a coat, etc., happen rather automatically, and they don’t contain any especially romantic meaning ... For me, it is even unpleasant because it is a stereotype. We have this so-called candy period, when men without fail give champagne, a box of candy and flowers.”

Another consequence of the shortage of males is intense competition among women for “the right guy.” According to Bezouglyi, “there are many more so-called decent women – beautiful, good-looking, in good health and without bad habits – than men like this [in Russia] ... And the women have always been closer to Western standards.” The obvious implication is that women spend more time on their looks because they have to, while men can get away with just being their “adorable selves.”

More ominously, according to a Human Rights Watch report, 14,000 women die every year at the hands of their husbands or other family members in Russia. And the Interior Ministry reported that, in 1996, 80% of all violent acts were committed within the family. Most of these acts go unreported, as there is still a widespread belief that “if he beats you, he must love you.” In another arena, ultranationalist Duma Deputy Vladimir Zhirinovsky obviously has no qualms about attacking female deputies during Duma sessions – and justifying his behavior by their lack of femininity (see Note Book).

Reverse Discrimination

But before labeling Russian men as macho monsters, the situation should also be looked at from another standpoint. As a matter of fact, there are quite a few public leaders who see Russian men as a victim of gender discrimination. There is the idea – propounded by the leader of the “Women of Russia” movement, Yekaterina Lakhova, among others – that the myth of the male as the head of the family, as an aggressive leader who has no right to show his softer side, is taking its toll on male health. In other words, men suffer from the stress of being placed first.

Take life expectancy. The Journal of the American Medical Association recently published a survey showing that, during the first half of the 1990s, the life expectancy of Russian men fell from 63.8 years to 57.7 (from 74.4 to 71.2 for women). This male-female differential – about 13 years – has no parallel in any developed country, and according to Lakhova, the mortality rate of working-aged men is currently almost the same as it was a century ago. Men in Russia are eight times more likely than women to have infectious diseases, and four times more likely to have tuberculosis. Their incidences of heart disease, alcoholism and suicide are the highest in the developed world. And drug abuse is on the rise among young men. In 1997, 20,000 young Muscovites were declared unfit to serve in the army for health reasons.

So what does all this have to do with discrimination? Well, for one thing, men are doing the majority of dangerous and harmful work in Russia (Lakhova stated that 79% of those injured in manufacturing are men). As comic Mikhail Zhvanetsky said, poking fun at today’s business terminology: “If a man comes home from work beaten up, that’s called small business. If he comes home killed, that’s big business.” Work-related stress can also lead to alcoholism and depression. “How many drinking bouts and divorces have been provoked by the principle that the man is the head of the family!” exclaimed Lakhova. And, partly because there is no place in Russian society for the nurturing male, men have almost no chance of being granted custody of children. A study conducted by the Russian State Statistics Committee in 1996 did not reveal a single case of a man taking a leave of absence to care for his children. The “Women of Russia” movement is currently working to get this practice changed and to lower the retirement age of Russian men to 55 (from 60 or 65). After all, you can’t give a pension to someone who is already dead.

Adaptation and Desperation

A major factor contributing to the health problems of Russian men is the difficulty of adapting to a market economy. Men who formerly had no trouble supporting their families on a decent level are now struggling at or below the poverty line. Men in professions that used to be privileged and revered – teachers, doctors, scientists – can barely make ends meet, and the shock is nasty. Those who are young, well-educated and enterprising enough may have an opportunity to turn to business. But for the others, there seems to be no place.

Many young people have trouble understanding the older generation’s failure to adapt. “A real man,” Menshova asserted, “is someone who has managed to get his bearings in this new life. To this day, they are still living in comparison with yesterday ... If you have already found your bearings, you want to snap your fingers in front of the guy’s face and say: ‘dear, we have lived for a very long time in another world, you’ve got to understand it, you have to adapt to it.’ Moreover, it is terribly off-putting to hear ... that the present day is something different. Let’s go ahead and act in the present day.”

Medved’s Vorobyov formulated this idea slightly differently: “A real man,” he said, “is someone who is capable of enduring any difficult situation. A transfer from one economic system to another is without a doubt an extremely complicated situation, and those who have accomplished this, they are truly well done, they are truly ‘real men’.”

One excellent example of adaptation in today’s Russia is opera singer turned entrepreneur Alexander Voroshilo. For many years, Voroshilo had a shining career on the stage of Moscow’s Bolshoi theater. Then, in 1983, he caught pneumonia, which led to chronic bronchitis, and could hardly talk. Just like that, his career was over. Desperate for work, Voroshilo threw himself into the first opportunity – sausages – and today, he is the head of a sausage empire. In an interview with Ogonyok weekly, Voroshilo talked about how he embarked on his new life: “There was fear, but nothing else remained. Who besides me is to feed my family? If a person is talented ... then he is most likely capable of mastering another business. The recipe for success is the same throughout the world. You place a goal in front of you and head toward it.”

But Voroshilo’s story is only one success out of many failures. According to Lakhova, only 10% of Russian males are currently capable of supporting their families. Many members of the intelligentsia are simply incapable of becoming taxi drivers. And understandably. As Men’s Health’s Bezouglyi recounted: “My father was an aerospace engineer all his life. He built up space technology in this country, worked for 30 years, and then when he was around 50, the whole program was just closed. That was a big tragedy for him ... and he still cannot overcome it completely. I am afraid that for the next several years, life for him will not get easier, because now is not the time for this kind of people.” Even Voroshilo himself confessed that he “suffered terribly” in making the switch to business: “Singing for me is the meaning of existence.”

As a result of business dynamics in the new Russia, the younger generation often ends up supporting the older one. The drivers of BMWs are not doctors and lawyers in their 50s, as in the States, they are young guys in their 20s or 30s – mobsters or businessmen or both. “It’s tough,” Bezouglyi said, “it’s a jungle situation, only the strongest survive.”

School of Life

Today, Russian men are required to complete two years of military service, although exemptions do occur for health reasons and for those who have completed higher education. Some say the army is a school of life, where men learn how to be men. Others call it a dangerous exercise in violence and emotional scarring. In Moscow alone, over 12,000 young men are reportedly hiding out from military service – about the same number the capital sent out to serve last year. Some are terrified by stories of hazing and accidents. Some see no point in serving for meager pay that comes months late. Others just don’t see the point of serving at all when they can get away without it. Last year, according to Interfax, only five cases against draft dodgers made it to court in Moscow.

In many ways, these young men are lucky to have been born at a time when they have a choice. As Bezouglyi recounted: “When I was 18, there was no opportunity to escape this, simply because we had a war in Afghanistan, and everybody had to go (except for people in technical schools maybe).” He compared the experience to being sent to prison, yet said that the army taught him valuable and irreplaceable lessons about men’s characters. “They call it a school of life,” he said, “but it’s a very ugly way to learn things about life.”

Ugly, indeed. Even during peacetime, military life is full of dangers and hardships. Many young conscripts are undernourished, and in a recent study, over 70,000 were found to be mentally unstable. According to The Moscow Tribune, over 80% of potential conscripts plan to dodge the draft in 1998. Perhaps bowing to the inevitable, the Kremlin plans to reduce the army by 500,000 soldiers, to 1.2 million, by the end of 1998 and eventually abolish conscription in favor of a professional army.

The problems with today’s army are very real. But, in the face of this, some young men continue to serve out of a sense of duty. And for those, young and old, who have fought for Russia, it must be tough to see the lack of respect for the army among today’s youth. General-Major Viktor Nikulin, who is in charge of military recruitment in the Saratov region, maintained that, come what may, “military service remains the most important pursuit for men.”

Duma deputy Stanislav Govorukhin also has a deep respect for the military. His documentary film entitled The Russia We Lost bemoans the loss of traditional religious and social ideals in Russia. Govorukhin’s son volunteered for active duty in Chechnya, where he lost a leg, and later made his own patriotic documentary about his experiences.

Meanwhile, the image of a military man continues to have some resonance with Russians even if much of the shine has rubbed off. General Alexander Lebed, who won himself a reputation as a no-nonsense commander in Moldova’s Transdnestr region and came in a surprise third in the first round of the 1996 presidential elections, is widely respected. Fired as secretary of the Security Council (many feel as a scapegoat for Yeltsin’s Chechnya policy), Lebed is now back in the spotlight as a candidate for governor of Siberia’s Krasnoyarsk region (though he is trailing badly in the polls at press time). Russian women of a certain age consider Lebed’s deep voice and uncompromising stance sexy. And even those who don’t agree have to admit that he seems like a “real muzhik.”

Lebed would almost certainly agree with Rashem’s view that “it is important to understand that the strength of a man, of the army, of any stable society, is based on respect for yourself, for commanders and for the Fatherland ... A man who feels deep respect for the Defense Minister, the President is a true soldier in the highest sense of the word ... If an army wants to be victorious, it must honor its commander under any circumstances. This is also the deepest moral of a man not only in the army, but in society, in the church as well.”

In Russia now, the men – and women – who would support such an extreme position are few and far between. Today, men are admired more for their language skills and business savvy than for their moral depth or unwavering loyalty. They are not expected to obey their leaders without question, or to sacrifice themselves like General Gorbatov. But one can hope (as does this female correspondent), when all this transitioning is through, that giving flowers will not be passe. And that getting up off the couch to help your wife pound in some nails will be the norm, rather than the exception.  RL

– Vladimir Dernovoi also contributed to this article.

“Do you want me to tell you the truth about men? They have one brain convolution and you have two. You have to feel sorry for them. They’re the weak sex.”

Actress Nina Ruslanova (Komsomolskaya Pravda) 

“... I love men with stable habits. Not the best ones – maybe even extravagant ones – even better. But in the eyes of girlfriends, such a man can always be justified – he’s an eccentric and with his peculiarities. But all the same a man, and in this lies his main strength ... So long as you are fighting his stupid habits, he’s yours. As soon as you win, he leaves you. Why fight? It’s better to forgive and prolong the pleasure.”

Freelance journalist Yelena Levina (Komsomolskaya Pravda) 

“Stanislav Yezhi Lets believed ... that out of the three things that bring a man pleasure (work, cars and women), the best is the dog. In my opinion, what brings men even more pleasure is money, or to be more exact, the process of obtaining it.” 

Yuri Katsman, Editor-in-Chief, Dengi Magazine

“I believe that we don’t have any muzhiks among actors, that the strongest sex in Russia is women. All the same, the men contrive to play some sort of strong characters.”

Stage actress Alla Demidova (Novye Izvestiya)

“My first husband – an opera singer – was well adapted to the socialist system and was absolutely helpless in the new one. Helplessness in the face of capitalism is a common trait of many ex-husbands.”

Maria Arbatova, playwright and feminist icon (Komsomolskaya Pravda)