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I hope you will never see this letter (1961)

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81–90 of 122 posts

Re: I hope you will never see this letter (1961)

#81
post #61

From a modern perspective, it is a bit harsh to demand from one's wife ¨Hey babe, I am not coming back, please raise our two kids, oh and by the way please help our parents also!¨ - if she really was not at all informed.

Yes, because asking your wife and the mother of the children the two of you created together knowing that they're a commitment of decades at least, to then take care of those children for as long as she can is just so old-fashioned and sexist? What's the "modern perspective" he missed out on here? That caring for one's own children is a circumstantial and fluid responsibility depending on convenience levels? Asking h…

Calm down, I’m sure a wife would say similar things given the circumstances.

If I was on my death bed or my wife was we would both ask each other to look after our kids.

Re: I hope you will never see this letter (1961)

#82

Anyone who hasn't seen "For All Mankind" should check it out. It depicts a future that might have transpired if the Russians had beaten the USA to the moon.

It's a great show and at times really makes you wish that's how things would have transpired (i.e., we would not have taken a collective ~30 year break from space travel). Fully seconding this recommendation!

Re: I hope you will never see this letter (1961)

#83
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He died in a training flight accident when he was only 34. I would still call it "untimely".

Thank-you for sharing that. I had not realized he would survive the mission in the article, only to ultimately pass so young.

I remember reading an SF story in which the Soviets think Venus is a relatively hospitable jungle, send Gagarin there, then come up with the plane crash story to cover up their mistake. Sadly I can't find it at the moment.

Re: I hope you will never see this letter (1961)

#84
post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, because asking your wife and the mother of the children the two of you created together knowing that they're a commitment of decades at least, to then take care of those children for as long as she can is just so old-fashioned and sexist? What's the "modern perspective" he missed out on here? That caring for one's own children is a circumstantial and fluid responsibility depending on convenience levels? Asking h…

Calm down, I’m sure a wife would say similar things given the circumstances. If I was on my death bed or my wife was we would both ask each other to look after our kids.

I think you misunderstood my comment. I was arguing that there's nothing at all wrong with asking a wife (or husband) to take care of the kids or even asking either to try doing the same for your parents. Marriage shouldn't just be a passing transactional thing with responsibilities that completely end if one partner dies.

Re: I hope you will never see this letter (1961)

#87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does it really matter the what and the who, if in practice both are effecting total submission and/or supression of dissent?

Look, I think your career ending example would make a better case for what you are trying to argue. If you dig into history of longstanding democratic countries like US and Switzerland, you find plenty of rioting and chaotic infighting throughout centuries. Classic republican (as in, US founders) thinking would be that while unfortunate, this is preferable to a police state being able to establish a true monopoly on…

I don't think we are disagreeing. Of course ideological and political conflict are to be expected in any healthy civil society. But my argument is that the threat of violence by the government is no longer what keeps people quiet, no matter how discontent they are.

Re: I hope you will never see this letter (1961)

#88
post #74

There were also the other words of Yuri Gagarin, on the way back from space: "Я горю, прощайте товарищи" ("I'm on fire. Farewell, comrades"). The capsule somehow managed to land successfully, and he ended up being alive.

He didn't land in capsule, he parachuted at approx 7km altitude or so.

wow, that must have taken a while

Re: I hope you will never see this letter (1961)

#89
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GP may be referring to this: > Raise them as people who will deserve to live a new communist society. > I wish to dedicate this flight to the people of the new communist society... Would it seem political if someone wrote: > Raise them as people who will deserve to live a new capitalist society. > I wish to dedicate this flight to the people of the new capitalist society...

I think the America parallels to this statement would be God, democracy, "our way of life" and such, references to which would not at all be unexpected in a letter such as this from the 60's.

I get it now.

Americans think "communism" is an icky political thing that Soviets were coerced to like, unlike "freedom and democracy (TM)", worthy abstract ideals that all Americans (nay, all Humans) should rightfully worship naturally and organically.

It's pretty amusing!

Re: I hope you will never see this letter (1961)

#90
post #52

There were also the other words of Yuri Gagarin, on the way back from space: "Я горю, прощайте товарищи" ("I'm on fire. Farewell, comrades"). The capsule somehow managed to land successfully, and he ended up being alive.

> горю Wow, such wide-ranging cognates! https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-Eur... ("warm", "thermal", "furnace", and even the "garam" in "garam masala") I'm glad he made it back to Earth safely.

TIL, my new fun fact for Garam Masla -- out of this world spice
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