Russian women. Reasoning aloud

In America I am Russian. In Russia I am American. And as a woman I straddle the fence, somewhere between the culture I inherited and the American feminist one I was brought up with. The two identities have coexisted without a problem and most in my life was easily explained within my Russian-American identity. But a year of living in Moscow seems to have both accentuated the differences while simultaneously closing the gap between them. I guess it is only in exploring the differences within ourselves that we can reconcile them.

There were many challenging aspects to being a young American woman in Moscow. These were complicated by the fact that the American is modified by Russian and my Russian family regarded me as no different as anyone else in Russia. So you easily blend in because of your unflawed Russian and cultural understanding and after awhile people regard you as one of them. Do not get me wrong--this is a huge plus, particularly in my line of work. But it does take away your freedom to be shocked, outraged or simply curious about something that everyone considers completely normal.
So here I am a 25-year-old unmarried woman in Moscow. That was shocking to my family and after awhile became shocking to me when I realized that most of my Russian friends were either married or married and already divorced. A woman never married at the age of 25 is somewhat strange to Russians. At age 25 my Russian cousin lamented to me that she was doing her best to stay away from her parent's dacha because her marital status was the constant topic of conversation.

In America I had grown accustomed to what is a trend among professional women of my generation--worrying about the career first and then thinking about settling down in the late 20s and early 30s and maybe a first child by 35 at the earliest. In Russia, marriage at a young age is the norm. There, women at a young age juggle the demands of career and husband and children even before they have any real stronghold in the career category. While successfully juggling all three, Russian women tend to put greater emphasis on the latter two--another peculiarity for someone like me who defines herself through her work.

The emphasis on husband and family seemed strange at first at my age, but after awhile I realized that the climate there facilitated it in a way that the climate in New York doesn't. There are so many single young women in New York, all playing the same game to meet and hold on to someone. And if you thought meeting someone you liked was difficult, try holding on to him. Young men here are caught up with the idea of always looking for something better so they are unlikely to commit. It is only by their 30s that they have had a taste of what is out there and are no longer obsessed with looking for something better. Then they appreciate you.

In Russia, that seems to happen at a younger age. Both men and women seem to have no problem committing to a relationship. The downside of willing to commit so easily is that marriage is not taken quite as seriously as it is here. In Russia, most people get married the first time while still in the university. They even refer to those marriages as "university weddings," as if a euphemism for one that is not going to last. When compared, though, divorce rates in America and Russia are about the same--50 percent make it so whether you start young or old seems to have little bearing on your chances of success.

In the Soviet period marriages were also a result of scarcity. Apartments were hard to come by and women did not leave their parents home until they were married so getting married was a way of getting out of the house. That was how my mother explained her first marriage to me. Although the Soviet period is over, apartments in cities like Moscow are still scarce and marriage is still viewed as a way of getting out of the house.

Women in Russia are much more pragmatic. The difficulties of life in the Soviet and post-Soviet period have necessitated it. They are better at adapting because they are the ones who have always had to cope--often propping up their men while enduring the hardships of work and complete responsibility of family and housework. It is no wonder that studies show that in the "New Russia" women have been better at adapting than men. Weighed down by job loss and loss of financial security, many men have been unable to cope, rather turning to alcohol to drown the sorrows of the transformative economy in Russia which has made many of them obsolete. In such times it has been the women, who recognize the necessity of feeding and clothing a family who have been the ones to adapt to the new economy and its new demands.

Russian women are amazing in that way. Discussions of feminist principles are generally not the topic of conversation around the kitchen table, but that is only because Russian women's feminism is pragmatic. Their strength is extraordinary, but at the same time it is feminine and beautiful. In their strength they seem to lose none of their gentleness.

The streets of Moscow are teeming with professional young Russian women making their way to and from work. Most of the women are dolled up, often wearing short skirts or chiffon blouses which leave little to the imagination. They accentuate their femininity and they flaunt it even in the professional setting. Outfits often border on what would be regarded as 'inviting sexual harassment" in the States. There is no word in the Russian language for sexual harassment The best they have is the American word pronounced with a Russian accent. It is this vision of the Russian woman that is most often captured by the American media and presented as evidence of Russian women's lack of female empowerment. Professional women in America of my generation have been fed these ideas since birth--equal treatment in the work place and equal pay. Through high media cases that go all the way to the president we have been schooled in the injustices of harassment and discrimination.

As women in the "New Russia" gain status in business and government, they will begin to be sensitized to this as well. I think the process has begun. The problems of domestic violence have surfaced and women's crisis centers cannot spring up quickly enough to fill the need. Female empowerment is a process--one that has to be accepted by both sexes in the society before its presence is felt. After so many years of the male-dominated Soviet system we must give time to the system to transform. It is somewhat like democratization and the transformation to a capitalist economy. We in America think that there is a formula that can be applied and instant democracy and successful capitalism can grow in a couple of days like a Chia Pet. That is not the case. It is an evolving process and one that we have been working on for several centuries.

The same can be said of feminism. It is our grandmothers and mothers that began the fight for women's rights and it is only our generation that reaps the fruits of this. In Russia the process has just begun. In the meantime any woman, Western or otherwise, should admire Russian women's strength and perseverance.