Washington Post on deterioration in American-Russian relations since 1988
The article correctly notes that America-Russian relations have deteriorated not only politically, but also personally since the Soviet era. Whatever our government's political differences during Soviet (at least post-Stalinist Soviet) era, Americans as people were always warmly received by the average "man on the street". But things have changed since 1988. This polling was done by independent agency, not by Putin's boyz, and thus its findings can be taken seriously (with any limitations being the same as with any poll).
Saddening and worrisome.
That real interpersonal warmth between ordinary people in our countries 30-50 years ago, and a shared understanding of the dangers of nuclear war, genuinely helped world stability (Yes, bad/dangerous things happened during that time, but I think it would have been worse had there been more personal animosity).
I blame the Putin leadership/mindset for the current situation,including its effects on the mindset of ordinary Russians); but , again, that is different from before when citizens' interest in and attitudes towards Americans were at some disconnect with the leadership. Putinism combined with a loss of inter-personal interest/warmth between our countries is truly dangerous.
Graphs at :
apps.washingtonpost.com/g/page/world/opinions-in-russia/1620/
Article itself:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/russias-anti-us-sentiment-now-is-even-worse-than-it-was-in-soviet-union/2015/03/08/b7d534c4-c357-11e4-a188-8e4971d37a8d_story.html?hpid=z1
MOSCOW — Thought the Soviet Union was anti-American? Try today’s Russia. After a year in which furious rhetoric has been pumped across Russian airwaves, anger toward the United States is at its worst since opinion polls began tracking it. From ordinary street vendors all the way up to the Kremlin, a wave of anti-U.S. bile has swept the country, surpassing any time since the Stalin era, observers say.
The indignation peaked after the assassination of Kremlin critic Boris Nemtsov, as conspiracy theories started to swirl — just a few hours after he was killed — that his death was a CIA plot to discredit Russia. . . .There are drives to exchange Western-branded clothing for Russia’s red, blue and white. Efforts to replace Coke with Russian-made soft drinks. Fury over U.S. sanctions. And a passionate, conspiracy-laden fascination with the methods that Washington is supposedly using to foment unrest in Ukraine and Russia.
The anger is a challenge for U.S. policymakers seeking to reach out to a shrinking pool of friendly faces in Russia. And it is a marker of the limits of their ability to influence Russian decision-making after a year of sanctions. More than 80 percent of Russians now hold negative views of the United States, according to the independent Levada Center, a number that has more than doubled over the past year and that is by far the highest negative rating since the center started tracking those views in 1988.
. ..
Soviet rhetoric was officially anti-Western, but it couldn’t repress ordinary Russians’ passion for the Beatles or their enthusiasm for getting news from jammed Voice of America broadcasts. Those positive feelings spilled over after the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union.. .The years of perceived humiliations have “led to anti-Americanism at the grass-roots level, which did not exist before,” said Vladimir Pozner, a journalist who for decades was a prominent voice of the Soviet Union in the United States. More recently, he has to explain the United States inside Russia. “We don’t like the Americans, and it’s because they’re pushy, they think they’re unique and they have had no regard for anyone else.” Anti-American measures quickly suffused the nation, ranging from the symbolic to the truly significant. Some coffee shops in Crimea stopped serving Americanos. Activists projected racially charged images of Obama eating a banana onto the side of the U.S. Embassy in Moscow. . .
