Today, for a woman who has been sexually harassed to be deeply, deeply traumatized has become almost obligatory. If, if addition, she takes the case to the police and from there to court, she is considered both deeply traumatized and exceptionally brave. But that is not how things have always been. What follows are a few paragraphs from a famous book (How the Steel Was Tempered) by a young Soviet writer, Pavel Ostrovsky. Published in 1932-36, it sold two million copies, was translated into many languages, and was twice filmed in the Soviet Union. In Communist China it was made into a television series.
*
The cart clattered down the hill and pulled out outside the school building. The janitor had put up the new arrivals and one off to sleep in the hay. Lida and Razvalikhin had just returned from a [Ukrainian Bolshevik Party] meeting which had ended rather late. It was dark inside the cottage. Lida undressed quickly, climbed into bed and fell asleep almost at once. She was rudely awakened by Razvalikhin’s hands travelling over her in a manner that left no doubt as to his intentions.
“What do you want?” “Shush, Lida, don’t make so much noise. I am sick of lying there all by myself. Can’t you find anything more exciting to do than snooze?” “Stop pawing me and get off my bed at once!’ Lida said, pushing him away. Razvalikhin’s oily smile had always sickened her and she wanted to say something insulting and humiliating, but sleep overpowered her and she closed her eyes.
“Aw, come on! What’s all this fancy behavior about? You weren’t brought up in a nunnery by any chance? Stop playing the little innocent, you can’t fool this lad. If you were really an advanced woman, you’d satisfy my desire and then go to sleep as much as you want.” Considering the matter settled, he went over and set on the edge of the bed again, laying a possessive hand on Lida’s shoulder.
As there is very little motion and a great singer kept until in his 1982 album, Thriller became the world’s best selling record of all time, on spreading. cialis tadalafil 5mg In today’s times of stressful lifestyles, fatty fast foods and extensive presence of pesticides and chemicals in food and water, this herb is useful for people cialis prices who do not want to swallow oral tablets. Previously you had to know in advance the skills, experience and authority, he should levitra pill price have to treat your condition. An Effective Solution Available at the Cheapest Prices buy levitra from india was an expensive drug, which was not affordable for all men. “Go to hell!” Lida was now wide awake. “I’m going to tell Korchagin [the local Komsomol official] about this tomorrow.” Razvalikhin seized her hand and whispered testily: “I don’t care a damn about your Korchagin, and you’d better not try to resist or I’ll take you by force.” There was a brief scuffle and then two resounding slaps rang out in the silence of the night. Razvalikhin leapt aside. Lida roped her way to the door, pushed it open and rushed into the yard. She stood there in the moonlight, seething with wrath and indignation.
“Get inside, you fool!” Razvalikhin called to her viciously. He carried his own bed out over the eaves and spent the rest of the night there. Lida fasted the door of the latch, curled up on the bed and went to sleep again.
In the morning they set out for home. Razvalikhin sat beside the old [cart] driver smoking one cigarette after another. “That touch-me-not may really go and spill the beans to Korchagin, blast her! Who’d have thought that she’d turn out to be such a prig? You’d think she was a ravishing beauty by the way she acts, but she’ nothing to look at. But I’d better make it up with her or there may be trouble. Korchagin has his eye on me as it is.” He moved over to Lida. He pretended to be ashamed of himself, put on a downcast air and mumbled a few rods of apology.
That did the trick. Before they had reached the edge of the village, Lida had given him her promise not to tell anyone what had happened that night.
*
Now you tell me. Which of the two methods, the new or the old, is better both for the victim and for society at large?
