The excerpt clearly makes the case that the lives of the minority population are treated better in the Soviet Union than elsewhere in the West. The author then answers the burning question, what was life like before and how did the Soviet Union get to such a place of equality? It is answered with, “Before [the transition to communism], Kurbanov said, racial persecution and segregation, the natives treated like dogs. Now, that is finished, and Russian and native, Jew and gentile, white and brown, live and work together. Before, no intermarriages of white and dark, now there are many. Before, Kurbanov himself was a herd-boy in the mountains. Now, he is a member of the Party and the Chairman of a city soviet” (Hughes 74). The excerpt credits the equality that the author is seeing to the transition to communism, where equality was required and celebrated. This work was published in the Soviet Union but the message seems to be directed at the minority population in the United States. The message seems to be that communism would create a state of equality in the United States. Do you think that with the history of the United States that communism would create equality? Is it possible that there was an audience in the Soviet Union still seeking equality? Was it a good idea to target a minority population to spread communism?
