• beerclue@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    63
    ·
    edit-2
    1 day ago

    I grew up in a rough communist regime. I was really young when I overheard my parents talking about how the “supreme leader” was bad and things were starting to boil the next town over. There was nothing on TV or radio. Innocent me just asked my dad like, if he’s that bad, why don’t they just arrest the guy? They didn’t realize I actually understood what they were talking about. I can still remember, to this day, 36 years later, how the soul left my parents’ body in an instant, and we had a looong conversation about how I should never say anything like that ever again. People disappear when they talked like that, and “you don’t want your mum and dad to go away, do you”?

    A few months later there was a nation wide uprising, people died, the regime fell, and they actually arrested the guy.

    • DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.worksOP
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      31
      ·
      2 days ago

      Lol, when we immigrated to the US, my mother told me never to publically criticize the government because it brings trouble, because their parents (aka: my grandparents) lived through the “Cultural Revolution” of PRC and this fear was passed down even after emigration, and I was like “but this is America? freedom of speech?”

      Looking at modern day developments of the US, turns out they were right lol.

    • SomeAmateur@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      1 day ago

      My great grandparents immigrated from Eastern Europe to the US. My Grandma told us about the time one of their relatives came to visit them. She remembers that he almost never took off his shoes, even when sleeping. They asked him about it and he said it was to run out the back door if the secret police came. He was amazed that nobody else in the family did the same, and then even more amazed to learn that nobody HAD to