Kasparov's grandfather was a staunch communist, but the young Kasparov gradually began to have doubts about the Soviet Union's political system at age 13 when he travelled abroad for the first time in 1976 to Paris for a chess tournament.[198] In 1981, at age 18, he read Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago, a copy of which he bought while abroad.

Goober

[–] PosadistInevitablity@hexbear.net 51 points 1 year ago

When you have to read a book to believe your country is evil because your lived experience doesn’t lead you to that conclusion whatsoever

[–] ShimmeringKoi@hexbear.net 31 points 1 year ago

Thats's like becoming a death to America guy after reading Man in the High Castle

[–] UlyssesT@hexbear.net 27 points 1 year ago

Many such cases. pete

[–] Alaskaball@hexbear.net 19 points 1 year ago

he read Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago, a copy of which he bought while abroad.

Well there's your problem. You read a lying antisemitic, lying, trotskyite, saboteur, grifter, and CIA-payed fan-fiction writer's shitty-ass book

[–] Awoo@hexbear.net 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

My guess is this douchebag was young, easily impressionable, and absolutely desperate to fit in socially with the rest of the people in the sport.

This is a bad recipe for socialists in sports, because sports people from capitalist countries are going to continue being the majority for a long time. They travel abroad, want to fit in and end up taking on the role of a pick-me. Everyone joining a new community is going to try to fit into that community and the advantage of capitalist hegemony is going to affect socialist sports people, especially because they're young.

[–] VILenin@hexbear.net 3 points 1 year ago

Communist countries are deliberately isolated, and then western propaganda will go "see, they're missing out on our 18 different flavors of delicious Chef Boyardee!" and to a dumb teenager during soviet stagnation it would be pretty easy to fall for it.