![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Rockers and Russians
Question: What do old Russian men under capitalism and elderly Western rock stars have in common?
Answer: They're both probably dead already -- and for quite similar reasons. The average life expectancy for a Russian male is currently 60.2 years, down from 64 years in the last year of socialism. That puts Russia amongst Western Sahara, Mongolia, Bolivia, Guyana and North Korea in the national male life expectancy ranking tables. The average life expectancy for a post-war Western rock star is even more pathetic: 42 years for North American stars and 35 for European ones. In both cases, substance abuse and alcoholism play a major part.
Women of Slyozi is a fascinating video essay on The Guardian's website. Reporter Luke Harding went to the village of Slyozi, just 40 kilometers from the Latvian (and therefore European) border, trying to find men. What he found instead was a village of stoical, fatalistic old women in their 80s, widows of husbands who, if they hadn't perished fighting the Nazis, had survived to drink themselves to death in their 40s, 50s and (those who made it) 60s. In Slyozi, today, not a single male survives.
"Drink is a huge problem around here," Zinaida Ivanovna, 79, told Harding. "It's a terrible problem in this village. It's a nightmare. The men here drink their pensions as soon as they get them. They sell whatever they have to get more booze. They drink anything - moonshine and even window-cleaning fluids."
When Professor Mark Bellis published research he'd done at Liverpool's John Moores University into rock star life expectancy in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health last year, he found a similar pattern. "The wild lifestyles of famous musicians, including drug taking and alcohol abuse, were the main reason for their early demise," he said. Rockers, seen as a community, are going to seed in much the same way as post-collective farming Russians.
Oddly enough, in this case money doesn't have much to do with mortality stats. The old women Luke Harding interviews seem quite content with their tiny pensions. Materially, they have all they need (big wooden houses, enough food to survive, fuel to keep warm in winter) and there's nothing much to buy in Slyozi anyway. Rather than trickledown (and let's face it, in oligarchical Russia trickledown is, quite literally, moonshine), what they'd like is company. But the male company -- rotten, lazy and irresponsible as it was -- has all died.
The widows of Slyozi are a bit like "tour widows", the longsuffering girlfriends and wives of touring rock stars, who have to put up with long absences, alcoholism, chronic infidelity and fundamental instability in the lives of their partners. Rock stars are under too much stress when they're touring and famous and too little when they aren't -- they often find it difficult to negotiate the transition between the two states (too busy and not busy enough). That's when they turn to drugs and drink, and fall into depression.
The connection gets more interesting when we think of rock stars as poster boys for capitalism. The Russian men who, under Russia's toxic brand of capitalism, are now lucky to reach 60 were easily reaching 65 in the era of collective farming. (A campaign by Gorbachev in the mid-1980s to reduce alcoholism managed to add a full three calendar years to male life expectancy... temporarily, at least.) In still-communist Cuba, with its socialised medicine and sense of collective purpose, men live to 74. As James Petras says in Capitalism versus socialism: The great debate revisited, "the transition to capitalism in Russia alone led to over 15 million premature deaths (deaths which would not have occurred if life expectancy rates had remained at the levels under socialism)... Fifteen years of "transition to capitalism" is more than adequate time to judge the performance and impact of capitalist politicians, privatizations, free market policies and other restoration measures on the economy, society and general welfare of the population".
In the individual lives of Western rock stars, getting rich endangers your health far more than staying poor. Back in Liverpool, Mark Bellis found that music stars were most likely to die within five years of becoming famous. Later -- for the Europeans, at least -- things got better for those who could survive this initial transition. "About 25 years after shooting to fame, European stars returned to the same levels of life expectancy as the general population while North American stars continued to experience higher death rates."
In America, "ageing rockers remain almost twice as likely to suffer a premature demise, particularly from heart attack or stroke... Professor Bellis suggested that the high death rate among older American musicians could be related to the continent's greater appetite for reunion tours, exposing the artists for more years to an unhealthy "rock'n'roll" lifestyle."
Bellis didn't quite go as far as pointing the finger at capitalism itself, but did mention "the poor medical outlook for impoverished US ex-pop stars who have no health insurance". But maybe it isn't entirely fair to blame capitalism -- national character has something to do with it too. While the Russians drank themselves to death, elderly Poles (male life expectancy: 68.6 years) were doing interesting and constructive things in their rural areas, like building homemade tractors. It's something ageing Western rock stars -- who currently die as young as men in Cote D'Ivoire or Afghanistan -- could try.
Answer: They're both probably dead already -- and for quite similar reasons. The average life expectancy for a Russian male is currently 60.2 years, down from 64 years in the last year of socialism. That puts Russia amongst Western Sahara, Mongolia, Bolivia, Guyana and North Korea in the national male life expectancy ranking tables. The average life expectancy for a post-war Western rock star is even more pathetic: 42 years for North American stars and 35 for European ones. In both cases, substance abuse and alcoholism play a major part.
Women of Slyozi is a fascinating video essay on The Guardian's website. Reporter Luke Harding went to the village of Slyozi, just 40 kilometers from the Latvian (and therefore European) border, trying to find men. What he found instead was a village of stoical, fatalistic old women in their 80s, widows of husbands who, if they hadn't perished fighting the Nazis, had survived to drink themselves to death in their 40s, 50s and (those who made it) 60s. In Slyozi, today, not a single male survives.
"Drink is a huge problem around here," Zinaida Ivanovna, 79, told Harding. "It's a terrible problem in this village. It's a nightmare. The men here drink their pensions as soon as they get them. They sell whatever they have to get more booze. They drink anything - moonshine and even window-cleaning fluids."
When Professor Mark Bellis published research he'd done at Liverpool's John Moores University into rock star life expectancy in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health last year, he found a similar pattern. "The wild lifestyles of famous musicians, including drug taking and alcohol abuse, were the main reason for their early demise," he said. Rockers, seen as a community, are going to seed in much the same way as post-collective farming Russians.
Oddly enough, in this case money doesn't have much to do with mortality stats. The old women Luke Harding interviews seem quite content with their tiny pensions. Materially, they have all they need (big wooden houses, enough food to survive, fuel to keep warm in winter) and there's nothing much to buy in Slyozi anyway. Rather than trickledown (and let's face it, in oligarchical Russia trickledown is, quite literally, moonshine), what they'd like is company. But the male company -- rotten, lazy and irresponsible as it was -- has all died.
The widows of Slyozi are a bit like "tour widows", the longsuffering girlfriends and wives of touring rock stars, who have to put up with long absences, alcoholism, chronic infidelity and fundamental instability in the lives of their partners. Rock stars are under too much stress when they're touring and famous and too little when they aren't -- they often find it difficult to negotiate the transition between the two states (too busy and not busy enough). That's when they turn to drugs and drink, and fall into depression.
The connection gets more interesting when we think of rock stars as poster boys for capitalism. The Russian men who, under Russia's toxic brand of capitalism, are now lucky to reach 60 were easily reaching 65 in the era of collective farming. (A campaign by Gorbachev in the mid-1980s to reduce alcoholism managed to add a full three calendar years to male life expectancy... temporarily, at least.) In still-communist Cuba, with its socialised medicine and sense of collective purpose, men live to 74. As James Petras says in Capitalism versus socialism: The great debate revisited, "the transition to capitalism in Russia alone led to over 15 million premature deaths (deaths which would not have occurred if life expectancy rates had remained at the levels under socialism)... Fifteen years of "transition to capitalism" is more than adequate time to judge the performance and impact of capitalist politicians, privatizations, free market policies and other restoration measures on the economy, society and general welfare of the population".
In the individual lives of Western rock stars, getting rich endangers your health far more than staying poor. Back in Liverpool, Mark Bellis found that music stars were most likely to die within five years of becoming famous. Later -- for the Europeans, at least -- things got better for those who could survive this initial transition. "About 25 years after shooting to fame, European stars returned to the same levels of life expectancy as the general population while North American stars continued to experience higher death rates."
In America, "ageing rockers remain almost twice as likely to suffer a premature demise, particularly from heart attack or stroke... Professor Bellis suggested that the high death rate among older American musicians could be related to the continent's greater appetite for reunion tours, exposing the artists for more years to an unhealthy "rock'n'roll" lifestyle."
Bellis didn't quite go as far as pointing the finger at capitalism itself, but did mention "the poor medical outlook for impoverished US ex-pop stars who have no health insurance". But maybe it isn't entirely fair to blame capitalism -- national character has something to do with it too. While the Russians drank themselves to death, elderly Poles (male life expectancy: 68.6 years) were doing interesting and constructive things in their rural areas, like building homemade tractors. It's something ageing Western rock stars -- who currently die as young as men in Cote D'Ivoire or Afghanistan -- could try.
no subject
By the way, Slyozi means Слезы, tears in russian. Quiet days in Tears, what a romantic headline.
no subject
They can live if they promise not to do any of that, though.
no subject
I don´t want to live in a world without him and his cherry ties.
Or Vitas. But he´s gay as a fiddle so he probably gets a GET OUT OF ROCK FREE card.
no subject
THAT'S WHAT THEY ALL SAY. THEN THEY BREED. AND JUMP.
SADFAX :(
Vitas looks like a Tchernobil survivor, plus he hits higher notes than Mariah Carey, so I don´t know if he CAN breed.
Might die of AIDS like Klaus Nomi, though.
aging rockstars
(Anonymous) 2008-02-12 11:41 am (UTC)(link)Re: aging rockstars
no subject
(Anonymous) 2008-02-12 01:19 pm (UTC)(link)Your constant bashing of the USA has gotten tired and repetitive. We get it, you think you're better than the people of America and England.
- Matt in New York City.
no subject
no subject
(Anonymous) 2008-02-12 01:36 pm (UTC)(link)All apologies,
Matt in NYC
no subject
no subject
touch me in new york
(Anonymous) 2008-02-12 02:06 pm (UTC)(link)for a washed up wife and a
permanently plastered pissed up bastard...
paranoid security state indeed
what can we do about the british american
problem they are not all scum
no subject
It's not capitalism if the Russian state just doesn't care very much.
no subject
no subject
no subject
(Anonymous) 2008-02-12 06:00 pm (UTC)(link)momus descending a staircase
Re: momus descending a staircase
And I may come off small town americentric, but I grew up in Sarawak, Hong Kong and Peru. In Borneo, we were a mixed bunch of Christians, Muslims and Iban headhunters all living and thriving together. The one thing we feared were the maoist guerrillas living in the hills. One of my earliest memories is of walking through the rice fields and entering a little hut, where there was a man with several large bowls filled with the amputated legs of small birds. Seems maoist agriculture theory taught that by cutting the legs off of songbirds that they could not land and eat the grain.
In Hong Kong we would travel to the Red Chinese border which consisted of razor wire and steely looking guards with machine guns. Didn't look like any fun going on over there, compared to the beauty and excitement of Hong Kong harbour.
And Peru? The Sendero Luminoso were all over Iquitos and Lima. Scary fuckers. Seriously. Constantly blowing shit up and taking hostages.
So my idea of communism may differ from yours. To me it seems that the capitalists want to use us all as pawns in their money making schemes and the commies want us all in a police state wearing jumpsuits and calling each other comrade. I reject them both.
Re: momus descending a staircase
I have quite a few nepenthes (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trWzDlRvv1M) plants from Borneo in my terrariums. I almost envy you--that story of the birds is heartbreaking.
Re: momus descending a staircase
(Anonymous) 2008-02-13 09:54 pm (UTC)(link)We climbed Mt. Kinabalu when I was six years old! Well, they climbed. I glided to the top on our guide's shoulders, magic carpet style. I remember seeing the sunset above the clouds the evening we reached the summit. Which still may be the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.
My dad is an amateur naturalist/birder and pointed out every pitcher plant and hornbill we came across. I think we may have even seen/smelled a corpse flower. I may have dreamed this part though. Or maybe it was the Durian.
(wiki informs me that it is probably the Rafflesia (complete url here) I am trying to remember. And that Amorphophallus titanum - from Ancient Greek amorphos, "without form, misshapen" + phallos, "penis", and titan, "giant" - is a flowering plant with the largest unbranched inflorescence in the world.)
There is a momus song in there somewhere.
Save a life: double all prices today !
(Anonymous) 2008-02-12 06:53 pm (UTC)(link)The Pro-Bling etc..
no subject
It's also funny how you manage to point a shaky finger at Capitalism. It was Communism which destroyed Russian culture to the point where drinking yourself to death seems like a good idea. Sticking them in slave labor camps (do you even know what collective farming is?) hardly seems a humane solution. Converting them to Christianity (like those healthy Poles) and getting them non-Russian wives is likely to work better.
"Doggy style is an indecent position.."
(Anonymous) 2008-02-12 10:22 pm (UTC)(link)Interesting analysis of Russian sex lives in Pravda. "Get more aggressive and brutal, and she will go crazy about you.”
no subject
The not so super-annuated citizen of the glorious leftist dictatorship.
Actuary's Conundrum
We will ignore the fact that you were raised in Scotland, which must take years off your life for having the worst diet in the world (no offense to your mother)because you have lived in Greece (Mediterranean diet, 75.2 years) and Montreal, Canada (French paradox, 75.9). Also assuming that Hisae prefers shiojake over hagus, we must surmise that you are eating a very healthy diet these days. So by these calculations you should be kicking off in August 2035.
Re: Actuary's Conundrum
Re: Actuary's Conundrum
farming Russians vs rock vitreous humor