“Telegram” notes to a Russian friend, to read then delete: You are, of course, living in a world, an environment, of real enforced lies and deception. Clearly true. Willingly accepted by the majority dupes, whether they be innocent or guilty of their dupeddom.
I wonder how this society of lies around you compares to the lies of society of eg the 1970s and 1980s in the USSR? What is the same? What is different? How?
But of course now the peril of truth, prison or less, at a time of war, gives everything a reality much more than that of the façade of social order and political doctrine of the late Soviet days.
Stephen Lapeyrouse . . . Notes Dropped Along the Way 