Donahue in Russia. March 14, 1987
Excerpts from the Donahue in Russia program broadcast on Soviet Television on 14 March 1987.
Donahue: I would like to talk for a moment about family planning. How widely available are information and devices for preventing pregnancy? Are you satisfied with their availability? Why is the abortion rate so high in the Soviet Union? Suddenly I sense silence from this audience. Is it the woman’s responsibility here? Are the men involved in solving this problem? Why is the number of abortions so high in the Soviet Union? [To man in audience] Yes, sir?
Man: I can give some professional information, because I am a professor of sociology and in addition to that my field is sexology. The fact is that we are a long way behind in this. This is now being talked about by doctors and demographers: the style of the propaganda is changing, but these subjects, so to speak, are regarded as being delicate in our country, and that’s why your question really does provoke a rather sharp reaction. But as far as contraceptive devices are concerned, the situation is quite simply awful. There is a shortage of hormone pills and their quality is not good enough. They are now dealing with this; doctors and demographers are dealing with this. There is a high abortion rate because of the poor standard of contraceptive devices the rate is much higher than in many other countries, although everyone knows it’s a bad thing, because it is hard to think of anything worse than an abortion.
Donahue: Is abortion also provided free in the Soviet Union? Same man: Yes.
Donahue: Thank you very much for your candor. Is there anyone else who would like to speak on this subject? Yes?
Woman: I would like to answer this question not simply as a woman, but as a specialist. I work in a chemist’s shop as a pharmacist. The comrade has just said that things are difficult in our country as far as contraceptive devices are concerned. I would like to disagree. At present there is a wide range and a large amount of propaganda work being carried out amongst boys and girls in the higher classes. I, for example, work in the chemist’s shop and can see for myself how many people buy these things. I can’t talk about the abortion rate. But as to whether or not these devices are in demand and are popular, well I can’t say that they aren’t. They are very much in demand. Both devices manufactured in the Soviet Union and imported ones.
Donahue: Who purchases the contraceptive, the man or the woman? Same woman: Well, you know, it’s chiefly the woman, of course.
Donahue: Does it matter to you if your child starts to be sexually active before marriage? Does that bother you?
Women: No, it does not bother me. [Donahue begins to clap, thereby suggesting that members of the audience in sympathy with this view should also clap; no-one in the audience is heard to clap, perhaps because not everyone has understood Donahue’s intention]. Yes, it does bother me. [Some members of the audience clap]. I want my child, my daughter, to be a virgin before her marriage. [Some members of the audience clap, possibly fewer than the previous number]. I am sure that she will be a virgin until she gets married. [One of two members of the audience clap; laughter from the audience].
Donahue: I have noticed that as a rule Moscow families have just one child although, of course, my observation is not based on any scientific analysis. So couples of your age have one child; not all of them, of course, but most of them. And I have also been told that the state encourages families with more than one child, since the birth rate here in Russia is lower than in any of the other republics of the Soviet Union. Are you moved by any feeling of patriotic responsibility towards having two or more children?
Woman: I have two children, and I can’t really say whether that is going to be all. Of course, we might have some more. And the state gave us a flat immediately, a two-room flat, within a year, because we had twins. If a family has three children the state immediately provides a three- or four-room flat, and the parents even have the right to choose which rayon in Moscow to live in, and they get a telephone, and masses of benefits of all kinds. They immediately receive help from the order departments of the food shops and Children’s World and they get help everywhere. I regard this as a big concession, and for this reason people now consider having at least three children, because housing is in short supply in the Soviet Union.
Donahue: Why, then, are all these families with only one child waiting? Have more babies and you’ll get an excellent flat.
Woman: Our American audience might think that we really are embellishing things; because that woman was not absolutely right in what she said. I have three children, and of course I receive benefits. I could describe them in detail for our American audience. But we do have a problem in our family; we live in a communal flat. How can I describe it? Our family, and another family too. We share a kitchen. Perhaps this isn’t so typical now; but it really is a problem for our family, and we are going to be waiting for three years, that is the shortest time likely. And we’ll see how we get on.
Donahue: Yes. Yes. Our time is coming to an end. Please go ahead.
Woman: I have been married for 12 years, but I only have one child, one child in 12 years. The child is eight years old. It isn’t the material side of things that worries us, it’s the housing issue. We live just like that woman, in a communal flat; they’ve already explained to you what that is-it means several families living in one flat. We have only one room. And it is precisely that which is stopping me from having more children, because a new child would grow up to the age of five-the most difficult age-and I still wouldn’t be given a flat during that time. I think young families ought to be given flats from some kind of separate waiting list, perhaps. Generally speaking, housing policy ought to be changed a little in our country in favor of families, the allocation of flats to families, and then families will have more children. I think that this problem can only be solved by means of housing, Everything rests on housing. I have bad housing conditions, and this stops me having more children.
Source: George R. Urban, ed., Social and Economic Rights in the Soviet bloc: a documentary review seventy years after the Bolshevik Revolution (New Brunswick: Transaction, 1988), pp. 194-196.