Every year during the winter holidays we see articles about communism and the death of dictator Nicolae Ceausescu who was shot for treason on Christmas day 25 December 1989. If I look at the comments, I see every time the same quarrels are born between 2 camps. The first is comprised of those who remember the famine, the secret police, travel restrictions, absolute government control, invasion of personal life, control of the press and the restriction of freedom of speech, rationing of food, gas, electricity and heating… . and on the side we have the group of people that does not remember any of these things, but just remembers simpler times when you had the security of the day of tomorrow (even if it was a bad and bitter day).
As far as I noticed young people and generally those that are educated, traveled and had contact with the outside world, they are part of the first group. In the second group we tend to find some middle aged and a large part of the elderly part of the population. They are the nostalgic who have worked their whole life at the factory and enjoyed the benefits of the early years of communism when the country was growing. For them, the last harsh period (1980-1989) of Communism did not mean much, and the period after it brought only destruction, inflation, pension cuts and they saw their entire working life reduced to a few Lei (National Currency units). They obviously have no interest in traveling outside, or in getting to know the world outside of Romania. They voted for most of their life the Communist Party, and now it’s seems only natural for them to vote for the red socialist party PSD which is largely comprised of the same people that were in charge during communist times. Unfortunately they are locked in a loophole of promises that their pension will increase and lured in by speeches that they and their work are still respected by someone in the country. Lately more and more young people tend to join this group. They are part of the group of young people disappointed with the current democracy in Romania. These people, generally found in rural areas are not well educated or exposed to the outside world, and are the kind of people who do not want to struggle too much in life to get things done. For them a system where you get offered a home and a job on a silver platter in exchange for personal sacrifices of liberties sound pretty good.
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