Comments by "BVargas78" (@BVargas78) on "Disability Benefits for Soviet Veterans. Taking Care of Our Heroes #ussr" video.

I think it's two reasons that they wanted to hide handicapped people. Firstly I think it's partly a throwback to Stalinist times. In Stalinist art and propaganda they tended to look to portray Soviet workers as the fittest and strongest people of the world and this mindset continued, perhaps to a lesser extent but it was still there in the 60's and 70's. Disabled people would not be compatible with that image. Secondly, I think the Soviets had an awareness that the way they treated their disabled was not great. And were afraid that westerners would start calling them out so they went by the 'out of sight out of mind' approach. Not good and I also think it was foolish because even from a more cold and calculating point of view, treating the disabled well could have been a very cost effective propaganda for the cold war to improve the image of the country in the eyes of westerners and the world as a whole.
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