In the Name of the Nation

Not so long ago, I turned on some loud children’s TV show, totally up to the minute and aimed at even the youngest viewers. Unfortunately, late into the night, I wasn’t able to watch the whole show, but what was most interesting is that after the children’s program, advertisements full of half naked women and (probably, haha) their phone numbers came on, and I was really surprised.

I don’t know exactly whether it was because I was tired, or if it was the cheerful children’s program that got me to thinking about how people explain where babies come from to the smallest of children. My grandmother would say that in her day everything was different, but as I caught myself thinking about her I remembered the collection of Rusyn folktales called Erotica Ruthenica published in Novi Sad in 1995.

I think there isn’t much of a difference between the hot-line girls and erotic literature passed along for more than two centuries from mouth to mouth. Back then, these same young children probably just closed their eyes and furtively opened their ears to listen to the grown ups’ conversations. I guess this isn’t as taboo of a subject as it seems.

But then, another question occurred to me: how would our leaders characterize the role of sex in Rusyn culture?

Atila Kovač, editor of the gay magazine Dečko (28)

It seems to me that there isn’t any vulgarity, perversion or pornography in contemporary Rusyn culture. In the Rusyn national character, there clearly is some sort of purity, but there’s also a poetic form of erotica. For example, our American Rusyn Andy Warhol had a specific type of erotica which he expressed using playful colors. His erotica is neither masculine nor feminine, rather it is entirely androgynous – like Warhol himself.

Irina Hardi-Kovačevič, poet (...)

I’ll speak for my generation. I think Rusyns basically have a healthy attitude towards sex. Since my youth, I’ve seen it as “that thing“ which must be done. I don’t mean force or torture, just that it’s something that has to be done in order to perpetuate life. Rusyns as a group intuitively know that sexual activity is what perpetuates them, and so the result of the activity is more important than the act itself.

I don’t think it’s strange at all that in our literature and folk songs “that thing“ is pushed to the side. You also see this when you figure that we don’t have any swear words, and that we have a lot of euphemisms. This means that “that thing” is something about which there isn’t anything to say in and of itself.

It’s like talking about love. As far as I’m concerned. I think that someone who talks a lot about love doesn’t spend much time loving.

There are differences in how Rusyns and other nations look at sex, but this is all basically cultural. From my personal life, I can say that Rusyns and Montenegrins have similar views on sex, particularly because of their traditions. Both of these nations see sex as something which isn’t a primary focus, but each person has an immanent understanding of it. And for the Serbs, I think they’re even more ashamed of sex than the Rusyns are, but they talk big and so people think that’s how they really are... Among the Hungarians, it is obvious that sex is a very important part of a person’s happiness.

Ana Marija Ramač (25) secretary of the youth section of the Union of Rusyns and Ukrainians

Among the Rusyns, sex is a taboo because of the divide between town and country. Since Rusyns mostly live in villages…. Our literature doesn’t say much about it either. The ethnographer Volodymyr Hnatjuk, when he came here at the end of the 19^th century, collected some stories from the older people on this topic but not much else has been done. Personally, I won’t speak with just anyone about sex. It’s not because I am ashamed, but because it’s an intimate thing. Some might say it’s vulgar. So I speak about sex with people I trust.

Young people in the former Yugoslavia, particularly in Vojvodina – and the Rusyns among them – are open to the subject of sex but they take it seriously. In Ukraine, the general attitude among young people is that they’re shocked if sex is spoken about, since conservatism is part of the post-Communist syndrome. They don’t have even a system of euphemisms like we do. But they go to the other extreme. They have this syndrome where being liberal is treated like a dare, and they express it by the “export” of Ukrainian strippers and prostitutes to other countries. Young people don’t know about it, and if they do, then they aren’t interested and don’t discuss the problem.

Julijan Tamaš (52) – academic, professor at the faculty of Rusyn Language and Literature

Everyone encounters sex in some way in their life, but it doesn’t have the same importance each time. One of my friends from the “heroic lands” (Montenegro) was in Kerestur and had sex with a Rusyn girl. He was amazed at how few Rusyns there are, since Rusyn girls have sex with such eagerness. This reminded me of a journey – is it more important for man to reach his goal, or to see the landscape?

Among Rusyns, the guys want to reach the goal as quickly as possible, and girls (at least the older ones) are preoccupied with thoughts of God even when practicing this deepest human need. The deeper you practice this need, the greater the sin you feel, but it all goes away with a Confession.

Once I asked a gentleman if it is a sin when a married woman and a married man are together and there aren’t any negative consequences. He said that it isn’t a sin, so long as no one finds out. Two cultured people who are drawn together and find each other have the right to everything they both want, regardless of how complicated it is within the social milieu.

Mikola Šanta (42) – director of Ruske Slovo publishing

Sex has the same function for Rusyns as for any other nation. Mentality or some sort of popularity within the nation that might govern sex differently than among another nation is not convincing enough. You have to look at sex in relation to the person, to the individual. People have sexuality regardless of whichever nation they belong to.

Sex, like every other freedom to which man is inclined can be dangerous, but it can also be beautiful. You have to understand and to control sex. If you let it have free reign over you, it won’t end well. But if you have control over it, you can enjoy it in the proper manner. Sex at work might seem like a good idea, but it’s less desirable than you might think. Congeniality among colleagues is very developed and some amount of socializing is normal. It is impossible to know all the details when there is sex in the workplace, since it’s so well hidden, but everyone knows who bothers with whom. On the other hand, just because two people are sexually attracted to one another doesn’t mean they’re having sex. At work, we are a small group and we all know each other. And what we don’t know, we can guess.

Simeon Sakač (72) – lawyer, secretary of the Union of Rusyns and Ukrainians of Yugoslavia

Among the Rusyns, sex is a taboo and it isn’t publicly discussed. It is rarely written about, and even then only indirectly in scientific articles.

As a lawyer, I have rarely encountered sexual matters in my cases, and never among Rusyns. When it does pop up, it’s mainly relating to divorce and dissatisfaction within a marriage. The biggest problem is abuse.

Young people discuss sex – it’s an eternal topic of conversation for them. But it’s necessary to discuss the dangers of sex from a medical point of view, because things happen all the time which have serious consequences. I think sex is treated more as a vulgarity, and that it isn’t discussed seriously, in a scientific matter. Experts should talk about it. Gynecologists for example. Sex doesn’t have to be a taboo, but it must be discussed maturely. Older people don’t talk about it, and they won’t be talking about it anytime soon. But if the intelligentsia doesn’t, then who will?!

Zvonimir Pavlovič (47) – honorary RKPD president

One of my friends asked how it is that Rusyns don’t have swear words. What do we call “that?”

I said that we don’t have a word for “that” – we use a Serbian word, or a Hungarian one.

He said that this will be the Rusyns’ downfall.

We are a very shameful nation and we are uncomfortable. When they opened the first pizzeria in Novi Sad, Rusnaks were ashamed to say the word “pizza,” since the association was with something else – “pica” is a Serbian swear word.

I think that the biggest problem is the relation between the rural and urban setting. The urban setting swallows such things more quickly, while the rural lags behind, but now the borders are beginning to blur.

Sex is a normal topic, but sexual diseases are a medical and sociological problem. In my performances, there is an exceptional amount of swear words connected with sex and sexual organs. Rusyns laugh. But violent sexual abuse has greater consequences, and primitivism is all around us. Among Rusyns, marriage is still respected and women are honored, and so there is no violence within marriage. A Rusnak is also such that he doesn’t change partners often, and this is our exoticism.

Stevan Konstantinovič (37) – High Councilor of the Ministry of Science, Education and Culture

First of all, sex has a role in reproduction, and only after that does it have a role in pleasure. As a taboo, the problem is the ways of the village, not the small size of the ethnic community. In villages, human imagination is excited most of all by shaking out the bed sheets. Many dream of going to the city and living with a little anonymity. In the village, there is much control and it comes from many sides. Things like sex are quickly detected. Young people know all each other, and if someone enters into a relationship, they know it. Adults cross their fingers, looking for the blushing bride.

Sex becomes a part of people’s lives from puberty and it remains until it loses the power of reproduction. Sex among the Rusyns might have some distinct aspects aside from the village – city thing. Compared to the majority Serb population, Rusyns are under more moral control by the Church, since they are more closely connected to it.

Our civilization is based on four basic pillars: money, sex, power and death. Of these, there might actually be more taboos surrounding death than sex.

Velimir Paplacko (50) director for minority broadcasts, Radio Novi Sad

Sex among the Rusyns is the same as among any other group. Maybe there is something specific in the fact that we have lived here 250 years and are still here. But particularly after the Second World War, the Church began to lose influence on the Rusyns and they started marrying people of other nationalities and mixing blood.

During the war there was the so-called “partisan sex,” but this was simply to satisfy needs, since sex is a human function. The hippy movement brought freer discussion and Rusyn girls lost their skirts, so to speak. I think that young people were not well enough informed. In the classical traditional Rusyn family sex has been a taboo theme for a long time. This is not because Rusyns are backward, but because of the wildness of youth. Adults forget what they did as children, or they don’t want to admit to it. The problem is the rural environment, because people’s minds are a little more closed. According to patriarchal morals, sex is not discussed in public, but everyone knows about it.

We must help young people through seminars, meetings and school lessons so that sex stops being a taboo. Sex education should be introduced as a regular subject. Through education (in schools and in families) much can be accomplished. In European countries, there are already condom machines in every corner, since AIDS is a disease which does not discriminate. Freud said that abstinence has effects on physical and psychic health, and I say that this must be born in mind. Girls and boys are always mischievous, they want to see more and to know more. At the Rusyn radio service, we once had a youth program and we talked about sex. Young people responded to it and were interested.