In the 1920s, Soviet power belonged to prostitutes dialectically: some could shoot at the same time with former officers and Mensheviks, and to equate others to the operated class (in the photo-the process above the mains of the underground house of tolerance, below in the forefront-accused samia, on the left-victims of sexual labor workers)

45 years ago, in 1959, the Moscow City Committee of the CPSU adopted a resolution on additional measures to combat prostitution. The reason was the mocking publications in the Western press, which described the heyday of this relic of the bourgeois system in the capital of the USSR. The history of Soviet socialist prostitution was restored by the observer of "power" Evgeny Zhirnov.

"Shoot and take hundreds of prostitutes"
Unlike pre-revolutionary times, when the vast majority of sex industry workers came to it from the reluctance to earn more hard work, in the first years after the Bolsheviks came to power the main incentive to trade in the body was hunger.

Photo: RGAKFD \ Rosinform

The great American friend of the Soviet regime Armand Hammer, who made a huge fortune on a special relationship with the USSR, was not without pleasure recalled that during the civil war he could get any the most beautiful girl in Moscow, exchanging a night of love for several pies - a real trifle, if we count in dollars, but a whole fortune in the starving capital of the Bolsheviks.
But that was only the beginning. With a deterioration in the economic situation in the ranks of prostitutes, there were more and more representatives of all layers of society - from the proletariat to the unfinished nobility. The reports of the lower party bodies to Moscow in the early 1920s testified to the fact that in some cities of Siberia and the Far East, most women trading in the body-"scrabs", school workers, whose insignificant teacher salaries could not live. And as the factories closed and the unemployment strengthened, as reported to the Central Committee from the GPU, "mass prostitution developed in the proletarian areas."
In 1922, the Petrograd police stated: "The more or less lively streets of the city in the evening and night hours are teeming ... Women who openly sell their body and pay attention to causing behavior." The same was the same in Moscow.
The development of the market was greatly facilitated by the authorities themselves. Among the Bolsheviks there was no unity in relation to corrupt love. The leader of the world proletariat himself considered sex issues to be secondary against the backdrop of the approach of the world revolution. And with prostitution he suggested fighting a favorite method. In August 1918, Lenin wrote to the Nizhny Novgorod Sovdep:

On May 1, 1929, pupils of a medical and labor dispensary for prostitutes expressed their solidarity with the rest of the working people of Leningraders

"The White Guard uprising is clearly prepared in the lower. We need to strain all the forces, make up the three dictators, instill a massive terror, shoot and take hundreds of prostitutes, saving soldiers, former officers ... We must act in full swing: mass searches, executions for the storage of weapons, mass export of the Mensheviks and unreliable."
At the same time, Alexander Kollontai, who was responsible for the social sphere, was responsible for the social scope of public screening:
"For the class tasks of the proletariat, it is completely indifferent to whether the love of the form of a long formalized union accepts or is expressed in the form of a transient connection. The ideology of the working class does not put any formal boundaries of love."
Apparently, not least, because of this ideological dough, the department involved in the fight against the prostitution of the department sought to resign this duty as soon as possible. For example, in November 1922, the People’s Commissariat of Labor and the NKVD consistently abandoned this. And as a result, the eradication of the "shameful relic of the bourgeois past" was under the jurisdiction of a much less influential countdown. In this department, the fight against the trade trafficking naturally came down to the identification and prevention of sexually transmitted diseases among prostitutes and their customers.

Photo: RGAKFD \ Rosinform

"A man chooses Marusya or Lily"
Formally, of course, the struggle against prostitution in the country continued, but even the slogan “Communism-Prostitution” popular in the 1920s said that the authorities did not count on an imminent victory. The country tried to create a network of dispensaries for re -educating priestesses of love. But only one of them functioned properly - in Leningrad. And to commemorate the success in his work in 1929 in Leningrad, a column of overwhelming prostitutes was brought to the Pervomaisky demonstration.
But this did not go further. Perhaps because, according to official figures, the number of professional, constantly working on the panel of prostitutes in cities ranged from several dozen in provincial cities to several hundred in the capitals. And prostitution supposedly did not represent real social danger. In addition, consumers of sex services, in terms of quality and scope of returning to the pre-revolutionary level, turned out to be many party, Soviet and economic leaders. And the "trips to the rooms" for the state account were quite common. And with the development of the NEP, another former form of service of solid gentlemen and comrades was restored - in the rear rooms of clothing stores, where the clients liked the client.
For slightly less demanding consumers, there was an analogue of current saunas - private baths. For the same categories of customers, there were brothels, but in comparison with 1913, their number decreased significantly, they were officially discovered officially, of course, they were not allowed, and the containers of "secret dens" were caught and betrayed to the court. Therefore, cafes were most often the place of acquaintance with clients, and for customers, more than the qualified workers and guards are tea. This type of service with great benefits was used by many catering points.

Photo: RGAKFD \ Rosinform

The district police officer reported about one of the cafes in Leningrad:
“The public was completely weak since the opening of the case. The public was not enough, and then everything suddenly turned upside down and the cafe was as a cafe, but it became a focus of prostitution, and due to the fact that in addition to beer and the like, one can buy a woman, the public became apparently invisible ... Prostitutes gather after 11 hours. The full height of about 1-2 hours. The woman comes at the table, she sets a black table. Coffee is with one glass and the man chooses the man to taste, invites Marusa or Lily, etc. to his table, he speaks, speaks and, paying the lady, leaves for a private apartment or to her, or to him, is no longer in the cafe. Money is required.
The demand of low -paying citizens of the country of Soviets satisfied, in addition to the inhabitants of the inhabitants of the proletarian hostels, who had fallen to the outskirts of the profession of professionals. In most cases, representatives of the Ghegemon class pushed the need to the panel. The worker at the factory earned in the second half of the 20s about 20 rubles. per month. And prostitutes appreciated by customers received twice as much in one night.
In the 30s, it was believed that prostitution no longer exists. However, the number of prostitutes in the country did not decrease. Body trade flourished even in the camps of the OGPU. The order on the Belomors-Baltic correctional camp of the OGPU of February 8, 1933, for example, said:
"As a result of extremely weak cultural and social work and insufficient attention to the needs of prisoners of women in everyday life, there are even such abnormality as theft, drunkenness, card game and prostitution."

Photo: RGAKFD \ Rosinform

The services of prostitutes were used by the heads of state security. There is a lot of evidence that Beria, when there was nothing better, spent time with famous Moscow prostitutes. Whether he paid them is unknown. But his deputy, and then the Minister of State Security, Viktor Abakumov, paid in full.
People from Lubyanka cultivated prostitution for foreigners. As one middle -aged lady told me many years ago, in her youth she worked in a hotel for intorers. And some nice guest asked her to go to his room for a moment. As soon as she came out, she was called to a comrade who supervised the regime, who explained that he could actually put her. But if it turns out to be understood, everything will cost. You can go to foreigners at any time. The main thing is to write after that, with whom, when and how, with a maximum of details. For example, is the guest inclined to oddities and perversions.
And during the Patriotic War, state security actually organized a sex service for the allies in the country. Opponents in the occupied territories also did not remain without female affection. True, there was some difference between the invaders from different countries. The Germans drove the women into the brothels by force. The Italians were different. The ladies who showed the initiative were examined by a military doctor-venereologist who issued them a work permit-a special sign was placed on their house, allowing soldiers and officers to use the services of native prostitutes for a fee.

"The voice is low, intimate, calling"
In the post-war years, as after the civil war, the size of the sex services market regulated the economic situation. Officially, prostitution did not exist, but the authorities were forced to use extraordinary measures to curb it. For example, in 1957, to combat hotel prostitutes, a rule was introduced that forbidden outsiders to be in rooms after 23 hours. To the ladies selling their body, they began to apply measures of public influence. The most common were wall newspapers, where a caricature of a prostitute was placed, her last name and address were indicated. Someone probably embarrassed. But most were only happy about free advertising.
From the mid-50s, when the number of foreigners coming to the USSR began to be measured tens of thousands, currency prostitution has blossomed in the country. Many foreign publications told compatriots about its features. In 1959, the correspondent of the British News of the World described this side of the Soviet reality for the Moscow authorities.

Photo: RGAKFD \ Rosinform

“A few minutes after you occupied the room in one of the Moscow hotels,” the article said, “a seductive, gentle, low female voice calls you on the phone. Of course, the girl at the other end of the telephone line speaks you in Russian. Therefore, you, like me, will probably make an assumption that there is some kind of mistake.
You will say: 'Sorry, but, in my opinion, you have incorrectly dialed the number'-and put the phone. After a few minutes, the phone calls again. This time you begin to perplex.
“There is no wrong number,” says a plaintive voice. But this is all that she can say in English. A few more such calls, and you find that you are playing some kind of game with a mysterious voice. You speak English all the time, and she continues to respond in Russian. Sometimes the voice becomes excited and high, but in most cases it is low, intimate, calling.
Therefore, you go down, and if the hotel has anyone whom you know and who knows Russia, you ask him what is happening. You will learn that the voices that you hear by the phone standing at your bed are the voices of women associated with the dignified as a system of calling girls that are widespread in the Soviet Union.
Suppose that you have a mood and that you can pronounce a sufficient number of Russian words to agree on a date with one of the girls calling you. Since it is difficult with housing in Moscow, you will not be invited to meet a girl in an apartment. Most likely, you will be given a taxi number and ask you to find this taxi at a certain time in any particular place of the city.

Photo: RGAKFD \ Rosinform

A pretty girl sits in the back seat of the car. It is possible that she is a university student. In appearance, she resembles a Western girl, as they were about a year or two ago. She will have a hairstyle and a long thread of beads. She has eyelashes, on her lipstick lip, nylon stockings and heels-heels. Her nails are long and varnished. It is possible that she will smoke a cigarette in a long mouthpiece.
So dress in Russia is worth a lot of money. Significantly more than a Russian girl can get in the usual way, and, undoubtedly, much more than the student receives. Therefore, you will not be surprised that a trip with her in a taxi outside the city will cost about 150 rubles, that even for a relatively generous tourist exchange rate, about five pounds will be about five. But you still have to find about another pound to persuade the taxi driver to take a little walk and leave you alone with the girl when you come to some kind of secured place.
Taxi drivers say that they can earn in one night when they carry girls, more than for a whole week of ordinary work, considering both wages and tips.
No less popular among 'girls who call customers' is the role of a stenographer. They put on horn glasses, pick up a portable writing machine and notebook in their hands and quietly pass by the duty officers in hotels. They allegedly go in order to do their secretary work. Provided that they will leave the building until 11 o’clock in the evening, they, apparently, cannot be interfered with officially. In some of the largest hotels in Russia, scenes from Cinderella are played every evening. Excited girls are in a hurry to leave before the terrible hour breaks. But I did not hear that any of them forgot the shoe. "
There was a short revelation for the authorities in the article that in addition to currency prostitutes in Moscow, there are also currency pimps - hated by any real Soviet man.

Photo: RGAKFD \ Rosinform

“Usually,” the article said, “the Italian type on them is a suit: a short jacket, narrow trousers, boots with sharp noses and ties woven from threads and tinsel tins. Usually two or three stools accompany four-five-five girls.”
Of course, the Central Committee instructed the Moscow City Home to take strict measures. And not least, therefore, the Komsomol detachments began a ruthless hunt for the dudes and the girls that appeared with them. And soon the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the RSFSR adopted a decree on the fight against parasitism. The number of persons leading the antisocial and parasitic lifestyle were prostitutes. Fulfilling the decree, by 1962, the police identified 5119 prostitutes in Russia. And 1502 of them, as particularly malicious, were sent to settlements to remote places.
Measures were taken in subsequent years. But it was not possible to defeat socialism. And communism never came.

With the assistance of the publishing house, Vagrius "Power" represents a series of historical materials

Magazine "Kommersant Power" No. 36 dated 09/13/2004, p. 72

Authors:

Evgeny Zhirnov

Topics:

Kommersant History

"Communism is a grave of prostitution"