The Russian Communist party (KPRF) blames the media for bringing the society to moral and spiritual decline and urges the government to introduce tougher censorship and preserve the country’s culture and traditions.

The West constantly accuses Russia for the lack of freedom. On the contrary – there is not enough control, Communists say.

“Freedom lets out both the best and the worst qualities of a person,” the KPRF believes. There must be legal limitations to prevent “the release of the worst,” the party stated in a resolution published on its official website.

The document was signed on the results of a round-table discussion on the protection of spiritual and moral traditions of Russian peoples. State Duma deputies, scientists and public activists took part in the gathering chaired by Gennady Zyuganov, the KPRF’s long-time leader.

Just like their predecessors, the Soviet Communists, the party’s modern members believe that the state should supervise the nation’s morality. Methods they suggest are also similar to those in the USSR: censorship and tough control over the media. They describe the latter as “today’s most dangerous weapon which harms the minds and hearts of millions.”

The participants of the meeting agreed that modern “aggressive” information environment poses a threat to the youth and children, who are not able to distinguish between the truth and myths.

“Public speeches on TV and radio abound in strong language and thieves’ talk,” the resolution pointed out. “Dominance of scenes of violence, vulgarity, sex, and evil destroy entire populations in Russia.”

Besides that, Soviet-style heroes such as scientists, workers, dairymaids, cosmonauts, workers and officers have been replaced with successful businessmen, criminals, gays, dissidents and pragmatics.

Largely thanks to the media, people strive for physical pleasures rather than spiritual excellence, the document observed.

Others threats to the community come from foreign cartoons picturing mainly “robots, monsters and never-ending fights between children,” as well as videogames that promote information about prostitution, pornography and drugs.

Social networking services also came under fire as an instrument that is used to “deform the Russian language” and impose an alien morality on society. The process of Russia’s Westernization is in full swing “disguised as communion with modern civilization,” the Communists asserted.

Demolition of the Annunciation church in Labor square, Leningrad, Russia, 1929 (RIA Novosti)

As a way to improve the situation, the KPRF urged the State Duma to set up a Council on the Protection of Morality on Russia’s TV and radio, develop a national program on the matter, and form a new state policy on education based on Russian classical literature and culture. In addition, the party believes it is necessary to counter “negative influence of foreign religious organizations.”

“Lately, we’ve been witnessing barbaric attacks on the Orthodox faith and our historic traditions," Zyuganov told the meeting, adding that such a trend is absolutely unacceptable.

Meanwhile, Zyuganov’s party comrades remain split on the role of religious faith in the society and harshly criticize the KPRF leader for being too loyal to the Orthodox Church and betraying one of the party’s basic principles – atheism.

In the Soviet era, religion was considered “opiate for the masses” and did not fall in line with Marxist-Leninist ideology. Following the Bolshevik Revolution in October 1917, the Soviet government launched a huge anti-religious campaign, destroying cathedrals, mosques and temples. Thousands of clerics were arrested and executed.

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