as typical, the use of “GULAG” as synonymous with “labour camp”. Makes it sound more ominous and spooky and foreign. You never see this used with “Auschwitz” or “Guantanamo”. Meanwhile, the word “GULAG” is short for “Glavnoye Upravleniye LAGerey” - “main control of camps”. Aka the government body overseeing the prisons, not the prisons themselves.
the usage of “Russian” instead of “Soviet” is also purposefully misleading and purposefully insidious. It continues the trend of presenting the USSR as a “Russian imperialism” project, as well as equating modern capitalist Russian federation with the USSR.
A little note on the phrasing:
as typical, the use of “GULAG” as synonymous with “labour camp”. Makes it sound more ominous and spooky and foreign. You never see this used with “Auschwitz” or “Guantanamo”. Meanwhile, the word “GULAG” is short for “Glavnoye Upravleniye LAGerey” - “main control of camps”. Aka the government body overseeing the prisons, not the prisons themselves.
the usage of “Russian” instead of “Soviet” is also purposefully misleading and purposefully insidious. It continues the trend of presenting the USSR as a “Russian imperialism” project, as well as equating modern capitalist Russian federation with the USSR.