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Comment by maxxxxx | Hacker News Reader

They had female fighter pilots in world war 2 and the first female astronauts. That was long before anybody in the west could even think of that possibility. Not sure if it's a Russian thing or communism. East Germany also had more female engineers and scientists.

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Yep. They just expected women to be able to do the same thing as men. There weren't these half-hearted attempts to "boost diversity" that just never, ever feel genuine. There are Russian greats across the board both male and female -- even pre-soviet. But yes, female astronauts, engineers. Go back a couple centuries, and you had Catherine the Great -- one of the greatest and longest tenured Russian monarchs, a woman. The faith of the Russian people -- the Orthodox Faith -- venerates a woman as the "greatest Saint" and the "Queen of Heaven". It's just always been a part of the mindset. So women are everywhere and it just isn't treated as anything out of the ordinary, or as hitting some diversity figure. It needs to be natural.

There's a wikipedia page with with female astronauts(google list of female astronauts).

Out of the 60 that actually flew to space, only 2 are from the USSR/Russia, and both of them were elected to the soviet/people's representatives, so I'd say female astronauts in the USSR was nothing but a publicity stunt.

Actually it's four as far as I could see but your point is valid.

Random statistics alert. Of those 60 women in space: 2 flew on Chinese spacecraft, 10 flew only on Russian spacecraft, 42 flew only on American spacecraft, and 6 flew on both American and Russian spacecraft (including the one woman currently in space).

> They had female fighter pilots in world war 2 and the first female astronauts.

Not just fighter pilots, but bombers/CAS as well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_Witches

They also employed female snipers, who were very effective in that role. For example, Lyudmila Pavlichenko is one of the most successful and decorated snipers in military history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyudmila_Pavlichenko

JFYI, first female pilot was from Turkey.

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