Required reading for 4th graders in Illinois....

[eppie]

Interestingly enough, when I was in 4th grade, my required reading was the biographies of Lenin and Brezhnev.

Naturally, there is absolutely no connection between these requirements.

It is very common for people with your background to become right wing extremists. If you see the way the average Russian (or Ukrainian or white Russian, or Baltic) thinks about minorities such as gays and people of colour it is highly likely that this is a reaction on living in a communist society for a period.
In Russia you see also a huge growth in religious extremism among orthodox Christians. I don't mean terrorism but taking over all the church' extreme views on minorities.

You see this also amongst extremist religious types. Many of the most extreme ones are the ones that were converted to that religion in a later stage of their live.