Criticism of Mass Culture by K.I. Chukovsky as an Anthropological Problem

Introduction . In connection with the current agenda of the widespread imposition by the West of anti-values and anticulture, children are in a special risk zone. For many years, and today with particular force, the latent formation of children’s deviant spirituality has been carried out through publishing. In order to identify this trend, the task is to refer to the experience of the leader of Russian literature studies K.I. Chukovsky. This reference showed quite specifically that the origins of growing destructiveness, negatively affecting the spiritual and moral education and development of children and youth, are located at the beginning of the 20 th century. Over time, they only intensified. Materials and Methods . Axiological and systemic approaches, historical method, methods of moral theology and formal logic are applied. The main material base was the work of K.I. Chukovsky “Nat Pinkerton and modern literature” (1908), the works of domestic and foreign philosophers as well as modern studies of literature studies. Particular attention was paid to the study of the research done by the famous Russian teacher V.I. Soroka-Rosinsky. Results . It has been revealed that the man’s rejection of their spiritual principles (the process of secularization) leads to the degradation of the man themselves, to the well-known “everything is allowed” (F.M. Dostoevsky). K.I. Chukovsky was able to see the signs of this all-permissive threat (“signs of illness, but not illness”), in particular, in the issue of upbringing and development of children. He tried to demonstrate it on the example of the figure of the detective “Nat Pinkerton”, popular among children and young people at that time. Discussion and Conclusion . K.I. Chukovsky was one of the first to see the prerequisites for the formation of children’s deviant spirituality at the beginning of the last century as a consequence of a systemic anthropological crisis. His hypotheses are confirmed by further studies, in particular, done by V.I. Soroka-Rosinsky and other scientists.