Dogmatic Aesthetics

Alexandr raises an interesting point on page 234, saying “If she does not understand this she is not a teacher of live, developing aesthetics, but a preacher of dogmatic aesthetics – which is no better than religion.”  I think Alexandr touches on something important here by comparing officially approved aesthetics to religious dogma. The state encourages “light” and “melodic” music (185), but both of these are subjective to at least a certain degree, because even atonal music like Schoenberg’s work in the early 20th century could be described by both of these terms. It seems that attempting to classify subjective descriptions as objective goes even beyond what most religions do in terms of creating a dogma. How could the Soviet Union reconcile the encouragement of critical thinking with aesthetic dogmatism? And did the USSR consider that “light” and “melodic” music might still be bourgeois music even if its roots are older?