Moscow’s mayor tried to crush the city’s gay pride parade. In doing so, he did the cause of gay rights in Russia a huge service Russian gay rights …
Russian gay rights campaigners are toasting Moscow’s homophobic mayor, Yuri Luzhkov, after he ordered the banning and violent suppression of last Saturday’s Slavic gay pride parade in the Russian capital – just hours before the Eurovision song contest was staged in the city.
“Luzhkov has done more than anyone to publicise gay rights in Russia,” beamed Nikolai Alekseev, the gay parade organiser, as we chatted on Sunday afternoon following his release from nearly 24 hours of police detention:
By stopping the gay parade he has provoked massive media coverage of our fight against homophobia. The Russian media has been full of reports about gay issues for the last week. This has hugely increased public awareness and understanding of gay people.
Slowly, we are eroding homophobic attitudes. Through this media visibility, we are helping to normalise queer existence. After our successive gay protests in Moscow since 2006, people are less shocked about homosexuality. We have a long way to go, but gradually we are winning hearts and minds, especially among younger Russians.
We ought to give Luzhkov an award. His violation of our right to protest has given us a remarkable platform, with day-after-day of publicity about lesbian gay human rights. It is the equivalent of about 200m roubles (£4m pounds) in free advertising.
AfteSee Thank you Mayor Luzhkov
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Moscow Police Smother Rally for Gay Rights as It Begins
MOSCOW — Police officers in Moscow quickly suppressed a gay rights demonstration on Saturday, detaining dozens of protesters who hoped to showcase discrimination in Russia ahead of the Eurovision song contest final on Saturday evening.
The approximately 40 people rounded up face misdemeanor charges for trying to hold what a police spokesman, Anatoly Lastovetsky, called “unsanctioned” demonstrations.
Such demonstrations have become an annual headache for the Moscow authorities, who refuse to grant permission to organizers to hold the events despite constitutional guarantees protecting freedom of assembly. At previous gay rights events, police officers have often stood by as neo-fascists and radical Orthodox Christian groups attacked protesters.
While there were no reports of violence on Saturday, the crackdown on this year’s protest could prove an embarrassment as thousands of European visitors enter the city for the Eurovision final, a huge pop music spectacle that Moscow is hosting for the first time after Dima Bilan, a Russian pop star, won last year’s contest in Serbia. See Moscow Police Smother Rally for Gay Rights as It Begins New York Times
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Gay protest broken up in Moscow
Police in Russia have broken up a protest by gay rights activists in Moscow, staged to coincide with the final of the Eurovision Song Contest.
Some 30 campaigners had gathered near a university in defiance of a ban on their march and many were dragged away by police when they shouted slogans.
British gay rights activist, Peter Tatchell, was among those detained.
A counter-demonstration by nationalist and religious groups was allowed to go ahead elsewhere in the Russian capital.
Equal rights
The gay rights group had been waving flags and chanting slogans demanding equal rights and condemning the treatment of gays and lesbians in Russia.
At least 20 were arrested as police moved in to disperse the protest.
As he was being taken away by police, Mr Tatchell shouted: “This shows the Russian people are not free.”
Speaking from a police station, he later told the BBC: “The way the police violently broke up our peaceful protest is an indication of a drift toward authoritarianism that is affecting all Russians.”
‘Satanic’
The organiser of the gathering and leading campaigner, Nikolai Alexeyev, was also detained at the event, which took place in the south-west of the city.
See Gay protest broken up in Moscow
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Gay Pride in Moscow: Report from a Chicago Activist
MOSCOW, May 14, 2009 (Gay Liberation Network) – After 14 hours of flights, last night I found myself in Eastern Europe for the first time in my life, warmly greeted by lesbian and gay activists who, despite state repression, are organizing their fourth annual pride event in this city. This year’s event is dubbed ‘Slavic Pride’, denoting the significant participation of activists from around the region.
The previous three years’ events have gone forward despite bans from the authorities and violence from neo-fascists in Russian orthodox and skinhead garb. This year the authorities not only banned the Pride event, but for good measure, approved the anti-gays’ application to hold their own event this past Tuesday.
That same day, our Moscow friends countered with their own unsanctioned action at the Department of Registration of Acts of Civil Status – an attempt by two lesbian activists to get a marriage license.
Leading Slavic Pride activist Nikolai Alekseev said the action was inspired in part by a February civil disobedience action at a marriage license bureau in Chicago. The Moscow action received widespread international press coverage, including from the New York Times.
As I shadowed Alekseev around the city last night, press coverage if anything seemed to build, with Nikolai’s two cell phones ringing incessantly and meetings with Finish and Slovenian journalists held near midnight just outside of Red Square.
Slavic Pride is slated for this Saturday, amidst the big ‘Eurovision Fest’ being hosted this year by Moscow. For those not familiar with what Eurovision is, think American Idol times ten, with a profusion of media coverage and street banners that puts Chicago’s 2016 Olympics bid hype to shame.
While our specific plans for Saturday are necessarily secret at this time, the aim is to cause maximum embarrassment to the government if they attempt to arrest us or allow the neo-fascists to attack.
In response to Moscow activists’ application for a permit this year, police chief Vladmir Pronin told the Russian news agency Interfax that gay pride parades in the capital are “unacceptable – gay pride parades shouldn’t be allowed”.
“No one will dare to do it, such ‘braveheart’ will be torn to shreds,” he added. “The West can say we’re bad guys, but our people will see it is right. Our country is patriarchal, that’s [sic] sums it up… I positively agree with the Church, with the Patriarch, politicians, especially with [Mayor] Luzhkov, who are convinced that man and woman should love each other. It is established by God and nature.”
However, Moscow Pride organizers have vowed to move forward with this year’s Pride event despite the police chief’s threats.
“Mr. Pronin already showed his incompetency last year when his services were unable to prevent us unveiling a banner directed against the Mayor, right opposite his office,” said Alekseev.
The main pride event successfully took place nearby at the monument to the famous Russian gay composer, Peter Tchkaivosky, while the authorities and neo-fascists were hoodwinked in to thinking that it would take place outside of homophobic Mayor Yuri Luzhkov’s office.
Today at the start of a gay rights conference at an undisclosed location east of the city, I was joined by British gay rights campaigner Peter Tatchell and LGBT activists from around Russia and Belorussia Minsk, Rostof, Sochi, Ufa, St. Petersburg, Krasnodar, Ekaterinbourg, Volgodonsk, Ryazan and of course Moscow.
As we gathered on a coach to go to the conference, Moscow activist Nikolai Baev explained how a group of young activists from Ryazan, about 200 miles south of the capital, got involved in organizing this year’s Slavic Pride:
“There is a very discriminatory law in the Ryazan region which prohibits so-called propaganda about homosexuality20and among minors. The law passed in 2006 and we had pickets that said that homosexuality is absolutely normal and we are proud of our situation. We picketed in front of schools in Ryazan and we were detained because it was illegal.”
Two people were found guilty and fined 1500 roubles (about $45 US) each. Alekseev came to Ryazan to help in the campaign and in the appeal of their cases to the Constitutional Court of Russia.
Then, Sergey Yenin, 19, explained how he became involved in gay rights organizing in Belorussia :
“I felt myself to be gay from my early childhood, he explained.
“Last year I came to Minsk and there I got acquainted with some gay activists and I thought it would be great if I fought for my gay rights. There are a lot of people who don’t fight for their rights, who don’t participate in such activist movements, and they just consume our achievements.
“For example, we fought for our gay club, our one gay club in Minsk. It was in danger of being closed [by the government], but it still exists, due to us.”
I asked Sergey if he had participated in Minsk Pride events before.
“Yes, of course. The most outstanding Pride parade took place in 2001. But I didn’t participate because I was only 11 then. There were over 300 people participating in this event and 300 watching. This was fabulous This was an historical moment in Belorussia.
“The last one took place in October of 2008. It was named Queer Walk and it took place on the 11th of October 2008, the international day of coming out, and we organized a pride parade. It was a rather private, intimate event, there were fifty participants because we cannot organize such a public event because of our government.
“If we applied for an event, we would be denied.
“There is an action that takes place [each year] called Chernobyl Way, and all of the opposition parties take place there, and our LGBT group participated last year and this year. Last year we raised the rainbow flag and there were a lot of bad comments about it, there were a lot of thre ats [of violence]. There were such political parties as Right Alliance, and they threaten us all of the time. This year we didn’t20raise our rainbow flag because the organizer of the Belorussian National Front, the main opposition party, they coordinated a call to us, do not raise your rainbow flag, not because we have anything against you, because our fight for clean air, free of radiation will turn into a fight for gay rights.”
I asked Sergey why he personally joined the 15 others for the ten hour train ride from Belorussia to join this Saturday’s Slavic Pride: “I [only] made the conclusion [to come] on May 12 because I was really very frightened about myself and my friends. I know that there is some information that Pride is going to be canceled, and more than this, that Pride participants are going to be beaten.
“Because this is my fight really.If I don’t go to the pride parade, who will go there? My reasons to come was to support my friends – and of course to support gay rights.”
SEE ALSO
Tatchell To Attend Moscow Gay Pride. Despite threats to bash and arrest the marchers, British gay human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell will attend this Saturday’s Moscow Gay Pride parade – this year renamed Slavic Gay Pride to support the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) equality struggles in all Slavic countries, Russian and non-Russian. (UK Gay News, May 11, 2009)
Gay Marriage Campaign Starts in Russia. Two women will apply for a marriage license in Moscow on May 12, it emerged this afternoon. The announcement was made today during a press conference for Slavic Pride which is planned for later this month in Moscow. (UK Gay News, May 5, 2009)
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Russia warns of clampdown on Eurovision gay protest
Russia on Friday warned it would clamp down on an unsanctioned gay rights parade in Moscow that coincides with the Eurovision Song Contest final, but organisers vowed to press on with the demonstration.
Russia is proudly trumpeting the annual pop extravaganza in Moscow on Saturday as the latest example of its ability to hold large-scale international events.
But away from the lights and laser beams at the mammoth 80,000-capacity Olympiysky Arena, police, homosexual activists and extreme-right wingers risk clashing at the “Slavic Gay Pride” parade in central Moscow. See Russia warns of clampdown on Eurovision gay protest
AFP * Tags = gay men gay news lesbian news transgender bisexual
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Violence feared over Moscow gay march
Gay rights activists have warned there could be violence on the streets of the Russian capital Moscow on Saturday as the city stages the Eurovision Song Contest final.
Irina Shipitko (l) and Irina Fedotova’s marriage attempt was rejected
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The competition traditionally has a large gay following and Russian activists are trying to hold the country’s first ever gay pride march while thousands of Eurovision fans are in Moscow.
But the city council has refused to give official permission for the march, while allowing hardcore nationalists and religious groups to stage a counter-demonstration on the same day.
Gay activists have come under attack from such groups in the past.
“We will still go ahead”, says Nikolai Alekseev, leader of Russia’s gay rights movement.
“There will be outrage around the world… if on the 16 May people are being arrested and beaten on the streets of Moscow hours before the Eurovision Song Contest final.
“It will be a disgrace for Russia.”
See Violence feared over Moscow gay march BBC News
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In Moscow, an Attempt to Wed Pushes Gay Rights
MOSCOW — They knew they had no chance. But there they were anyway at a marriage registration office in Moscow on Tuesday. Two young women, wearing tuxedos and clutching bouquets, trying to become the first same-sex couple in Russia to legally wed.
“We have love, we have happiness, we want to be together for our whole lives and we want to do this here in Russia,” said Irina Fedotova, who hoped to marry her longtime partner, Irina Shipitko.
In a country where the push for gay rights has materialized only recently — and in fits and starts often met with violence and arrests — their attempt to marry was a bold, if muted, political statement as much as it was an expression of love.
The unsurprising response from the official at the registration office was dry and unequivocal. “According to article 12 of the family codex, for a marriage to be sanctioned it is necessary to have the mutual and voluntary agreement of a man and a woman.”
Both women said they had expected their marriage application to be rejected and said they would appeal the decision.
Their attempt to marry was meant in part to draw attention to gay rights in Russia as thousands of Europeans flood Moscow for the Eurovision song contest.
Gay rights groups plan a demonstration in Moscow Saturday, the day of the Eurovision final. See In Moscow, an Attempt to Wed Pushes Gay Rights New York Times * Tags = gay men gay news lesbian news transgender bisexual
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Moscow warned to allow gay rights protest – or face Eurovision boycott
But only a few days before this weekend’s grand finale, things have turned ugly, with official homophobia and a boycott threat casting a shadow over the entire event.
lready, one Eurovision contestant has said he will walk out of the competition if violence flares at the proposed demonstration.
“If we get to the final and the demonstration is suppressed by force, I will refuse to get on that stage in Moscow,” Gordon, the singer and songwriter from the Dutch group De Toppers, told Dutch television. “If my kind of people are discriminated against in any way, then there is no reason for me to be here; I’ll be on the first plane home.”
Prominent British gay activist Peter Tatchell, who was assaulted and arrested at the demonstration in 2007, has added his weight to the campaign by announcing that he will attend Saturday’s march, despite a ban on him travelling to Russia.
“I am joining the parade to show my support for the courageous Russian gay campaigners,” said Mr Tatchell, who is the human rights spokesperson for the Green Party.
“All year round they risk arrest, imprisonment and queer-bashing attacks. These men and women are absolute heroes. I salute them.” See
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Lesbians to attempt first gay marriage in Russia
A lesbian couple will try to defy deep-rooted Russian homophobia next week in the first attempt at a gay marriage even though rights activists say it will be rejected outright.
Public relations worker Irina Fyet, 31, and her partner of the same age will apply for a marriage license at a register office on May 12 in Moscow, a city where mayor Yuri Luzhkov once described gay pride marches as “satanic.”
Gay rights activist Nikolai Alekseyev said it was the first time a gay couple would apply for a license.
See Lesbians to attempt first gay marriage in Russia
Reuters – USA
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Ultra-orthodox CatholicMel Gibson’s family values: conservative until it hits home
Holy Week ended with a big bang in the conservative Catholic community. Robyn Moore, Mel Gibson’s wife of 28 years and mother of their seven children, filed for divorce in Los Angeles. With no prenuptial agreement, she is likely to get a settlement worth somewhere around half a billion dollars. Seems like a small price for 28 years of living with Mad Max and his homophobia, anti-Semitism and ultra-orthodox Catholicism.
In a joint statement, the couple acknowledge that they separated in August 2006 shortly after Gibson was arrested for drunk driving. When he was arrested Gibson publicly humiliated his family by engaging in a drunken tirade claiming that the Jews started all the wars in the world and asking a female police sergeant who was filming the event, “What are you looking at, sugar tits.”
But the tipping point that led Moore to seek a divorce seems to have been the publication of photos and stories about Gibson cavorting on a Costa Rican beach with an unidentified young woman. A Russian pop idol named Oksana says she’s the one and Gibson has asked her to marry him. Others claim the woman on the beach was a different Oksana, 39-year-old Ukrainian singer Oksana Grigorieva, who lives in a house owned by the CFO of Gibson’s production company Icon and is the former girlfriend of Timothy Dalton.
Why is it that these right-wing family-values guys are always the worst sinners? Newt Gingrich, Ted Hagee, Larry Craig and now Mel Gibson. Gibson was quoted in the Observer in 2000 as having said, “There is nothing more important than your family. If you ruin that part of your life, what’s left? Work? Money? Screwing around?
See Mel Gibson’s family values @ sALON
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