If you’re planning to go to Russia — say, for the 2014 Winter-clusterfuck Olympics in Sochi — don’t. If you do, don’t be gay. Try not to do anything gay either. No rainbow flags. No holding hands.
If you do pull any public gay, lesbian or “pro-gay”/gay-affirming/non-homophobic faggotry of any sort, you can be detained by the police and placed under arrest for up to 14 days.
Am I some sort of flag-waving queer? Sure. But for a supposedly secular country this is FUCKING INSANE.
This year, in Russian Gay Life!
– Gay Pride parades are now illegal for the next 100 years. All recent peaceful protests by gay rights activists have ended in violence, with the activists outnumbered sometimes ten-fold and beaten severely by Christian Extremists, soccer thugs and the police.
– Adoption of Russian-born children by gay couples and any straight or single parents living in a country where gay marriage is legal in any form is banned.
– Come out? Get fired, no matter how important, visible and pro-Kremlin you’ve been.
– Any public statements by individuals or corporations whatsoever insinuating that (1) homosexuality exists and (2) it is not evil/immoral/abnormal is automatically considered illegal “propaganda of nontraditional sexual relations” to minors and punishable by arrest and fine. This includes parents talking to their children.
– Fatal hate crime is on the rise.
– There is a rumor that President Putin’s next legislation will allow forceful removal of children from homes of gay and suspected gay parents.
So you still want to go? I admire your courage or abhor your apathy, depending. Surely, they’re not just hauling people off the street into gay gulags.
Either way, better punch a gay for safe measure.
(Image: Putin a Rainbow, Buzzfeed)
