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Loading ...Russian gays convicted of promoting homosexuality
04.06.2009 5:28pm EDT
(Moscow) Two Russian gay activists Monday were convicted of promoting homosexuality in Ryazan, southeast of Moscow.
The Ryazan region is the only area in Russia with a law barring discussion of homosexuality to minors. The law is used to bar schools from any discussion of gay issues.Nikolai Baev and Irina Fet, both associated with Moscow Pride, were charged with “propaganda of homosexuality to minors” for carrying a banner advocating gay rights close to a school and a library.
The banner declared “Homosexuality is normal” and “I am proud of my homosexuality.”
Baev and Fet said they wanted to show that the law is unconstitutional.
The court fined the pair 1,500 rubles – about $ 50.00 each.
“We will now file a complaint with the Russian Constitutional Court,” Russian gay rights leader Nikolai Alekseev, who attended the protest but was not charged, told the Interfax news agency.
Last month, Alekseev and other gay leaders called on contestants to the Eurovision Song Contest to speak out from the stage for LGBT rights in Russia. The contest which will be broadcast throughout Europe is being held this year in Moscow.
The finals will be broadcast on May 16th, the day Moscow Pride will hold its pride festival. The city already has barred the group from having a gay pride parade.
Laws against homosexuality were repealed at the end of the Communist era, but Moscow city officials have refused to allow gays to hold a pride march for years.
Moscow Pride has seven cases already pending before the European Court of Human Rights.
The latest was filed against President Dmitry Medvedev. The others involve Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov.
What, and heterosexuality isn’t promoted to me in school every day, while bisexual/homosexual people are PERCEIVED as “straight” in textbooks? It’s sad. It sure would be nice to get the truth in the place where I’m supposed to get it!
But of course, when anti-gay slurs are used by other students, all the teachers ever say is, “Okay, cut it out.” When I don’t tuck in my shirt, I’m threatened with a D-slip (discipline slip) or even a detention!
What is this “promoting” homosexuality to minors? They aren’t recruiters. A gay child or teen needs to be told that they are okay, just the way they are. It seems like that law forbids that, which is really sad.