Crazy scene in Russia, with groups of hoodlums and brown shirts beating up on gay protestors.

The ever-efficient Russian police kept the situation under control - by PROTECTING THE THUGS and ARRESTING THE PROTESTORS! Insanity.

Some video and pictures.

http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/0...reut/index.html

It is worth muting through the commercial to view the video for those of us who may not catch the undependable re-runs on CNN, since this may not be as popular a story as some starlett being raped on a remote Carribean island.

Interesting that the commentator says much of Russia seems to prefer "living in the past". A more accurate description might be "living in the closet".

Right wing groups around the world, including here, have always had fervent contingents of closeted gay men who tend to be the most extreme members in such groups. I would not rule out the possibility that some are simply planted by authorities as undercover operators seeking to solidify their legitimacy with their target group. But no instigator can create homophobia; they can only use what already exists.

Gay rights has long been an indicator of the extent of human rights - in western societies especially. Russia seems to be going through a very interesting and late-blooming version of that. How it will play out will be affected by the fact that it is taking place in a place and time very different from Nazi Germany or pre-Civil Rights USA.

Europe's is a relatively sophisticated and "old" culture. And with the development of a Merkel-Sarkozy-Brown alliance, will set the cultural tone for the continent and maybe the world. Even Russia can't resist that.

Yes, but in many ways Russia itself is a very 'NEW' culture. It is just emerging after a very long dark night, and it has many very reactionary elements.

Also there are many in Russia who are totally unfettered by 'modern western' sensibilities. Make no mistake, prevailing Russian views and social thought are not Western European. Mostly they are reactionary. totalitarian, and even imperialist.

I think things are going to get much worse there before they get any better

R

I was afraid that the Russian pride parade would end up marred by violence. The fascist right is extremely strong in Russia. These types are most represented by young men who hate gays and any ethnic minorities. Armenian and Georgians as well as other ethnic minorities in Russia are often the target of hate crimes. These hatemongers often follow western aryan supremacy groups like Stormfront.

Do not be fooled, it is NOT just young men in the small Fascist right... the far larger R Orthodox Church and other religious groups have joined with the current reactionary government, and frankly, the majority of people who also feel that way on this issue.

R

There are so many different far right groups in Russia. Some want to restore the monarchy. Others are anarchist types. But all hate anyone they consider not reflecting their 'aryan' supremacy ideas. And ITJOCK is right that it is not just young men in these hate groups. The far right is growing all over Europe and the U.S. I personally see nothing different in the ideas of the hate groups such as Stormfront and the Jerry Falwell types. I have looked at the stormfront website and am appalled by the list of nationalities involved in such venom.

The Russian Orthodox church in Russia is one of the biggest enemies of the gay community. I am totally opposed to mixing church, synogogue or mosque with the state. Only evil can result from this mixture.

If anyone might recall, I addressed and predicted this a couple of month ago. So, no surprise here.

TRL

The Russian police let this get out of hand. ( gee I wonder which side they are on?!) I hope all gay and lesbian who were planning to go to Russia have canceled their trips.

It's not just Russia, Outsporters.

In Poland, the ruling right-wing coalition and its constituent parties have been attacking gays and lesbian groups and institutions for several years now. The extreme right-wing Prime Minister, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, and his identical twin brother, the President (yes, right-wing identical twins control Poland these days, I couldn't make that up) Lech Kaczynski, not long ago promulgated a law banning discussion of homosexuality in schools and authorizing the firing of teachers who are found guilty of breaking the law. This is only one of the many anti-gay steps these two have taken since they gained control. Supposedly the Polish authorities are now going so far as to investigate whether "Tinky-Winky" is gay!


The Kaczyinskis, rulers of Poland: President Lech and PM Jaroslaw

But the real irony is that one of the right-wing twins, PM Jaroslaw Kaczynski, has...BEEN OUTED AS GAY! Of course, is anyone surprised? Self-hating right-wingers always spell trouble for the rest of us (sane people)

Poland In Trouble with EU over Homophobia

It's fascinating how different cultures that are so close together can be. I was thinking of this because the Czech republic has emerged as pretty tolerant in the post-Soviet era and Hungary didn't seem all that bad either. At first, when we were just talking about Russia I thought--well, although the Czechs also speak a Slavic language, historically they were usually in Austria-Hungary's orbit, so their culture is really more central European. But much of Poland was German until WW II, and Polish and Czech are linguistically so similar that I saw a film recent that was partly in Polish with a Czech friend and he could understand most of the dialogue. It may be the Church--Poland has always had a very strong Catholic church. In contrast the Czechs went Protestant in the reformation and were forcibly re-Catholicised, and (at least according to my friend Ondrej) were never very fervent.

Oh come on dont blame the Catholic Church for homopobia- they are all goodness and light...

I think the organized religions are playing a major role in Poland's and Russia's cases, but it also has to do with specific, local political conditions. Slovenia, another predominantly Catholic country that was part of the former Eastern Bloc nation of Yugoslavia, appears to have as liberal an approach to LGBT issues as the Czech Republic, while Slovakia and Croatia appear to be a bit less open. But I wonder if economics aren't playing a role; the Czech Republic and Slovenia are relatively prosperous, while Croatia (also heavily Catholic) and Slovakia are less so.

I once read that Hungarian is actually in the same language family as Finnish (the Finno-Ugric languages) and not related to the Slavic languages, except through historical borrowings. Slavic is an Indo-European language, which is why its root words are close to those of Latin, Greek, proto-Germanic, Albanian, Celtic, Lithuanian, and Sanskrit.

Pride matters. Interesting piece here that expresses why Pride events, like this one in Russia, matter!!

http://www.ontopmag.com/article.aspx?id=43...amp;category=18