Why The End of Communism Didn't End Antigay Hate in Russia

[William769]

Russia may have adapted a few modern trappings, but this in depth look examines how LGBT lives there have only gotten worse in the last several decades.



In May of 1977, The Advocate published an interview with Gennady Smakov, a gay intellectual who fled Soviet persecution just two years prior, seeking asylum in the United States. Having fled a country where free speech did not exist and where homosexuality was harshly criminalized, the Soviet author risked his life to escape the widespread oppression that shaped Soviet society in the 1970s.

But that was nearly four decades ago, when communism was perceived as America’s great threat and homosexuality was still classified by the American Psychological Association as a mental disorder. In the four decades since Smakov’s dramatic escape, the world has itself changed dramatically, especially for LGBT people around the globe, both in the United States, and within the boundaries of its once-bitter enemy.

Fourteen years after Smakov’s own immigration, the Berlin Wall fell with a ring of democracy that quickly echoed across the Eastern Bloc, in the same vein that marriage equality now ripples across America. When the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a key section of the so-called Defense of Marriage Act last summer, the ruling ushered in a wave of progress already long reflected in the attitude of an evolving American public, the vast majority of which overwhelmingly support equal rights for LGBT people throughout the nation.

But the passage of time doesn’t always align itself with progress. The American evolution isn't always mirrored by free societies developing around it. The same summer that U.S. courts ruled it unconstitutional to deny federal recognition to same-sex couples, the Kremlin began to tighten its grip on LGBT citizens, invoking a nationwide ban on "gay propaganda" last June.

http://www.advocate.com/world/2014/02/07/why-end-communism-didnt-end-antigay-hate-russia

[oldandhappy]

1. Hate is taught/learned.

Hate for gays in many cultures is a taught/learned thing. It takes generations to unlearn. We have a problem in this country in that FN has taught and people have learned hate for many things the t folk have dictated. We will not bounce back quickly. It takes generations to unlearn hate. I taught ESL in Korea. The students were several generations removed from WWII and the hate for the Japanese was amazing. This hate was passed along from generation to generation. I lived in Vermont for several years. The families there who were long time Vermonters still talked about which families were Green Mountain boys and which families were Tories. We are talking over 200 years here. I have no answers. Just posting my observations.

[grilled onions]

2. Observe Little Kids

Be it daycare or a playground. They will play with any other child no matter what their skin color or what language they speak-------until the parents see them interact and then "racism" begins. "You shouldn't play with him/her" The child always asks "why" and there never, ever is a reason beyond hate and prejudice.

[closeupready]

3. This is important. People's lives are being destroyed.

Huge K&R Thanks, William.

[polly7]

4. Excellent read, William. nt.

[Behind the Aegis]

5. Rec #5!

It's good all this is coming out!

[TheKentuckian]

6. I'm not getting why such would be a natural expectation.

We are only recently getting our own house in order with no communism to "overcome" and it has little to nothing to do with capitalism.