[pipy]

I am Russian and live in Russia. I don't usually write comments, but, since I've never seen any reasonable explanation of the Russian homophobia issue on any Western website, I'm going to bite the bullet:

First of all, as banal as it may sound, Russian State Duma doesn't represent the interests and wishes of the general public in any meaningful way (at least, if compared to any Western European country or US). The votes are constantly rigged, and even though the Putin is supported by the large majority of population (sad truth), Russian State Duma by the huge part is literally a bunch of degenerates, clowns and Putin's yes-men at best. So, they can pass any insane law that they wish to pass.

Secondly, the regime's popularity is monotonically decreasing, albeit slowly. And the reason is that the relative economic prosperity is based only on high oil and natural gas prices (which can still help you during the next couple of decades). The industrial complex is in decline and nothing is able to revive it (because of the fact that any owner of successful company can be stripped of his ownership in any time -- and this is de facto at the core of the regime and cannot be changed).

When you begin to understand that your popularity trend wont ever change, you start looking for means for tightening control and providing alternative channels to drain the public discontent. For their main ideology the ruling regime has adopted the "back into the future" style monarchism and religion (which is miserable at best, but is the only choice when the largest opposing part of the public still praises higher standards of living in atheistic USSR).

Some jerk has made an arbitrary decision that it is a good idea to also go after gays. The passing of the anti-gay-propaganda law and the half-assed media campaign followed.

How does majority of the Russian people really relate to gays: 1) First and foremost, no one even thinks about the issue. When the large part of a population lives below poverty line, when there are significant issues with police misconduct and corruption, etc. etc., you have larger issues to think of. 2) Literally the overwhelming majority of the people I ever new are highly tolerant to gays. I'm speaking this as a person that has contacts within diverse social groups (university dropout, served as a conscript in a military for two years, born in another region, but now a long time Moscow resident). 3) This does not preclude that the Russian people as a whole are probably less fond of gays than Western Europeans, but not even near the scale of the current media hype. This is sad. But there are some orders of magnitude sadder things in Russia for everyone to deal with every day.

Now, when US and UK have some relationship issues with Russia, they have decided that this is a good time to raise the issue. Since the Russia is de facto tabula rasa for West and vice versa, the bullshit card has worked really fine.

I am personally for allowing gay marriage etc. etc., but we shouldn't even be talking about this, because this "Russian homophobia" is pure propaganda stuff, on both sides. There are huge issues in the West and Russia that are much more important.

Slightly offtopic: great lecture about ideology by Slavoj Žižek https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1Kb4JZGpA0

[berntb]

Thanks for an interesting read about a subject, when the main discussion was about the media garbage regarding the subject!

Some points:

1. I was lucky I saw that, stuff disappears quickly from the front page on HN. Next time the subject comes up, please post it again (or a link). Others would appreciate reading it too, imho.

2. If you go back just a few decades, intolerance to homosexuals were also official policy in the west. This moral panic about Russia is a bit ridiculous (my original point). Russian attitudes will change when (/if :-( ) the economy gets better and social development gets going.

3. As probably most West European computer people, I know enough Russians/East Europeans to understand that "Russians are X" is as stupid as generalizing about West Europeans.

4. I doubt there is a conspiracy to make Russia look bad. The coverage of human rights violations in Caucasus would then be much better. (You bought your local media's hype. :-) )

(I added the video to my "Watch Later", I would rather watch that than write more tests for old code... Just 20 pages of tests or so left. :-( :-) )

[pipy]

Hi! I'd like to thank you too! It was kind of disappointing to become aware that my reply wasn't probably read by anybody (since there were no new posts on the thread at all). And equally refreshing to read your reply! :)

Thanks for a tip about posting a link on HN news, it didn’t cross my mind since I usually think of it as if it is a feed with important and interesting stories for the general public. It's hard for me to judge if my reply was interesting to anyone apart of you and a couple of other posters on the thread.

As about conspiracy theories, maybe I didn't choose the right words. I don't think about the Russian homosexual issue as a part of some grand plan, rather as a temporary and somewhat arbitrary distraction from more important issues. At least today, when Russia is more or less compliant with the West on the major issues. Even when the most of the people like to think otherwise, Russia is nowhere near waging an independent foreign policy (we can probably argue on that for a long time, but I don't think it's worth it). Also, such distractions and theme changes as "Snowden revelations" >> "Problems of Russian homosexuals" don't even need to be conscious.

You've made a great point about Caucasus and the overall horrendous human rights record of Russia. And it is a really interesting point that the media has raised some relatively mild issue instead of, just from the top of my head, jailing of union workers that were fighting for better wages and improvement of abysmal safety controls on the factories of Western automotive conglomerates that are based in Russia. Or even something just as horrible and at the same time not strictly related to the interests of Western business. An equally interesting question is why we hear lamentations about the homosexual propaganda law now and not couple of years before, when the policy was implemented. These are important issues that you've raised, but the answers to them don't lie on the on the surface. IMHO, they also don't lie in the field of conspiracy theories, rather in the field of human psychology and the somewhat recent history of US-USSR relations. I'd really like to expand on this, but now I need to write some code, too. :)

Good luck!

It would be interesting to hear your opinion about Žižek's points! (Don't consider this too binding: if you won't find time to watch the talk, or would be reluctant to express your thoughts about it, I would understand! :))

P.S. If memory serves me well, the largest media hype about atrocities in Chechnya was just before the Kosovo War, when Yeltsin hasn't yet decided not to provide direct military support to Milošević regime. At least, that was my impression.

[berntb]

Hi again,

I have no clue how posting stories works. (I have a suspicion that a of extra accounts are often(?) used to vote most stories up, so they get to the front page.) Most of the times when I get (or lose!) karma is when I write something in a very new story.

Interesting point about laws re homosexuality, I didn't know they were that old. Hmm, maybe there is some reason why it is so visible right now. Maybe not only the Chinese state can set the media's agenda...?

Good luck yourself! Still writing tests and I'll go drink at a wedding this weekend. :-( :-)

I'm aiming for beginning of next week.

[pipy]

I'd like to correct myself: I've said that the policy was implemented couple of years before, this is not correct. The first country-wide law ‘against propaganda of homosexuality to minors’ was really passed on 11-th of June, 2013. But we had multiple similar laws that were passed on regional levels long before, starting in 2006 when the law was passed in Ryazan Oblast, and culminating in 2011 when it was passed in many other regions and Saint Petersburg among them. And the media was talking about the need for such laws probably for five or six years.

Here is a good summary of the situation: http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=auto&tl=en&u=...

I should have checked the facts earlier. The media was babbling about the need of the law for so long, that it seems that I've lost touch. The ruling party has introduced the bill in March of 2012. They government is doing so many blatantly absurd things, that it's hard to track of all of them. The current issues that I'm interested in are the dissolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences; extending of blatant religious propaganda to small children in schools; possible two-fold or three-fold increase of the utility payments; introduction of the ‘non-state’ center for fighting ‘atheist extremism’ by the church which is so integrated into the ruling regime, impudent and crooky that it alienates not-insignificant part of it's own congregation; the legislation for prohibiting the Tor network and the growing list of banned websites; dismantling of free education. And the disturbing fact that anything that doesn't go along with government's plans is becoming ‘extremism’. Even small local protests against non-political issues are being videotaped by the FSB, in the regions some people literally go to jail for protesting against minor stuff, etc., etc.

Have a good time! Since I haven't been invited to any wedding party, I have no choice but to resort to drinking alone. Ha ha, just kidding. In the coming days I would probably do some work. )))

[berntb]

Oh my Cthulhu, thanks for a depression :-( :-)

I had forgotten about the Tor network and most of the other craziness.

So, the last dictators kept the church down and the coming one one hugs it closely? Re religion...

As a hard line atheist, I have to admit the Orthodox churches I saw in a short St Petersburg visit long ago impressed me.

You know Scandinavian "taste"? One extra line in a design is a bit... brave. Two lines is, well, avantgarde. Three -- beyond tacky. The churches there made my eyes bleed from the sheer amount of details, while they blew me away with sheer beauty. Cool feeling.

I exaggerated the drinking. I was outsourced to Romania a couple of years back and am still here. People here are nice but just don't drink for fun. (In the small villages they are said to drink like sponges, I'll avoid moving there. :-) )