Quote Originally Posted by Hanna View Post
Yes, but haven't you checked what the law is about?
It's NOT outlawing actually BEING homosexual, having homosexual relations or going to gay bars..

It's some specific acts that it is referring to, that anybody gay or straight, could refrain from doing.

Just like I can go to Lebanon and refrain from wearing shorts and a tank top, or go to Germany and refrain from constantly bring up the war. Or in the case of Russia; refrain from making a gay manifestation even if I happened to be gay.

A Swedish female athlete competed in Russia today and had a rainbow manicure which she showed off after she jumped. Nothing, of course, happened.

However Elena Isinbayeva, the Russian gold medalist said it was insensitive and showing a lack of respect for her country.

I agree that if it was illegal to actually BE gay, then that would be wrong, since gay people for the most part cannot change.
Yes, I saw Alex's post about the law. It's a semantics game, Hanna.

It's like saying that it's not illegal for you to be a woman. But if you use tampons, or maxipads, or if you wear dresses or makeup or if you speak about women's rights, you are spreading "propaganda" and should be arrested. In other words, you can be female, but don't let anyone know you are female or we will arrest you.

It's similar to the "don't ask don't tell" policy America's military used to have. It wasn't a crime to be gay, but telling anyone you were gay was a crime.

In some ways, this new law is even worse than the old Soviet law which simply made it a crime to be gay, because it is extremely ambiguous. Painting rainbows on someone's fingernails shouldn't matter, shouldn't offend anyone, and certainly shouldn't be interpreted as "propaganda" - and yet, it can be. It all depends on who is doing the interpreting. Is it the prosecutor, as Throbert asked? Or is it the responsibility of the "suspect" to prove it is not propaganda?

And anyway, beyond the ambiguous wording of the law, there is an undeniable hostility towards gay people right now, as exemplified by all of the articles and pictures already posted in this thread. The Orthodox Church appears to gives tacit, but unspoken, approval of the persecution of gays, much as churches in America give passive support of individuals who bomb abortion clinics and murder gynecologists.