We seemed to reach a peak with our furore over the plight of LGBT Russia a month or so ago. Two mass protests outside Downing Street; verbatim plays rushed together; Stephen Fry blog posts comparing Putin with the gays to Hitler with the Jews; heavy coverage of the whole situation in this very magazine. And then it all died down a little. Not that the anti-propaganda laws targeting the Russian LGBT community have died down, but because such is the wont of attention that it ebbs and flows in crests and troughs. However, last weekend a series of talks held at The Yard theatre in Hackney, organised by the Dalston Superstore, TEDxHackney, Culture Device and The Queer Archive, brought the Russian situation bursting back onto the topical agenda.
‘To Russia LGBT With Love’ brought together some of the most scintillating speakers and keynote artists the gay community has to offer to voice their messages of support to our gay peers living under Putin. Hosted by the engaging Daniel Vais of TEDxHackney and glued together by Rachael Williams of the Superstore, proceedings kicked off with an energetic speech courtesy of renowned performance artist Jonny Woo. A consummate public speaker, he worked the assembled well, explaining the disparity between what we take for granted in London and what is held sacred in Moscow, paving the way for the more in-depth analysis that would follow.
Oreet Ashery, an influential theatre-maker, followed. She made a searing point of how vulnerable a state it is to be exposed, whether it be in terms of sexuality or physically exposed, and invited two members from the audience to face one another, undress to the point where they felt comfortable and then embrace. Journalist Oliver Bullough stepped up to The Yard’s stage after Ashery, to deliver his own experiences of living in Russia and attending the first fledgling gay pride events attempted in St Petersburg.
‘It was chaos,’ he said. ‘An entire ring of policemen arm-in-arm surrounded the park where they wanted to lay flowers by an eternal flame so no one could enter; this is the equivalent of closing off Hyde Park. A cavalcade of angry Russian Orthodox nuns turned up and were throwing eggs at everyone – you see normally they throw eggs at immigrants who, conveniently, they could tell apart by the colour of their skin, however gay people they couldn’t easily identify as separate, therefore everyone got the egging indiscriminately.’
As a ripple of laughter swept the audience at the story of the crazy egg-throwing nuns, Bullough brought the tone back to why we were sitting there, telling his sombre tales of the violence he had also witnessed. Then he gave his rationale as to why the gay community may have become the scapegoats of the Russian state. When Vladmir Putin returned to power at the last ‘transparently fraudulent’ election there were riots in the streets, the Russian people were not just angry, they were furious. This was very worrying to Putin. To direct the attention and disaffection of his people against a minority neatly deflects their feelings of frustration to their state and its leader.
“To direct the attention and disaffection of his people against a minority neatly deflects their feelings of frustration to their state and its leader.”
Choreographer Javier de Frutos gave his own poignant personal feelings about coming to terms to homosexuality even in as forward-thinking a place as the West; Dr Christopher Bryant, editor of Polari magazine, expanded on some points raised by Bullough of Putin rallying himself and ‘Russian values; against the perceived degradation of the liberal West, and also made the excellent point of how he objects to the trend of placing Putin in makeup on protestors’ placards. He stated that it is like saying that putting someone in makeup is a bad thing, or that feminisation is a bad thing. Bryant also illustrated how the marginalisation of sexualities can still occur in our own UK society, bringing with him as a prop the ‘G*y best friend’ blow-up doll that was made available to buy on Tesco’s website in recent weeks. Aside from the offensiveness of the stereotype, why is the word ‘gay’ censored with an asterix? Do we really think exposing children to a word will influence their sexualities in later life?
Other notable speakers included Wendyl Harris of Outrage!, Peter Tatchell, who turned up at the last minute, and Saci Lloyd who expanded upon the subject of children, that ‘protecting’ some children, as these Russian laws claim to do, is to persecute gay children at their very most fragile and defenceless stages. Dr Jonathan Kemp, DJ extraordinaire and acclaimed author of The Penetrated Male, delivered a stirring and comprehensive examination of the political situation. These speeches were interspersed with notes of support from figures such as Peaches and Glenda Jackson; messages read out from the LGBT citizens of Russia; and wonderful performance and music interludes from the ever-excellent Ursula Martinez, Holestar serenading the hipsters, DJ Rokk’s phenomenal collaboration with gay poet Dean Atta on ‘Young, Black and Gay’ and Jamie McDermott managing to channel the gorgeously orchestral sound of his band The Irrepressibles with just his lovely cello player and a punk violinist.
Inbetween songs Jamie told us a story of how The Irrepressibles were invited to play at a Russian festival earlier this year, in front of 5,000 people. They decided to show the video to their song ‘Arrow’ there, which features two young, nude men wrestling and then eventually sharing the most intimate of kisses. Against the attempted sabotage of their Russian tech team they got across a message of visibility and solidarity to the gay community of Russia, and this very reason was why we were gathered together in the Yard theatre last Sunday. An excellent event, and an excellent message well said.
