"The Lights you Bare"

 ST. PETERSBURG, Russia (AP) — Police in St. Petersburg on Sunday, August 2nd, 2015 detained several gay activists who have held pickets in defense of gay rights on a Russian military holiday.

 Yuri Gavrikov, the leader of a gay rights group, was detained by police as he left his home to hold a one-man picket in front of the Hermitage Museum.

Police accused him of cursing on the street, which he denied. Gavrikov was held at a police station
 pending a court hearing.

 Veterans of Russian Airborne Forces confronted several other gay activists, who held individual pickets near the Hermitage, and tore up their posters.

 

Police quickly took the gay activists away, even though the law allows one-person pickets without permission from authorities.

(I like Airborne, but not these particular troops.  Eh my late Brother was Airborne.)

"Yes, I'm gay, and I have similar rights to other people," said one activist, Alexei Nazarov, who traveled from Moscow to stage a picket.

Paratroopers gathered in many Russian cities to mark the Airborne Forces Day on Sunday.

"What they do here is not right, it's terrible," said one veteran paratrooper, Alexander Fadeyev, who tried to tear the slogans from protesters' hands. "We're in Russia and not in America. Let them do what they want in America, but not in Russia."

Russia has been widely criticized for infringement on gay rights following the passage of a law that prohibits vaguely defined "propaganda of nontraditional sexual relations" to minors.

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 "Let them do what they want in America, but not in Russia."

Odd that these comrades still think that the U.S. of A. is a bastion of freedom. Well in context of the madness of the world we may seem to be that from the outside. It's another thing on the street level inside.

Russia had a short post-Cold War bloom of relative freedom. The breaks are on now. Indeed this very blog according to the current Russian Law would be illegal.  It would be deleted, and I'd be detained...for questioning. 

I think I'd be outright shot if the ever found my Queer page...see link on lower right "Dragonfly".  (See how hard it is to find.)

Anyway,..."Questioning." Shades of the "NKVD" during Uncle Joe's watch on things. I guess in for some of the more basic Freedoms the states, at the moment, and parts of Europe are a refuge.

Okay Australia, and New Zealand too. Though they aren't good to refugees...not one bit.  Well if you're white, and have money...maybe. Otherwise I see that they toss them back to the sharks. Sort of like we do to Mexicans, and Haitians.

From the general Gay Press when I bother to look,...they're so reactionary, and frankly boring. (Quentin Crisp had something to say about that when he was still breathing.) Things are seriously bad for Queers over there.

Community Centers attacked or shut down by the cops, and vigilantes. Individual Queers assauted, and police standby, and do nothing. Saw some of this on the BBC recently. They don't care if the world sees what they do...they're proud of it.

 I shudder to think what's happening to Queer young boys, and girls.

The Russian Queer media magazine newspapers videos films books once a growing institution are now criminal. Nothing can be printed or recorded that is sympathetic to Queerdom.

This to protect the children.

Of course. Just as it was here, and still is for the tattered heroic remains of the "BL" community.  

Yeah that "Dark Age" again. The triumph of the Bullies, and Alpha Males once again. Still as I've said keep the lights burning like some few did during the last era of darkness.

Nurture Hope, and keep your light alive comrades. that's our main job now keep the lights going so the darkness will never be complete. So one day it will be beaten back

Bless all you good comrades out there.

Bless you, and the lights you bare. 

Stay Tuned.