An unexpected event: an LGBT exhibition will be opened in St. Petersburg for 5 days

Before the entry into force of the law of the Russian Federation, which toughens punishment for LGBT propaganda, Russia’s first queer exhibition opened its doors to visitors in St. Petersburg – for five days.

The exposition is dedicated to same-sex love and transgenderism in art, tells BB.LVreferring to the online publication “North.Realities”. The creator of the museum is an LGBT activist and local historian Petr Voskresensky. He collected more than 30 exhibits for the exposition, exhibited in a room in the city center – art objects from different eras, from antiquity to the present. The historian told reporters:

“Actually, by declaring this museum the first in Russia, I am somewhat disingenuous. Back in the 19th century, there was an apartment in St. Petersburg in which the owner collected unusual artifacts: books, figurines, etc., which belonged to the homosexual subculture. What later happened to this collection, we do not know. But we know that there were not one or even two such collections. It is generally accepted that all of them were destroyed: either the relatives of the deceased person did it, trying to save his reputation, or collectors, fearing persecution by the authorities.

The museum plans to operate before new sanctions for “LGBT propaganda” come into effect in Russia. Then Peter Voskresensky intends to temporarily exhibit the collection outside the Russian Federation, but hopes to return in the future. He believes that even a few days of the exhibition are important for Russian society:

“The context of the opening of the museum is important, because our state, during its transformation into a totalitarian dictatorship, invents a new ideology in order to justify it, in which history plays a key role. Our past is our future, from the point of view of the authorities. And in this fictional past, there are only traditional values, and there were no LGBT people. The information presented here indicates that there were gays in Russia both a hundred and two hundred years ago, and much earlier. Traditional values ​​are not only the concept of a large monogamous family. It’s full of queer people. Of course, we will survive all the repressions. The museum itself is a monument to the fact that we did it. We survived the communists and Stalin, we survived the Nazis, we will survive them all. We are immortal.”

On November 24, the State Duma approved in the third reading a law toughening administrative penalties for disseminating information about homo- and bisexuals, as well as transgender, intersex and queer people among an audience of any age. Along with it, propaganda of pedophilia falls under the ban. Previously, such restrictions applied only to information for minors. Deputy Vyacheslav Volodin, one of the authors of the initiative, says:

“Responsibility threatens for any propaganda of “non-traditional sexual relations”. A ban has also been introduced on the promotion of pedophilia and gender reassignment. Fines will amount to up to 10 million rubles (ed. approximately 157 thousand euros).”

Representatives of the LGBT community in the Russian Federation often face discrimination, the newspaper notes: same-sex marriages are prohibited, a number of organizations have been declared “foreign agents” by the Ministry of Justice, and in some regions people become objects of extrajudicial persecution because of sexual preferences.

Our edition told that the Russian Embassy in Canada reacted with harsh comments to the Canadian government’s attacks on Moscow in connection with a new Russian federal law criminalizing the dissemination of LGBTQ+ propaganda in Russia. Prohibiting the promotion of non-traditional relationships, pedophilia and gender reassignment, the law was adopted by the State Duma of Russia on Thursday 24 November. Widely seen as a continuation of a 2013 law that banned the distribution of LGBT material to minors, it covers “both minors and adults.”

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