Russian activists are not always safe even after emigrating. Persecution can continue beyond Russia’s borders—including at the hands of informal groups acting in line with Russian propaganda. This is what sex educator and LGBTQ+ activist Sasha Kazantseva faced in Lithuania: last summer, she began receiving threats, and people associated with a homophobic group targeting queer teens and activists came to her home. Since then, Kazantseva has been seeking a response from Lithuanian authorities so that such cases do not go unpunished. In an interview with «Most,» Sasha Kazantseva explains how this pressure works, why it’s not an isolated case, and what is happening to queer people from Russia—both inside the country and abroad.

#bigtalk #homophobia #discrimination #europe #interview #LGBT #Lithuania #violence #police #repressions #SashaKazantseva #And #ultraright #Emigration

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Two years ago, the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation declared the «international LGBT social movement» an extremist organization. Since then, simply having a certain sexual orientation or gender identity can be used as grounds to accuse anyone who draws the state’s attention of extremism. LGBT people are afraid to go to the police or court, even if they themselves are the victims of crimes. Here are the stories of three people who have gone through such experiences.

#state #lifeinRussia #LGBT #personalexperience #violence #intolerance #society #humanrights #thatone #repressions

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The Trump administration is revising its approach to human rights assessments, excluding mentions of abuses in countries it does not wish to criticize excessively from its annual reports. Thus, in Russia, persecution of LGBT people and violence against women are no longer mandatory topics for coverage.

#StateDepartment #homereceipt #DonaldTrump #women #LGBT #MarkRubio #humanrights #rightturn #Russia #USA

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Across the country, bookstores are undergoing searches and prosecutor inspections. Publishers send them lists of «banned» books that must be removed from sale and destroyed. All foreign agent books must be sold by the end of summer: from September 1, any educational activity by authors with this status will be prohibited. How do small bookstores in the regions survive under these conditions? A report from Rostov-on-Don, where, despite all difficulties, there are three such stores.

#business #foreignagents #Books #LGBT #youth #society #education #Regions #reportage #repressions #Russia #securityforces #south

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In 2023, when the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation declared the non-existent «International LGBT Social Movement» an extremist organization, the Russian queer community finally went underground. For distributing any content mentioning LGBT, you can receive a hefty fine or even a criminal case. Stores stopped selling books with stories about same-sex love, online cinemas are deleting series and films with queer characters, and the social network VKontakte blocks search queries about LGBT. Queer people who agreed to talk about ways to preserve their identity under these conditions were forced to hide even for phone interviews—in friends’ apartments, or even in the forest.‍

#state #democracy #dictatorship #queer #LGBT #personalexperience #politicalrepressions #humanrights #Russia #sex

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