Intersectionality and Propaganda

Exactly eight years ago – the time when I was living in St Petersburg, Russia and working for ‘Coming Out’ LGBT Group – we were joining a campaign against ‘anti-gay-propaganda’ legislative initiative in Kyrgyzstan. 

 

Sometimes, I think about what lenses this gave to me – being an LGBT activist in Russia but also a daughter and grand-daughter of immigrants, those Ukrainian, Belarusian and Romani people coming to / being in Siberia to be able to feed themselves and their families; the girl who noticed that her surname was different from the majority of her classmates; the girl whose parents spoke Ukrainian as children but were not able to pass it to her.

 

By 2014, first regional and then the federal laws prohibiting what they called ‘propaganda of non-traditional sexual relations among minors’ had already been adopted in Russia. By that time, I had already had the experience of organizing street protests against these laws in Siberia, and more hidden (or, if you wish, more white-collar, more strict-legal-advocacy) campaigns on the national level. Neither prevented the laws from being adopted. Neither the ratio nor the emotional parts won. And yes, there were a lot of tears, broken hearts and dreams, and even blood involved. Mine included.

 

In 2014, the draft law aiming at prohibiting ‘gay propaganda’ was considered in Kyrgyzstan. Me myself and the group I was a part of at that time – were asked to participate in the actions against the draft law. After all, we had already gone through this, and we had some arguments prepared. This law has never been adopted in Kyrgyzstan, as it has never been in other countries in the ‘region,’ including my beloved Ukraine.

 

Eight years after, admittedly being in a relatively safe position, I am thinking about all the power dynamics involved, and the consequences following.

 

How the ‘anti-propaganda’ law initiatives were marked as the state-sponsored homophobia import of Russia. How it was, indeed, an exemplary case of the continuing imperialist dominance of the Russian Federation in the region. How the ‘anti-propaganda’ laws were not the invention of the Russian government, but the ugly adoption and adaptation of the US and UK previous experiences. Both adoption and adaptation. 

 

How we – LGBT activists working in Russia – were seen as the point of reference. How our involvement was construed as more valuable because we were from Russia. Big brothers, big sisters, big siblings.

 

What dynamics were existing and perpetuating there, both internally and externally. How even in this – frankly speaking – marginalized topic of LGBT – the imperialist ambitions played out. Internally, as there was (and even more so – still is) a huge gap between activism in Moscow or St Petersburg, and all the other regions. And – definitely – externally – when the question on what country you’re from – determined who was to be supported, invited, and recognized.

 

How generally the (mainstream) human rights activism has been (and still is) built on geopolitics. How our personal / political struggles were / are lost and unseen within the power structures reproduced by capital, whether financial, representational, media or any other one. What activism is seen as central, meaningful, serious, important. Who has the access to this activism and further mobility (and I am speaking here of the so-called ‘post-Soviet’ space dominated by Russia, as well as the global movement where all the ‘international’ organizing is coming only from the Global North).

 

How the Russian government just held a session to discuss ‘the need’ to restrict more – significantly more – the so-called ‘gay propaganda’ prohibitions. How LGBT community has been made a scapegoat, and how the Russian government still tries to use the affective rhetoric related to the ‘threat’ of two same-gender parents or gender reassignment as a response to all the fears related to the full-blown war. In the middle of the full-blown war of Russia against Ukraine. 

 

How some Russian activists (the main ones, not those from rural areas) still respond to homo / transphobic rhetoric with calls for outing MPs and letters to the deputies. As if anyone there, in the country, would magically realize the absurdity and the insane level of manipulations they were subjected to – just because some of the government officials are practicing gay (men) – after they were able to see the results of the Russian atrocities all over Ukraine. As if there is any sense in applying to the MPs of the Russian parliament. As if there is any sense (I am leaving behind the moral part of the question) in even engaging with the Russian authorities.

 

I am an intersectional feminist. The one only able to speak because I am in a relatively safe position. Relatively, but safe. 

 

I am an intersectional feminist believing in and living personal politics and outcast values. When global powerful resources do not work (as they so often do), we just go out to the streets, we just spend all our available money, time and resources to share, as we got them because of our community’s suffering, and as we are the community.

 

Sometimes, I think about what would have been here right now – in a geopolitical sense – if all the support had gone to the ones on the ‘margins’? What if it had not reproduced the imperialist ambitions of patriarchal forces? What if – in the case of Russia – the center had been rural activists and / or those from Kyrgyzstan or Ukraine? What if the queer struggles had not been co-opted and recycled for the global geopolitical goals? What if we had centered our attention on the ‘margins’ instead of ‘center’?

Sometimes, I see this in my dreams. Between the horrors of the atrocities.