Gay in Putin's Moscow: Why the City Is Pinker Than You Think

THE GUARDIAN: LGBT nights are easy to find and Grindr reaches into the heart of the Kremlin itself. But two years after the law banning ‘homosexual propaganda’, can being gay in the Russian capital really be much fun?

Russian men kiss in Moscow in 2012, a year before the 2013 law banning ‘gay propaganda’. Photograph: EPA
“Moscow is like a small European city in the mid-90s,” says Anton Krasovsky. “Everybody knows everybody. Everybody knows who’s gay, even if nobody’s out.”

Well, not nobody. In 2013, when the Duma was debating a new law outlawing “gay propaganda”, Krasovsky was a beloved Russian TV personality, working for a news channel he’d co-founded called Kontr TV. At the end of a wide-ranging discussion on the proposed legislation, Krasovsky said, on air: “I’m gay. And I’m just as much a human being as President Putin, or Prime Minister Medvedev, or the members of the Duma.” Less than a week later, Krasovsky was no longer working for Kontr TV, the clip was removed from the archives and his face had been scrubbed from the website.

And yet ask him and his friends what it’s like to be gay in Moscow and they shrug. “Moscow attracts gay men from all the villages, so there are more gay people in Moscow than anywhere else in Russia. And they all just want what everyone else wants: somebody to love.”

Moscow is, indeed, gayer than you might think. There might not be many dedicated gay clubs – the five-floor behemoth of Central Station being a notable exception – but many bars and restaurants have gay nights, from Cafe Mart to Mono to the famous Sunday discos at Propaganda. When it comes to clubbing, at least, the biggest concern for gay men in Moscow isn’t prejudice but what Russians call “face control”, which the Daily Beast describes as “knowing the right people – or having the right look”. There’s a gay magazine, Kvir (say it out loud) with listings and frothy lifestyle features: more Out than Advocate. With all the media furore over rising anti-LGBT activity in Russia in recent years, it can be a surprise to see how pink the capital feels in some places. » | Chris Michael, Judith Soal and Maeve Shearlaw in Moscow | Saturday, June 13, 2015

Russian Orthodox Church in Amsterdam Announces Split with Moscow

THE GUARDIAN: Clergy takes ‘difficult decision’ to cut ties with the Moscow patriarchate over the invasion of Ukraine

A Russian Orthodox church in Amsterdam in 2020. More than 280 Russian Orthodox priests and church officials from around the world have signed an open letter expressing their opposition to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Photograph: Koen van Weel/ANP/AFP/Getty Images
A Russian Orthodox church in Amsterdam has announced it is to split with the Moscow patriarchate in the first known instance of a western-based church cutting ties over the invasion of Ukraine.

“The clergy unanimously announced that it is no longer possible for them to function within the Moscow patriarchate and provide a spiritually safe environment for our faithful,” the clergy said in a statement posted on its website.

“This decision is extremely painful and difficult for all concerned.”

The head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, a trusted ally of President Vladimir Putin, has declined to condemn Kremlin’s decision to invade its neighbour, referring to Russia’s opponents in Ukraine as “evil forces.” In a Sunday sermon last week he also said gay pride parades organised in the West were part of the reason for the war in Ukraine.

The statement said the Russian Orthodox parish of Saint Nicholas of Myra had asked the Russian archbishop of the diocese of the Netherlands who is based in The Hague to grant the church “canonical dismissal.”

The clergy of the parish said they had requested to join the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, the Istanbul-based Orthodox branch, seen as a rival to the Russian Orthodox Church.
Kirill’s position on the war has led to unease among some Russian Orthodox priests who object to the invasion of a country often referred to as a “brotherly nation” in religious circles. » | Pjotr Sauer| Sunday, March 13, 2022

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Boris Johnson at a joint news conference with the Ukraine president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, in Kyiv. Photograph: EyePress News/Rex/Shutterstock
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