In the economical spirit, leaders of three major religious groups have joined together in moral outrage. These guys, and guys they are, are up in arms over the prospect of a gay pride parade in Moscow. Secular leaders have joined the religious crowd and are more than adequately represented in their bigotry by the mayor of Moscow.
It's enough to make you gag.
The first article below comes from the Independent Online and the second is from GayRussia.
Russia's first gay parade vetoed by 'outraged' city
By Andrew Osborn in Moscow
Plans to stage Russia's first gay pride parade have been vetoed by Moscow's city government on the grounds that the idea has caused "outrage" in society.
Mayor Yuri Luzhkov's administration said yesterday it would not even consider an application for a parade, prompting Russia's gay community to threaten legal action in the European Court of Human Rights.
Gay and lesbian activists have been campaigning for permission to stage the country's first gay pride event on Saturday 27 May.
The date marks the 13th anniversary of the decriminalisation of homosexuality in Russia in 1993. But the plans have drawn a furious reaction from religious leaders and been condemned as "suicidal" by other gay activists .
Earlier this week Chief Mufti Talgat Tadzhuddin warned that Russia's Muslims would stage violent protests if the march went ahead. "If they come out on to the streets anyway they should be flogged. Any normal person would do that - Muslims and Orthodox Christians alike ... [The protests] might be even more intense than protests abroad against those controversial cartoons."
The cleric said the Koran taught that homosexuals should be killed because their lifestyle spells the extinction of the human race and said that gays had no human rights.
The Russian Orthodox Church has called it "the propaganda of sin". Bishop Daniil of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk yesterday condemned the plans as a "cynical mockery" and likened homosexuality to leprosy.
The mayor's spokesman, Sergei Tsoi, said a parade would not be allowed. "[The plans] have caused outrage in society, particularly among religious leaders," he said.
In the Communist era Russian homosexuals were jailed for five years and their "condition" was classed as a mental disorder. In post-Soviet Russia public acceptance of homosexuality has been glacial. An opinion poll last year showed 43 per cent of Russians believed gay men should be incarcerated.
Nikolai Alekseev, head of GayRussia.Ru and one of the parade organisers, said banning such meetings was a criminal offence. He said the organisers were considering going to the European Court of Human Rights. Preparations will continue and an official application will be made in May.
Plans to stage Russia's first gay pride parade have been vetoed by Moscow's city government on the grounds that the idea has caused "outrage" in society.
Mayor Yuri Luzhkov's administration said yesterday it would not even consider an application for a parade, prompting Russia's gay community to threaten legal action in the European Court of Human Rights.
Gay and lesbian activists have been campaigning for permission to stage the country's first gay pride event on Saturday 27 May.
The date marks the 13th anniversary of the decriminalisation of homosexuality in Russia in 1993. But the plans have drawn a furious reaction from religious leaders and been condemned as "suicidal" by other gay activists .
Earlier this week Chief Mufti Talgat Tadzhuddin warned that Russia's Muslims would stage violent protests if the march went ahead. "If they come out on to the streets anyway they should be flogged. Any normal person would do that - Muslims and Orthodox Christians alike ... [The protests] might be even more intense than protests abroad against those controversial cartoons."
The cleric said the Koran taught that homosexuals should be killed because their lifestyle spells the extinction of the human race and said that gays had no human rights.
The Russian Orthodox Church has called it "the propaganda of sin". Bishop Daniil of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk yesterday condemned the plans as a "cynical mockery" and likened homosexuality to leprosy.
The mayor's spokesman, Sergei Tsoi, said a parade would not be allowed. "[The plans] have caused outrage in society, particularly among religious leaders," he said.
In the Communist era Russian homosexuals were jailed for five years and their "condition" was classed as a mental disorder. In post-Soviet Russia public acceptance of homosexuality has been glacial. An opinion poll last year showed 43 per cent of Russians believed gay men should be incarcerated.
Nikolai Alekseev, head of GayRussia.Ru and one of the parade organisers, said banning such meetings was a criminal offence. He said the organisers were considering going to the European Court of Human Rights. Preparations will continue and an official application will be made in May.
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Principal Russian Rabbi Berl Lazar: "Gays are Sexual Perverts"
On Wednesday evening the principal rabbi of Russia joined the fray of homophobic statements from Russian religious leaders. Rabbi Berl Lazar told the Russian news agency InterFax that if the Gay Pride parade was allowed to go ahead it "would be a blow for morality."
Propaganda of what he called "sexual perversions" does not have the right to exist, the rabbi said.
"As a religious figure, I must first of all say that our religion categorically bans homosexuality. As I know, such sharp condemnation of homosexual relations also exists in other traditional religions in Russia," he told the news agency.
"I would like to assure you, that the parade of homosexuals it is not less offensive to the feelings of believers than any caricatures in newspapers," he said, linking the Pride parade with the current furore over the cartoons published in Denmark five months ago.
"I think that it will be perceived as an insult not only by believers but by the absolute majority of the populations of our city," he added.
Nikolai Alekseev, one of the organisers of the festival countered, charging the rabbi of lying.
":Gay parades are already part of the Jewish society" and "no religion was able to stop gay marches in Tel Aviv"” he pointed out.
"In Judaism, there are several schools of thought and some of them not only accept homosexual relations but also allow the blessings of same-sex marriages. This is what we can see now in the UK where same-sex partnerships are blessed in some synagogues."
According to Alekseev, "comparission between the march for human rights and against discrimination with the publication of cartoons is nothing more than an attempt to incite hatred toward sexual minorities."
"Rabbi Lazar, being the citizen of three states at the same time, should know what is a public actions of gays and lesbians and what is respect for constitutional rights of citizens in the free democratic state. Both in the United States and in Israel gay parades became part of the state based on rule of law in the same way as freedom of religion and right to express one's opinion."
"The most outrageous aspect is that the principal rabbi of Russia can allow himself to call persons of homosexual orientation 'sexual perverts', while both heterosexual and homosexual relations have equal legal status in Russia".
Alekseev suggested that "among faithful Jews there are many gays. And in Israel their civil rights are respected. The statements of the principal rabbi in relation to Russia do not help to the growth of tolerance in the society and creation of objective image of Jews in Russia". He concluded that "Jews and gays were sent by Nazis to the same concentration camps, many were burnt in the same death chambers, the only difference between them was the sign on their clothes. In Berlin in front of the monument to the destroyed Jews of Europe there is going to be erected the monument to homosexual victims of Nazism. But Berl Lazar probably already forgot all this since the Jews are not anymore targets for mass repressions. It is sad to hear such words from one of the famous religious leaders. I think that Rabbis of other European countries would sharply denounce the words of Berl Lazar. This is a clear hypocrisy".
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