Peter Tatchell on human rights in Russia

Peter Tachell has an interesting article in the Gaurdian about Russian capitulation to threats of violence from religious groups about a gay pride march in celebration of the legalisation of homosexuality. He uses this to highlight the way that country is sliding back into autocracy and away from the rule of law and respect for human rights. The excuse used by the Russians is that they might not be able to protect the march

This, of course, begs the question: if the Russian authorities cannot ensure the security of a few hundred gay rights protesters, how on earth are they going to ensure the security of the G8 leaders who will soon be meeting in St Petersburg?

exactly, so then the real reason comes out.

He argued that gays and lesbians are regarded very negatively by the Russian population, especially by religious believers.

"Therefore," Kulikov said, "all public expressions (by gays and lesbians) must be banned ... They violate our rights. We have our traditions, lots of religious groups told us that they were against this gay pride."

Obviously he read any Russian translations of Orwell yet.

In many countries religious minorities where traditionally forced to wear distinctive badges, live in segregated ghettos, banned from practicing their faiths, or even killed. That does not make these actions right. Freedom means that you are able to be, do, think, and say what you like so long as it does not cause harm to anyone else.

Also interesting is the explosion of homophobia from the commenters who seem to want Mr Tachell to stop campaigning for universal human rights (luckily there is no chance of that happening), and would prefer gay people to just creep back into the closet.