Thanks to the across-the-board nightmare the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics have been thus far, I realized there was a secondary irony in the rainbow-colored Olympic rings – one that didn’t exist until the games were held in a country that has recently restricted some of the most important aspects of Russian LGBTQ people’s lives. In 2012, Russia passed legislation banning the distribution of “propaganda of non-traditional sexual relations” to minors. Last year, another law forbidding homosexuality in literature and the rainbow flag symbol were passed.
What’s next? Adios, Crayolas. Ciao, prisms. Do svidaniya, unicorn shit. Sayonara, Skittles. Putin doesn’t want anyone to taste your rainbow.
More recently, the country has enacted a law prohibiting the LGBTQ community from holding parades in the capital city of Moscow for the next 100 years. Hold up, President Putin. Stalin called; he wants his homophobic laws back…along with the title of “Manliest Man in Moscow.”
By criminalizing the dissemination of LBGTQ information to minors, Putin has officially stigmatized members of the LGBTQ community – not just in Russia, but across the world. Moreover, this law makes it nearly impossible for gay and transgender people to hold protests on behalf of restoring these basic, human rights – because children are everywhere. The shirtless, dickless, cowboy president has, in one swift move, set human rights in Russia back at least 60 years. Pull out your crinolines and penny loafers, Comrades; it’s about to get Iron-ic Curtain, in here.
While I observed the Sochi facade crumble – along with its hotels – over the last few weeks, I also realized that its failure is merely a sign that a sturdier, steel shade has been pulled across Russia’s windows to the world. Enacted in a country notorious for its propaganda, this legislation is nothing more than a manner in which to legitimize the beliefs and acts of every homophobic hate group within Russia’s boundaries.
Hmmmm. Why does this sound so familiar? A country systematically stigmatizing a particular minority, enacting laws meant to separate that minority from the majority, blaming that minority for the country’s economic downturn, and gradually eliminating that minority’s rights – to exist – altogether. I can’t quite put my finger on it.
Oh, that’s it! Danka schoen.
Here we have the Russian President still in the dawn of his third term. Let’s face it – the dawn of his third and fourth, 12-year long term. When you’re a former KGB agent and sociopath, you don’t accept the legitimacy of silly things like laws that prevent you from being in charge. No, before you complete your first 8-year reign, you restructure the government so that Russian governors report to the Prime Minister, select and endorse your successor, step down, and immediately accept the title of, wait for it, Prime Minister – from your tag team member, the new President Dmitry Medvedev, who looks like what would happen if Colin Firth and James Bond made it. And enjoyed it.
Except you probably didn’t know that. Why? Because no one ever talks about former President Medvedev, who is, currently, Prime Minister Medvedev (seeing a pattern here?), unless they’re explaining Putin’s rise to power. Or how much taller he is than Medvedev. Or how Medvedev was a pawn and his presidency was a tiny, 4-year bone thrown to Russian liberals that accomplished nothing. Simply put, Dmitry Medvedev was to Russia what President John Tyler was to the United States.
Never heard of him either, have you? All you need to know is that Tyler’s opponents reportedly didn’t take him or his presidency seriously, and referred to him as “His Accidency” or “The Acting President.” He’s widely considered one of the United States’ worst Presidents. So don’t expect to see Firth onscreen, wearing one of Medvedev’s characteristic, fat Windsor knots, and hunching his way through one of the invisible, former president’s speeches anytime soon.
But back to Putin’s rise to power. After ensuring that the presidential term length law is extended from four to six years, Medvedev conveniently declines to run again so that Putin is elected President of Mother Russia in 2012 for a third, non-consecutive term. Russia’s revolving political door circulates just one leader, a cycle seemingly limited only by Putin’s lifespan. Or is it? I’d bet my Stoli-packed linen closet* that Putin had himself cloned long ago, and, somewhere in a remote, Siberian laboratory, miniature Vlads are chasing one another around a playroom. With their shirts off.
So, while I appreciated and respected President Obama’s bold decision to not send any Cabinet members to Sochi and to, instead, appoint several openly gay athletes as U.S. Delegates to the Olympics, I think a louder message representing our antipathy for Russia’s homophobic stance would have been more supportive. Maybe brightly-colored uniforms, striped like a rainbow flag and —
What the f**k?
Wait, GERMANY beat us to it? The Germany? The Germany that nearly exterminated the Jews and, likely would have succeeded, had they not tried to beat the Soviet Union on its own turf. In winter. The Germany that allowed Hitler, possibly the most widely-despised man of the last century, to lead them into the heart of cruelty and evil, then abandon them – a scorched and scorned country – to pick up the pieces and apologize. To everyone.
Sure, President Obama gave Putin the finger with his LGBT-loaded U.S. Delegation. And, don’t get me wrong, I felt good about that. It was like a shot of testosterone surged through my estrogen-loaded body. I walked like I had balls. Buffalo balls. I was proud of my president. Proud to be an American.
But then German Chancellor Merkel comes along and, not only shoots the Russian President a huge, colorful BIRD at the internationally-aired, opening ceremonies of the most important event of his presidency, she sticks her rainbow-wrapped middle finger up Putin’s ass – an act not yet illegal in Russia – and demonstrates that Germany has huden so big, they make Putin’s look like a mosquito eyeballs.
Holy comeback, Batman! Germany’s leading the way in civil rights.
Danke schoen.
Miss Snarky Pants
*As if I’d drink Stoli. Ketel One, please…
***
If you enjoyed this post, subscribe. It’s free. Not in a free, mint candy kind of way, but in a free, unlimited bar tab for a year kind of way. So drink up. The Follow button is over there on the right. Go on.
Funnier In Writing 
Good post. Perhaps it is a good thing that he (Putin) is so bloody aweful and a laughing stock. Put the two things side by side and he can then be used to further discredit the attitudes that he promotes. Yay.
Let’s hope the whole Sochi debacle has taken Putin down a notch.
It’s too bad, I was kinda looking forward to the Olympics, now, not so much. It’s supposed to be about sports, competition, etc. Maybe I can get into it after it gets going, for now, I kinda ignore it. I guess people get hung up on it, thinking it’s still the USSR. I did away with the USSR years ago, me and the rest of the Pershing Missile guys. For me, it should be just “Nostrovia”, have a good time. I can still remember the 1st time I heard the toast, in the EM Club, Swabish-Gmuend, Germany, I had no idea what they were toasting.
What were Russians doing in the EM Club in Germany, Bapa? Thanks for commenting. I didn’t realize you read my blog. 🙂
The Russian LGBT stance is inexplicable. As are many other things Russian. For all their propaganda, Sochi shows us that Russia is truly decrepit. And $50 billion poorer now. Imagine being born there—your views, your identity shaped by propaganda.
And fear.
True. I complain abt some aspects of growing up in India but these kinda countries remind me it coulda been a lot worse
I was watching MSNBC yesterday morning and they were talking about how 1rst and 2nd generation Chinese, Indian, Nigerian and, interestingly, Mormons, were generally more successful and scored higher on tests than their counterparts whose families had lived in America for generations. However, by the third generation, the success evens out, pointing to a cultural difference in the manner in which Chinese, Indian, etc. kids are being raised in this country for the first generation or two – a difference that makes them succeed. I think it was Fareed Zakaria who a.sked, “If young Indians are so successful when they come to America, why is India such a mess?” Cracked me up. Every country is a mess in its own way
Really, the whole “we don’t want a specific type of person” to us rings terrible. It’s their country, so until they want to change, it whatever.
The actual problem with the Olympics being held there, and even in China, is the entire “good standing with the National community” has been tossed out the window and now it’s down to money. I can’t respect the Olympics, because the Olympic Comity doesn’t respect the Olympics. It’s no longer about celebrating each nation by honoring their top athletes, it’s about money. Just like everything else this day in age.
The Olympics has become a joke, and I’m glad some Olympiads have dropped out in protest.
Hi Em, just a thought. People who deny or repress things publicly are likely to be hiding the same thing within themselves. You know like the slave owner in the 1860’s who told everyone his slaves weren’t quite human who had an eye on the housemaid who turned down his bed. Things we hate are sometimes thing we hide within ourselves. Great post.
Thanks, Tom. I know what you’re saying…and I’ve kind of wondered the same thing. 😉
You notice , you see him on horseback, shirtless a of times. Not to mention other macho photo ops.
“Macho, macho man. I want to be a macho man.”
Perhaps a big gay hug from the world to Russia would solve things? OK, maybe not. Did you see the toilet seat Olympic rings picture? It comes in rainbow. 🙂
No, I haven’t seen that one, but I will have to look for it. Awesomeness!
I heard Junior’s parents are going away over President’s Weekend. You know any grown ups who can score us some Ketel One?
Don’t worry. I’ve got my fake ID. Tee hee.
I just love this
What’s next? Adios, Crayolas. Ciao, prisms. Do svidaniya, unicorn shit. Sayonara, Skittles. Putin doesn’t want anyone to taste your rainbow.
and the way you tied the whole Olympic debacle into history. Well done, snarky! And I’m glad to know a bit more about your heritage, too. BTW, did you see this ad out of Canada? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=effb2JYiKXM
Made me laugh.
Okay, that was my first LOL moment of the day. Thank you! I love that video. So awesome!
Thanks, as always, for your kind words, Laura. I love learning about this stuff (like I knew anything about Medvedev before I wrote this post), so I assume that everyone else does, too. I’m thinking I should just start writing term papers for a living. Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child include so much information in their books, I feel like I’ve read an enjoyable novel and learned everything there is to know about Mayan pottery at the same time. Maybe that’s why my posts are as long as novels. Hmmmm.