Gay Teenagers Targeted by Russian Internet Gangs

Hi guys, 

I have been translating, editing and abridging lots of articles concerning LGBT+ rights in Russia. While I will continue to publish some of them on here, perhaps with some personal insight, I will also be starting another blog, exclusively dedicated to the translations of these articles. I will post the link as soon as I am finished.

In the meantime, here is a suitably depressing article which I have translated from the following Gay Belarusian News Portal, although the subject matter concerns Russia, not Belarus:

http://www.news.gayby.net/news/ehkho_krestovogo_pokhoda_na_geev_v_rossii/2013-07-17-7632

GAY TEENAGERS TARGETED BY RUSSIAN INTERNET GANGS

17 July

Caption: BANNED

The popular Russian social network site Vkontake has blocked the group #Okkupai-gerontofiliai due to 'violating the rules of the site'. The page was full of video clips of homophobic 'raids' against adolescents. One of the most recent items caused particular indignation: in the post, the creator of the group, 16 year old far-right activist Filipp Dionits Razinskii persuades a gay adolescent to perform oral sex on one of the members of the so-called “safari” gang, threatening to otherwise upload an abusive video to the internet.

The site newsru.com provides the following example of the boy’s emotional blackmail: “I know you don’t want to, but this is your only option. Otherwise this clip is going to end up online. Your friends will definitely see it. Your parents too. You’re not the first. About 4 people have gone through this now, and we haven’t uploaded a single clip yet!” At present the clip has been deleted from Dionits’s personal page, however one of his warning statuses still remains on the site: “New release! Young cock-sucker in need of fame! 500 reposts and there will be a new release”.

The current surge of gay persecution can be traced back to a recent vote by the Russian State Duma, which introduced a ban on homosexual “propaganda” and therefore de facto outlawed gays in the country (ed. or at least their public manifestation). The deputy chairman of the State Duma’s Cultural Committee even went so far as to call gays “mutants”. Some observers think that these teenage homophobes took their inspiration from this recently passed law outlawing “the propaganda of non-traditional sexual relations among children”, and from the recent ban on gay adoptions of Russian children. The youths are completely convinced that their actions are justified. They aren’t bothered by the fact that they are destroying these citizens’ right to a personal life. They continue to insult and shame young people across the country. Nonetheless, Russian Law does seem to indicate that the homophobic youngsters could face serious punishment.

The under-aged followers of the leader of the “Occupy paedophilia”* page, Maksim Martsinkevich Tesak, took it upon themselves to hunt down young people with “non-traditional” sexual orientations. They track down young gays and those who are suspected of having a tendency towards homosexuality. Having caught them, they then force them to speak to the camera and say “I am gay and proud of it.”

*Ed: yes, dear readers, once again, another conflation of consensual homosexual love and sexual practises between same-sex adults with paedophilia. Oh Russia….

They use the following tactics, designed by Tesak, to carry out their “struggle against gays”: they find young homosexuals on the internet, persuade them to meet up with them (ed: largely for dates, often pretending to be attractive young men. More about this in future articles…) and then carry out a degrading “educational chat”. This takes place on camera and the footage is then uploaded to the internet.

This degrading “educational chat” largely consists of a lecture on morals, taunts and insults (including, horribly enough, urinating on the young man). The video is then uploaded to the internet. The leader of the young homophobes is a schoolboy named Filipp, who started the “okkupai-gerontofiliai”* movement. A group of the same name was started on the social networking site VKontakte, where the videos resulting from these “raids” are posted.

*Ed: this title is a bit hard to translate but, needless to say, related to persecuting “perverts”

The young homophobes “work” actively in both Moscow and Tambov. At present they have “destroyed the lives of about ten people”, the newspaper “Moskovskii Komsomolets” writes. The amount of young people they have succeeded in luring online, to then ridicule them in front of the whole country, is written in the article.

Law Enforcement has now begun to look into the young homophobes' case. Law Enforcement officials have so far refrained from making any comments regarding the repercussions that threaten the young homophobes. The actions of Filipp Dionitsa and his partners could, at the very least fall under statute 133 of the Civil Code – coercion into acts of a sexual nature. (…)

Former child ombudsman of Moscow, Evgenii Bunimovich, took the matter to the public prosecutor’s office requesting that they check the actions of the self-proclaimed anti-gay campaigners. In his opinion the posts on the site contain indications of violence and physical intimidation.

Anna Efimovetz, “Nedelia” newspaper

Link to Moskovskii Komsmolets article (in Russian): http://www.mk.ru/old/article/2013/07/16/884583-sotsset-vkontakte-zablokirovala-soobschestvo-okkupaygerontofilyay.html