Meleg in Budapest

international | gender and sexuality | news report

Tuesday June 27, 2006 23:06

by redjade

{ a redjade magyarország report }

nice to have riot cops protecting your own side, for once

The 2006 Budapest Pride Parade was hot. About 2,000 people suffered through the 30C+ humidity as they cheerfully marched from Hero's Square (Hõsök tere) to the Danube.

It is interesting that as 'Gay' is a politically correct/acceptable term for 'homosexual' in english, even though the original meaning of 'Gay' was 'Happy, joyful, and lively' - the politically correct/acceptable Hungarian word is Meleg which means 'Warm' or 'Hot.'

The Pride Parade is similar to a number of movements that have emerged in Hungary since the end of 'Socialism' that exist in a political space that is neither Left nor Right - with the exception of printed signs advocating the rights of the LGBT community and the presence of one centrist political party there was no presence of overt politics in this celebration - electoral nor activist. What 'politics' that did exist was mostly NGO-ish and service oriented, such as crisis centres and AIDS/HIV info distribution etc.

With the recent reports about Poland and Russia's anti-gay policies and police repression against Gay Pride demos one might think such repression was universal on the Eastern Pale of the EU and in Eastern/Central Europe in general.

But the Budapest Pride Parade went on, as planned, without much controversy or opposition and barely much notice in the media. The only 'backlash' that I know of was when the parade passed a small handful of conservative Christian protesters, a couple members of a right-wing political party and half dozen or so neo-Nazis (Arrow Cross wannabes, actually). The police were even fairly courteous and the riot cops lined the sides of the streets to protect parade participants, like myself, from the possibility of attack.

Although it has to be said, that it was reported in one newspaper that the neo-Nazis were not requested by the police for their identification papers. Contrast this with the Amnesty International Guantánamo protesters who just a couple days earlier were required to present their papers to police when they protested the visit of George W Bush.

So, perhaps it would seem that things are better in Hungary than its neighbors. Budapest, which is well known for its flamboyant and open heterosexuality does have an accepted social space for LGBT community, even if limited. A recent poll said that a majority of Hungarians do not support the rights of LGBT - but I think this would be typical of many countries in Europe and elsewhere. Opposition to the protest against the Pride Parade was small and LGBT rights were not even an issue in the recent national election.

additional photos posted at: All Other Places Blog

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Comments (3 of 3)

Gay rights in Hungary

Tue Jun 27, 2006 23:07

Gay rights in Hungary
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gay_rights_in_Hungary

'In 2000, the Constitutional Court recognized that the Constitutional ban on discrimination based on 'other status' covers sexual orientation as well. There exists an anti-discrimination law in the Act on Public Health since 1997. The 2003 Act on Equal Treatment and the Promotion of Equal Opportunities forbids discrimination based on (among others) sexual orientation and sexual identity in the field of employment, education, housing, health, and access to goods and services.'
[....]
'Unregistered Cohabitation has been recognised since 1996. It applies to any couple living together in an economic and sexual relationship (common-law marriage), including same-sex couples. No official registration is required'

additional photos posted at: http://agitprop.allotherplaces.org

Magyarország is actually the Hungarian word for Hungary

WWLD: What Would Lenin Do?

Tue Jun 27, 2006 23:10

Vladimir Lenin
'It seems to me that this superabundance of sex theories [...] springs from the desire to justify one’s own abnormal or excessive sex life before bourgeois morality and to plead for tolerance towards oneself. This veiled respect for bourgeois morality is as repugnant to me as rooting about in all that bears on sex. No matter how rebellious and revolutionary it may be made to appear, it is in the final analysis thoroughly bourgeois. It is, mainly, a hobby of the intellectuals and of the sections nearest to them. There is no place for it in the party, in the class-conscious, fighting proletariat'

see: Socialism and LGBT rights
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism_and_sexual_orien...ation

especially the above page on Lenin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism_and_sexual_orien...Lenin
and especially the above page on Anarchist homophobia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism_and_sexual_orien...hobia

additional photos posted at: http://agitprop.allotherplaces.org

Hungary and 'The Changes'

Tue Jun 27, 2006 23:12

World Legal Survey: Hungary
'In 1988 the group Homeros Lambda became the first LGBT organisation to be registered, this being also the first such official recognition in Central and Eastern Europe.'
http://www.ilga.info/Information/Legal_survey/europe/hu...y.htm

History of gays in Nazi Germany and the Holocaust
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_gays_in_Nazi_Ge...caust

Timeline of LGBT history
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gay_rights_timeline

Gay rights in the Republic of Ireland
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gay_rights_in_the_Republic...eland

additional photos posted at: http://agitprop.allotherplaces.org

Old lady dancing in the streets

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Meleg in Budapest

Comments (3 of 3)