Arizona's Near "Let's Use Religion To Excuse Our Homophobia" Plan Gets Vetoed and Skewered

This Daily Kos article by BruinKid about Jon Stewart's segment "Gay-Ban, Arizona's Preemptive Strike," below  is all kinds of awesome.

Enjoy the video.

The Daily Show
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,The Daily Show on Facebook

Jon Stewart - my kind of newsman.

And Arizona's Governor vetoing the law is good news, too. Though the law being voted through to arrive at her desk was ridiculous.

You can read more about the bill and its veto at the New York Times, here.

I, Emma Freke - A Middle Grade Book Where the Main Character's Friend Has Two Moms

I, Emma Freke by Elizabeth J. Atkinson

"Life wasn't always like this. In fact, when I was younger and shorter and dumber I usually had one or two friends to play with at recess. My grades were good, but nothing special. Then my height and brains took off one summer as if someone watered me with too much fertilizer. Even my dull hair turned redder. To make matters worse--to make matters impossibly worse--my name is Emma Freke. Like, if you say it slowly, Am a Freak."

Emma is 12, raised by a single mom, and her friend Penelope (who lives across the street with her two moms) is nine.

Emma's searching for her own identity, and gets invited to the Freke family reunion - her Father's side of the family, none of whom she's ever met.

While Emma desperately tries to find her niche, she discovers that perhaps its better to be her own "freak" than someone else's Freke.

Add your review of "I, Emma Freke" in comments!

Sara Bareilles Wants Us To Be BRAVE

I do, too.

Loved this video.




Here are the lyrics:

Songwriters:  SARA BAREILLES and JACK ANTONOFF

You can be amazing
You can turn a phrase into a weapon or a drug
You can be the outcast
Or be the backlash of somebody’s lack of love
Or you can start speaking up
Nothing’s gonna hurt you the way that words do
And they settle ‘neath your skin
Kept on the inside and no sunlight
Sometimes a shadow wins
But I wonder what would happen if you

Say what you wanna say
And let the words fall out
Honestly I wanna see you be brave

With what you want to say
And let the words fall out
Honestly I wanna see you be brave

I just wanna see you
I just wanna see you
I just wanna see you
I wanna see you be brave

I just wanna see you
I just wanna see you
I just wanna see you
I wanna see you be brave

Everybody’s been there, everybody’s been stared down
By the enemy
Fallen for the fear and done some disappearing
Bow down to the mighty
Don’t run, stop holding your tongue
Maybe there’s a way out of the cage where you live
Maybe one of these days you can let the light in
Show me how big your brave is

Say what you wanna say
And let the words fall out
Honestly I wanna see you be brave

With what you want to say
And let the words fall out
Honestly I wanna see you be brave

Innocence, your history of silence
Won’t do you any good
Did you think it would?
Let your words be anything but empty
Why don’t you tell them the truth?

Say what you wanna say
And let the words fall out
Honestly I wanna see you be brave

With what you want to say
And let the words fall out
Honestly I wanna see you be brave

I just wanna see you
I just wanna see you
I just wanna see you
I wanna see you be brave

I just wanna see you
I just wanna see you
I just wanna see you
See you be brave

I just wanna see you
I just wanna see you
I just wanna see you

I just wanna see you
I just wanna see you


Thanks to my amazing husband for sharing this with me!

Breaking Boxes - A Homophobia-Themed Teen Novel From 1997

Breaking Boxes by A.M. Jenkins

Charlie Calmont is a loner. Together with his older brother Trent, he gets by after both of their parents are gone. Most of the time Charlie feels lucky: Trent never hassles him, and, for the most part, they get on fine with fish sticks and canned vegetables. The calm disappears, though, when Charlie gets suspended for fighting with guys at school who care more about the kind of shoes he wears than who Charlie is on the inside.

The story explores what happens to Charlie after he befriends one of the guys who tried to beat him up. What is a friend, anyway? How will Charlie, who's never had many friends, know when it's appropriate to open his heart for a new friend or when it's time to shut himself off from the world and act cool?

This novel won the 14th annual Delacorte Prize. My thanks to Johanna Parkhurst for the heads-up on its gay content.

Add your review of "Breaking Boxes" in comments!

We're Over A Million!

A screen capture of the eye-popping blog stats!

This weekend while I was at the 2014 SCBWI Winter Conference we achieved a milestone - a million page views to this blog - and as of this morning we were at one million one thousand eight hundred and forty page views!

That's so exciting, and heartening, and wonderful.

Thank you for making "I'm Here. I'm Queer. What the Hell do I Read?" part of your community. Of transforming it from something that's mine to something that's ours - by reading, participating and sharing the books, videos and commentaries I'm so excited about.

When I started this blog on September 15, 2007 (with this post, "Welcome"), I imagined how cool it would be if I could make a difference.

Knowing I have - hearing your appreciative words over the years - has been deeply satisfying.

And now, knowing the circle I started and that you've joined in has grown so large makes me so proud.

Thank you, Teens and Pre-Teens.

Thank you, Adults and Elders.

Thank you, those of you who are Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Asexual, Pansexual, Questioning, and those of you who don't label yourself based on whom you're attracted to.

Thank you, those of you who are Straight Allies.

Thank you, those of you who are Trans, Queer, Gender-Queer, Gender Fluid, Intersex, Gender-Non Conforming and those of you who don't label your own gender.

Thank you, those of you who are Cis-Gendered Allies.

Thank you, Teachers.

Thank you, Booksellers.

Thank you, Librarians.

Thank you, Children's Book Writers and Illustrators and Agents and Editors and Publishers and Art Directors and my fellow Members of SCBWI.

Thank you, Friends.

Thank you, Family - especially my amazing husband Mark and our daughter!

Thank you all.


We are changing the world for the better, you and I. Together.

In our lives, and here on this blog.

I am grateful and humbled for your trust in me.

I am honored and full of joy at what we have created together.

And I am fired-up and excited for the adventure - and all the blogging, and community-building and world-changing still to come!

As I said at the end of that first blog post, the expression Namaste means, "the light in me recognizes and acknowledges the light in each one of you."

And so I say, with great light in my heart,

Namaste.

Day 17 Finale: So Many More Russian LGBTQ People To Celebrate!

Russian Pride Map, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons, found here.

In a country of 143 million people, even the conservative estimate of 10% of a given population being Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender or Queer would mean that 14,300,000 Russian people are not able to be their authentic selves.

More Than Fourteen Million People!

We who are able to need to stand up, speak up for, and celebrate Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer Russia!

To bring our celebration to a rousing and inspiring finale, here are 24 additional LGBTQ Russians to know about:


Polyxena Soloviova (1867-1924) was a poet and the first translator of Alice in Wonderland into Russian. She shared her life with Natalia Manaseina, who left her husband to be with Polyxena.

Polyxena and Natalia living openly as a lesbian couple, an arrangement "accepted by their families and by society" is mentioned here and on pg. 351  of "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture"

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Konstantin Leontiev (1831-1891) was a well-known novelist and literary critic. He was also bisexual.
pg. 351 of "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture"


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Prince Vladimir Meshchersky, Russian gay novelist and publisher who was "frequently invited to the imperial palace by the last three tsars." pg. 351 of "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture"

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Sergei Nabakov was Russian and gay. He lived in Austria with the man he loved up until he was killed in the Holocaust.  He was written about by his brother, Vladimir, in Vladimir's memoir about their Russian childhood. Vladamir also wrote in that memoir about how each of their parents had a gay brother (as did he.) pg. 351 of "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture"

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Viacheslav Ivanov and Zinovieva-Annibal Ivanov (1866-1907) were Russian. They were husband and wife. And they were important members of the Queer and Allied community.

Viacheslav was bisexual, and included in his poetry collection Cor Ardens (1911) a section called "Eros" about his crush on another man. Zinovieva-Annibal wrote the novel Thirty-Three Freaks and the collection of stories The Tragic Zoo "that did for Russian lesbians' what Kuzmin's Wings had done for gay men: They showed the reading public that lesbian love could be serious, deep and moving." After Zinovieva-Annibal's death, Viacheslav published more of her work that hadn't yet been out in the world. pg. 354 of "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture"

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Konstantin Somov was a gay Russian artist. pg. 356 of "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture"

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Kuzma Petrov-Vodin was a gay Russian artist - "Russia's foremost painter of male nudes." pg. 356 of "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture"

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Sergei Lemeshev was a popular Operatic tenor and Sviatoslav Richter was a pianist. Both were Russian and well known. And both were men who loved other men during "the Stalinist age." (1930-1953ish) Sergei and Sviatoslav were both married to women, but that didn't change who they were or whom they felt attraction to. pg. 362 of "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture"


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David Dar (1910-1980) was a Soviet writer who came out as gay after leaving the USSR.

Edward Limionov was also a Russian writer who, once he left Russia, openly lived (and wrote about his life) as a bisexual.  pg. 363 of "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture"

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"Twentieth-century Russians who have been openly gay, lesbian or bisexual during at least some part of their lives include activists Yevegeniya Debryanskaya, Roman Kalinin, and Alexander Zaremba; dancers Boris Moiseev and Valery Mikhailovsky, and writers Evgenii Kharitonov (1941-1981)... and Marina Tsvetaeva."
pg. 484 of "Completely Queer"

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"May 24, 1974
From the USSR (see RUSSIA) comes a rare public acknowledgement of the country's repressive policies against gay men and lesbians. American news services report that noted FILM director Sergei Paradzhanov has been given six years' hard labor for crimes including "partial homosexuality' and "incitement to suicide." He is one of an estimated 1,000 persons arrested each year on charges related to homosexuality."
pg. 648 of "Completely Queer"

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"1993
Two years after his death, Yevgeny Kharitonov's openly homoerotic poetry and prose are published for the first time in RUSSIA. Previously distributed via underground samizdat, Kharitonov achieved a reputation as the first major gay male writer in Russia since Mikhail Kuzmin, who died in 1936."
pg. 667 of "Completely Queer"

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"April 24, 1994
In RUSSIA, Yaroslav Mogutin, the country's most visible openly gay journalist, makes headlines when he attempts to register his marriage to American artist Robert Filippini. The head of Moscow's Wedding Palace No. 4 politely refuses his application."
pg. 669 of "Completely Queer"

***

Soviet Russian diplomat G.V. Chicherin (1872-1936) was gay. He was Commissar for foreign affairs, (starting under Lenin) until his retirement in 1930, and was the head of the Soviet delegation to the Genoa Conference after World War One. He negotiated - at a secret meeting with Germany's foreign Minister, Rathenau - the Treaty of Rapallo.

There's lots more detail on Chicherin and on how Rathenau was, like Chicherin, "another bachelor, who well understood Chicherin: they had similar tastes" - that's code for them both being men who could fall in love with other men - on pages 145-147 of "Homosexuals In History" by A.L. Rowse. Dorset Press (Macmillian) 1977.

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Alexie Apukhtim was a popular Russian poet of the late 1800s and early 1900s, who had a romantic relationship with Peter Tchaikovsky. pg. 351 of "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture" And for more on Tchaikovsky, see day one of our Celebration - taking us full circle!

* * *

The citations from "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture" are from Simon Karlinsky's excellent chapter, "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture: the Impact of the October Revolution" in "Hidden from History: Reclaiming the Gay and Lesbian Past" Edited by Martin Duberman, Martha Vicinus and George Chauncey, Jr. Meridian Press (Penguin), New York. 1989.

The citations from "Completely Queer" are from "Completely Queer: The Gay and Lesbian Encyclopedia" by Steve Hogan and Lee Hudson. Henry Holt, New York, 1998.

Anno Komorov and Masha Bast: Day 16 of Our Celebration of LGBTQ Russia - Not Just Yesterday, But Today! An Olympic Counter-Programming Event #OlympicShame #RussianPride #CheersToSochi

Anno Komarov

Photo of Anno Komarov at Moscow Pride 2010 by Charles Meacham, found here

Anno Komarov is a Genderqueer person. He is Russian. (I use the "he" pronoun since Anno requests it in his twitter profile, @annomosquito)

And standing in the photo above taken at Moscow Pride in 2010 with that sign, he says it so eloquently.

"My GENDER is MY choice" 

Masha Bast

From the Association of Russian Lawyers For Human Rights website

Masha Bast is a lawyer. She's Russian. She's the Chairwoman of the Association of Russian Lawyers for Human Rights. And she is an openly bisexual transgender woman.

As she says,

"It isn't a matter of upbringing," Bast said. "It's nature. That's why I think the law against 'homosexual propaganda' is a law against children and one that targets certain social groups. It is a fascist law and nothing else."

Bast also spoke about knowing that she was a girl from age 10, and even going to school dances dressed in women's clothing, though when she was growing up in Soviet Russia, there were no depictions of LGBT people that she could look to for inspiration.

"You have to understand the complete lack of information on this subject," she explained. "According to statistics, there are thousands of people going through what I went through. Just imagine all the kids who have no idea what's happening to them. I never once met a homosexual in my childhood and only learned what a homosexual was when I was 14."

Having the information kept from her about people who were like her didn't prevent Masha from becoming her authentic self - it only made the journey there more difficult. I completely relate to that.

That's why this idea that you protect children by not letting them know LGBTQ people exist is so cruel and flawed. Because it demonizes queer kids - for both those kids themselves and everyone else.

You can read more about Transgender Activism in Russia in this fascinating article by Yana Sitnikova at Freedom Requires Wings, and find out more about Masha in this Advocate article by Sunnivie Brydum, "Russian Lawyer Comes Out as Trans In Protest of Anti-LGBT Laws"


Celebrating Anno and Masha seems incredibly important. As far as I know, they're both in Russia, and I have sharing information that is widely available online.

I have to speak out about them because their standing up -- being their authentic selves and speaking out -- is inspiring.

There are so many bi, trans and gender non-conforming people in Russia, right now. And we need to give them a voice.

Because Bisexual Russia, Transgender Russia and Gender-Queer Russia is something to celebrate!

Sasha Korbut! Day 15 of Our Celebration of LGBTQ Russia - Not Just Yesterday, But Today! An Olympic Counter-Programming Event #OlympicShame #RussianPride #CheersToSochi

Sasha Korbut

Sasha Korbut, photo by Evgeniy Koval in OUT

Sasha is young, gay, Russian, living now in the US, and is speaking out about what it was like to grow up gay in Russia.

In this February 12, 2014 article in OUT magazine, he writes about "Finding Love In a Hopeful Place" and he spoke out in the excellent piece in the New York Times in November 2013, On Holding Hands and Fake Marriage: Stories of Being Gay In Russia.

In Sasha's words:

I knew I couldn’t build my private life in Russia. So when I got an offer to study at the Joffrey Ballet School in New York, in May of 2012, I took it. And it was there that only a few months later I met my boyfriend, Max. He was the first guy I ever held hands with in public.

Now I’m studying and working in New York. Just 35 minutes ago I kissed my boyfriend in a coffee shop. I would still never do that in Vladivostok. I talk to my gay friends back home and many of them don’t see it as bad because they have gotten used to living under certain kinds of rules. But under these rules, nothing ever changes. In small cities and rural villages, gay people just go on, seeming like something from a fairy tale.

Finally I worked up the courage to tell my two best friends that I’m gay. My female friend accepted it, and she basically told me she already knew. My other best friend, a guy, was upset and said, “Well, what can I do?” I asked them not to tell anyone, but he told his wife. And his wife told him I couldn’t see their child, the boy who they’d asked me to be godfather to. And the funny thing is that she and I were friends first since we were classmates. But she said, “We’ll tell our son that Uncle Sasha exists but we can’t see him because he lives far away.” Like I was a character from a book.

I’m still dancing, but I’ve also started writing for a couple of Russian magazines and newspapers, and gradually writing about gay issues in Russia. A couple of major magazines in eastern Russia have published a few of my articles but it’s a small world so of course my parents found out about the content and asked me to never write anything on the topic again. They’re afraid that when I come back to Russia I’ll have problems with the government, they’re worried I’ll end up in jail. But while I’m free and have something to say, I’m going to keep writing, to keep pushing back.

Sasha's story is poignant and important, and I'm so proud of him for standing proud and speaking out! Because we Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Trans, and Queer people DO exist outside of books. We exist in every country in the world - even in Russia!

So celebrate Sasha Korbut with me. Because there are so many other gay men still in Russia who can't speak out and stand up. And because Gay Russia is something to celebrate!

Masha Gessen! Day 14 of Our Celebration of LGBTQ Russia - Not Just Yesterday, But Today! An Olympic Counter-Programming Event #OlympicShame #RussianPride #CheersToSochi

Masha Gessen

Photo of Masha by James Croucher found here.

Masha Gessen is not living in Russia right now, and so we're going to acknowledge, and celebrate, her being one brave woman. She's a journalist. An out lesbian. A mother. And Russian.

Last year Masha stood up and wrote about getting her family out of Russia, in this article in Slate, When Putin Declared War On Gay Families, It Was Time For Mine To Leave Russia.

Read it. It's brilliant.

And read her other work, a recent piece in the NY Times about banking while Russian, a book on Pussy Riot, Words Will Break Cement: The Passion of Pussy Riot, and the book she co-edited with Joseph Huff-Hannon, Gay Propaganda: Russian Love Stories.

And celebrate Masha Gessen with me. Because there are so many other lesbians still in Russia that can't speak out and stand up. And because Lesbian Russia is something to celebrate!


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Bonus video: Oscar-Nominated Actress Ellen Page speaks out and stands up, and comes out as a gay person, at HRC's recent Time To Thrive conference...

Nikolai Przhevalsky! Day 13 of our Celebration of Russian LGBTQ Pride: An Olympic Counter-Programming Event #OlympicShame #RussianPride #CheersToSochi

Nikolai Przhevalksy (1839-1888)

Nikolai was an explorer, "one of the most well-known Russian celebrities of the 1870s and 1880s" who would return from his adventures with collections of exotic plants and animals.

He was known for both exploring central and far eastern Asia and for bringing along on his journeys handsome young men he was in love with (Like Pyotr Kozlov, who carried on the explorations after Nikolai died.)

Interestingly, the Russian government commissioned the men Nikolai loved as lieutenants in the army, which gave them a salary.

This entry on Przhevalsky gives more details on his expeditions: General Nikolay Przhevalsky was Imperial Russia’s most famous explorer. He made four equestrian journeys in Central Asia, crossing the Gobi desert, the Tian Shan mountains and exploring northern Tibet before dying on expedition in today’s Kyrgyzstan. An avid naturalist, Przhevalsky is credited with making hundreds of discoveries including the wild Bactrian camel and the Przhevalsky horse, which is named after this famous Long Rider. 

Nikolai's books about his travels and adventures were translated into other languages and "avidly read in England and America."

The Przhevalsky Horse - the original wild horse - was discovered by him during an expedition in Mongolia, and is named after him.

Nikolai Przhevalksy being a famous explorer, a Russian, and a man who loved other men is something to celebrate!


I read about Nikolai on pg. 372 of Queers In History, and on page. 350 of Simon Karlinsky's chapter on "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture: The Impact of the October Revolution" in "Hidden from History: Reclaiming The Gay and Lesbian Past" Edited by Martin Duberman, Martha Vicinus & George Chauncey, Jr.


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To Consider:

Look at how the Olympic machinery leapt into action when the snow was getting too soft - how they got all this salt from Switzerland in 24 hours - just in time to save the day. 

Interesting how when it comes to the human dignity and equal rights of LGBTQ people, there isn't that same sense of urgency - and there needs to be!

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Add To The Celebration:

Who are the Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Trans and Queer Russians you'd like to celebrate? Tell me your favorites in comments, or by twitter, and on the final day of the Olympics, I'll run a rainbow variety-pack post with everyone's suggestions!

Please Note: Given the situation in Russia, I'm thinking we should keep it to either people who are no longer living in Russia or are historical. I'd hate to create a list that then would be used against people by a repressive, anti-LGBTQ regime.


Having said that, there is a lot of Queer Russian heritage to explore and so many LGBTQ Russians we can celebrate!

Nikolai Kliuev! Day 12 of our Celebration of Russian LGBTQ Pride: An Olympic Counter-Programming Event #OlympicShame #RussianPride #CheersToSochi

Nikolai Kliuev

Nikolai Kliuev, photo from, among other sources, here.

Nikolai (1887-1937) was born to a peasant family and became the leader of a group of poets called "peasant" - because of their origin and because "the fate and survival of the peasant way of life in the twentieth century was their central theme."

He was 25 years old when two books of his poetry, The Chiming Pines and Brotherly Songs "created a sensation and made him a celebrity."

"Kliuev's unconcealed homosexuality did not prevent most poets and critics as well as many literate peasants from seeing him as the foremost literary spokesman for the whole of Russian peasantry."

Different sources list different men as "the greatest love of his life"

Hidden From History (on pg. 355) says,

"...the greatest love of his life was Sergei Esenin (1895-1925), better known in the West because of his brief marriage to the American dancer Isadora Duncan."

Sergei Esenin and Nikolai Kliuev, image from here.

And Matt & Andrij Koymansky Home The Living Room Biographies states,

"...the great love of his later life was the young artist Anatolii Yar-Kravchenko, a painter, with whom he lived in Leningrad at the end of the 1920s."

It's cool to know that Nikolai Kliuev was a Russian poet who loved other men - another piece of Russia's LGBTQ history to celebrate!

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Take Action:

Ukraine has politicians pushing for new anti-gay laws like Russia's. And they’ve just applied to the Olympic Committee to host the 2022 Winter Games.

If countries with anti-gay laws were banned from hosting the Olympics, it would make governments think twice about attacking lesbian, gay, bi and trans people. It could help stop anti-gay laws in Ukraine – and in time, help win the battle against anti-gay laws everywhere.

Together we've given the Olympic Committee a huge headache over Russia's anti-gay laws. They won't want a repeat, so a high-profile demand signed by thousands of us could be enough to get them to change the rules, preventing another anti-gay Olympics.

Sign now:
https://www.allout.org/change-the-rules

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Add To The Celebration:

Who are the Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Trans and Queer Russians you'd like to celebrate? Tell me your favorites in comments, or by twitter, and on the final day of the Olympics, I'll run a rainbow variety-pack post with everyone's suggestions!

Please Note: Given the situation in Russia, I'm thinking we should keep it to either people who are no longer living in Russia or are historical. I'd hate to create a list that then would be used against people by a repressive, anti-LGBTQ regime.


Having said that, there is a lot of Queer Russian heritage to explore and so many LGBTQ Russians we can celebrate!

Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich! Day 11 of our Celebration of Russian LGBTQ Pride: An Olympic Counter-Programming Event #OlympicShame #RussianPride #CheersToSochi

Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich

The uncle of Nicholas II, Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich was one of seven gay Grand Dukes in 1800s to 1900s turn-of-the-century Russia!

"There were at least seven gay Grand Dukes at the time (uncles, nephews, or cousins of the last two tsars). The most flamboyant of this group was the Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich, the uncle of Nicholas II. This uncle regularly went to the theater and other public functions with his current lover."

This information is pretty conspicuously absent from the news of the two-day conference "dedicated to the life and legacy of the Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich" held in St. Petersburg in May 2011.

Here's a less formal image - reportedly of Sergei swimming in the Moscow River with "some of his gentlemen (friends)."

photo from here

I found out about Sergei (and the other Grand Dukes) being gay on pg. 351 of the chapter by Simon Karlinsky, "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture: The Impact of the October Revolution" in "Hidden From History: Reclaiming The Gay & Lesbian Past" Edited by Martin Duberman, Martha Vincus and George Chauncey, Jr.

Russia having so many titled openly gay men in the late 1800s and early 1900s? That's pretty cool to know - and something to celebrate!


***

Add To The Celebration:

Who are the Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Trans and Queer Russians you'd like to celebrate? Tell me your favorites in comments, or by twitter, and on the final day of the Olympics, I'll run a rainbow variety-pack post with everyone's suggestions!

Please Note: Given the situation in Russia, I'm thinking we should keep it to either people who are no longer living in Russia or are historical. I'd hate to create a list that then would be used against people by a repressive, anti-LGBTQ regime.


Having said that, there is a lot of Queer Russian heritage to explore and so many LGBTQ Russians we can celebrate!

Mikhail Kuzmin! Day 10 of our Celebration of Russian LGBTQ Pride: An Olympic Counter-Programming Event #OlympicShame #RussianPride #CheersToSochi

Mikhail Kuzmin

Portrait of Mikhail Kuzman, found here

Mikhail was a famous author, composer and poet. He was Russian. He was also Gay.

He was actually famous for being gay, as his book "Wings" (Krylya) - serialized in 1906 and published in 1907 - is generally considered Russia's first gay novel.

In it, the male characters view falling in love with another man as "a natural phenomenon sanctioned by the prestigious Greek and Roman traditions. The main conflict is not whether or not Vanya will accept his homosexuality - his acceptance is virtually a given - but rather his struggle to reconcile his passion" with what he knows of the man he's attracted to.

After a soap-opera-worthy love affair with a handsome young dragoon, Vsevolod Knyazaev, who wrote Mikhail poetry and traveled with him, but then fell in love with a famous actress of the time, Olga Glebova-Sudikina (who was married to a man Mikhail had had a romance with as well!), Mikhail found love with Yuri Yurkun in 1913.

Mikhail and Yuri lived together for more than 25 years - the rest of Mikhail's life!

It's cool to note that the first officially registered gay and lesbian organization in Russia was called Krylya (Wings) after his novella.

"Love, whatever its nature, can never be depraved except in the eyes of a cynic." - Mikhail Kuzmin, Wings

Pretty cool to celebrate Mikhail Kuzmin, who used his voice and art to celebrate being openly Russian and Gay!


I read about Mikhail Kuzman on pgs. 336-337 of "Completely Queer: The Gay and Lesbian Encyclopedia" by Steve Hogan and Lee Hudson, and also in this article by Justin Torres at advocate.com, "Breaking The Ice Of Russian Repression."


***

Add To The Celebration:

Who are the Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Trans and Queer Russians you'd like to celebrate? Add your favorites in comments, and on the final day of the Olympics, I'll run a rainbow variety-pack post with everyone's suggestions!

Please Note: Given the situation in Russia, I'm thinking we should keep it to either people who are no longer living in Russia or are historical. I'd hate to create a list that then would be used against people by a repressive, anti-LGBTQ regime.

Having said that, there is a lot of Queer Russian heritage to explore and so many LGBTQ Russians we can celebrate!

***

Bonus:

Check out this great video of the eloquent Panti (a.k.a. Rory O'Neill) speaking out about the homophobia they face in Ireland. I particularly loved the moment at 8:45 in,

"...the word Homophobia is no longer available to gay people, which is a spectacular and neat Orwellian trick. Because now, it turns out, gay people are not the victims of homophobia, homophobes are the victims of homophobia!"

Note there is one f-bomb in this...

Sophia Parnok! Day 9 of our Celebration of Russian LGBTQ Pride: An Olympic Counter-Programming Event #OlympicShame #RussianPride #CheersToSochi

Sophia Parnok

Sophia Parnok was a poet. She was Russian. And she was a woman who loved other women - a lesbian.

Sophia, referred to in a biography as Russia's Sappho,  "... early on asserted that her own lesbian identity was both innate and potentially positive."

In 1905 (when she was 20) Sophia ran away with an actress to Western Europe.  That was the year she wrote this poem:

Just listen, how amidst inspired dreaming
the soul will suddenly lay bare its secret curves.
Let your thought illuminate them brightly
with creation’s breath in an audacious surge.
You will see, then, how the endless distance
so easily and wondrously removes its haze,
and there upon a lofty pedestal of marble
the depth of worlds feels Beauty’s silent gaze.

"Back in Russia, she briefly married to free herself from her family's influence, then left her husband in 1909 and began supporting herself by writing and translating.

In 1914, she fell in love with the poet Marina Tsvetaeva, and Sophia's first book, Poems (1916) "...included poems addressed to Tsvetaeva that are probably the first obviously lesbian love poems ever written [and published] by a Russian woman.

When she started publishing poems inspired by Sappho (such as The Roses of Pieria (1922) and The Vine (1923), "...critics were more hostile; ultimately, the Soviet literary establishment showed its disapproval by ignoring her."

Though she died in 1933, Sophia's work and impact were rediscovered by Russian readers in the 1990s.

Two more of her poems to enjoy:

I know profoundly well – you’ve shown me everything,
the breathing of the skies, and speech of mighty billows
and twinkling of the stars within the depths of air,
and lightning’s vivid laugh in gloomy quietude
you’ve given me with you in brilliant consonance.

So let that farewell cry, as always, sound above me!
I have a heart so that it can be broken!
I know too well that last, that grievous moment,
when happiness can’t help but be forsaken –
but through the garden joyfully I’ll go!
So what if a new loss lies in my future,
– My heart’s so happy in its secret fever:
love summons me, and I won’t contradict her

and

I see: you’re getting off the streetcar – utterly beloved
a breeze, and in my heart it breathes you’re – utterly beloved
I can’t tear my eyes from you because you’re – utterly beloved!
And however did you come to be so – utterly beloved?
You, she-eagle from Caucasian glaciers, where in heat it’s cold.
You, carrier of a very sweet contagion, who never has a cold.
You, beclouder of your lover’s reason with logic clear and cold.
All five senses reel from your intoxication – utterly beloved!

Sophia being an out, proud lesbian poet in Russia's history? That's something to celebrate!


Quotes above taken from pg. 431 and 432 of "Completely Queer: The Gay and Lesbian Encyclopedia" by Steve Hogan and Lee Hudson. Cited source "Sophia Parnok: The Life and Work of Russia's Sappho" by Diana Lewis Burgin (1994).

The photo of Sophia and more of her poetry, translated by Diana Lewis Burgin, were found here.

***

Add To The Celebration:

Who are the Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Trans and Queer Russians you'd like to celebrate? Tell me your favorites in comments, or by twitter, and on the final day of the Olympics, I'll run a rainbow variety-pack post with everyone's suggestions!

Please Note: Given the situation in Russia, I'm thinking we should keep it to either people who are no longer living in Russia or are historical. I'd hate to create a list that then would be used against people by a repressive, anti-LGBTQ regime.


Having said that, there is a lot of Queer Russian heritage to explore and so many LGBTQ Russians we can celebrate!

***

Bonus: Check out this fun video ad from Norway that pokes fun at Russia's anti-gay laws!

Rudolf Nureyev! Day 8 of our Celebration of Russian LGBTQ Pride: An Olympic Counter-Programming Event #OlympicShame #RussianPride #CheersToSochi

Rudolf Nureyev

A superstar ballet dancer, Rudolf Nureyev was Russian and Gay.

Rudolf started his formal training in ballet at age 11 (in 1949) and when he graduated from the Kirov Ballet School in Leningrad in 1958, "he joined the Kirov Ballet and, bypassing the corps de ballet, was immediately given solo roles."

In 1961, he gained fame while touring Paris, and defected, leaving the Soviet Union.

In 1962 he danced with the famous ballerina Margot Fonteyn, and together they made ballet history. Rudolf said of dancing with Margot,

"Because we are sincere and gifted, an intense abstract love is born between us every time we dance together."

After one performance of Swan Lake in Vienna, they were called back for the applauding audience so many times it earned them a place in the Guiness Book of World Records for the longest curtain call on record!

Rudolf Nureyev danced, and choreographed, for decades, and his being gay was "an open secret."

The critic Clive Barnes described Rudolf this way,

"People will be writing about Nureyev's stage personality for as long as people remember what a stage was. It was a personality compounded of sensual allure and sexual disdain. Yet he always suggested the loner, which is to say that everything about him, beginning with his androgynous but scarcely asexual looks, seemed to be a harmony of opposites; he was a yin and yang person for all seasons and all manners. No wonder he was compared with Nijinsky."

Cool trivia: Rudolf Nureyev played Vaslav Nijinsky in an unfinished film biopic on Nijinsky in 1970.

Check out Nureyev's "solo American Television debut" from 1963:



Rudolf Nureyev being a superstar dancer from Russia, and being gay? That's history to celebrate!

All quotes above are from pages 333 to 337 of "The Gay 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Gay Men and Lesbians, Past and Present" by Paul Russell. You can learn more about Rudolf Nureyev at the Rudolf Nureyev Foundation.

***

Add To The Celebration:

Who are the Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Trans and Queer Russians you'd like to celebrate? Tell me your favorites in comments, or by twitter, and on the final day of the Olympics, I'll run a rainbow variety-pack post with everyone's suggestions!

Please Note: Given the situation in Russia, I'm thinking we should keep it to either people who are no longer living in Russia or are historical. I'd hate to create a list that then would be used against people by a repressive, anti-LGBTQ regime.

Having said that, there is a lot of Queer Russian heritage to explore and so many LGBTQ Russians we can celebrate!

***

Today's Bonus:

This great video commentary, Dale Hansen Unplugged: Celebrating our differences



Go Dale!

And thanks to Steve for sharing this with me, so I could share it with all of you!

***

And for those of you in a romantic mood - and for my amazing husband, here's a video gift, courtesy of Jonathan Groff and the New York Times.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Vaslav Nijinsky! Day 7 of our Celebration of Russian LGBTQ Pride: An Olympic Counter-Programming Event #OlympicShame #RussianPride #CheersToSochi

A photo of Nijinsky found, among other sites, here.

Vaslav Nijinsky was a legendary dancer and choreographer, a Russian, and a man who loved both men and women. He was bi.

As the famous artist Jean Cocteau said of Nijinsky,

"In him is reincarnated the mysterious child Septentrion, who died dancing on the shore at Antibes. Young, erect, supple, he walks only on the ball of the foot, taking rapid, firm little steps, compact as a clenched fist, his neck long and massive as a Donatello, his slender torso contrasting with his overdeveloped thighs, he is like some young Florentine, vigorous beyond anything human, and feline to a disquieting degree. He upsets all the laws of equilibrium, and seems constantly to be a figure painted on the ceiling; he reclines nonchalantly in midair, defies heaven in a thousand different ways, and his dancing is like some lovely poem written all in capitals."

Picking up on the story yesterday, Sergei Diaghilev and Vaslav Nijinsky were a romantic couple and, as Vaslav danced and came to choreograph Sergei's Ballets Russes, together they achieved fame and success for them both.

Until 1913, when Vaslav married the Hungarian Countess, Romola de Pulsky-Lubocy-Cselfalva.

When Sergei found out, he was furious, and fired Vaslav from the dance company.

This image of Nijinsky, starring in one of the most famous ballets of the Ballets Russes, Afternoon of the Faun, is from here.

Vaslav tried to form his own dance company, but it didn't work out. He spent part of World War One interned in Hungary. In 1919, after a nervous breakdown, he was diagnosed with schizophrenia and lived in various sanatoriums in Europe until he died in 1950.

Sergei Diaghilev kept his Ballets Russes going and touring until his death in 1929.

While it doesn't have the happiest of endings, it's fascinating to know the story of how the professional and personal relationship between these two Russian men changed dance forever.

"Between them, Diaghilev and Nijinksy practically invented the modern male dancer. Before the Ballets Russes, male dancers played mostly a supporting role to the women - they were lifters rather than dancers. Diaghilev changed that, and the vehicle for that change was Nijinsky."

Vaslav Nijinsky as a young man, image from here.

Vaslav Nijinsky's brilliance, as well as his love for both a man and a woman, are well worth celebrating!

The Jean Cocteau as well as the "between them" quotes above are from pg. 181 of "The Gay 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Gay Men and Lesbians, Past and Present" by Paul Russell.

***

Add To The Celebration:

Who are the Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Trans and Queer Russians you'd like to celebrate? Tell me your favorites in comments, or by twitter, and on the final day of the Olympics, I'll run a rainbow variety-pack post with everyone's suggestions!

Please Note: Given the situation in Russia, I'm thinking we should keep it to either people who are no longer living in Russia or are historical. I'd hate to create a list that then would be used against people by a repressive, anti-LGBTQ regime.

Having said that, there is a lot of Queer Russian heritage to explore and so many LGBTQ Russians we can celebrate!

Sergei Diaghilev! Day 6 of our Celebration of Russian LGBTQ Pride: An Olympic Counter-Programming Event #OlympicShame #RussianPride #CheersToSochi

 A portrait of Sergei Diaghilev by Valentin Serov, found here.

Considered the founder of modern Ballet, Sergei Diaghilev was Russian and Gay.

He was considered an impresario - someone whose main talent was to bring out the best in - and promote - other artists.

In 1890 he settled in St. Petersburg and co-founded a cultural organization and a journal, both called Mir Iskusstva (World of Art) with the idea of creating a new movement that would combine all the arts.

In 1909, he formed the Ballets Russes (Russian Ballets) and with them he toured Western Europe - revolutionizing dance staging, creating collaborative teams of artists to work on the productions, and ultimately scandalizing - and dazzling - audiences!

Sergei had a number of romances with other men, including Dmitry Filosofov, whom he was with for fifteen years. They worked together on World of Art.

About Sergei it was said:

"He never worried much about what other might think: he once made a point of walking arm-in-arm down a crowded street with the then disgraced Oscar Wilde."

Sergei later had a celebrated romance with Vaslav Nijinsky, the star male ballet dancer in his Ballets Russes.

Léon Bakst, Russian, 1866–1924, Costume design for Vaslav Nijinsky as the Faun from The Afternoon of a Faun, 1912, as seen here.

Diaghilev lived with him [Nijinsky], took him everywhere, to picture galleries, museums, saw to his reading, his diet and well-being. ...Of this historic relationship it has been said, 'their union could produce no children, but it would give birth to masterpieces - and change the history of the dance, of music and of painting throughout the world.'

Vaslav was at the top of his career - he'd even started to choreograph to great acclaim and everything seemed great... until, on a trip without Sergei, Vaslav married the Hungarian countess, Romola de Pulsky in 1913.

What happened then?

Click by tomorrow, to find out.

If you can't wait, you can learn out more about Sergei Diaghilev here at biography.com. The top quote above is from pg. 183 of "Completely Queer: The Gay and Lesbian Encyclopedia" by Steve Hogan and Lee Hudson, and the bottom quote is from pg. 143 of "Homosexuals in History" by A.L. Rowse.

***

Add To The Celebration:

Who are the Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Trans and Queer Russians you'd like to celebrate? Tell me your favorites in comments, or by twitter, and on the final day of the Olympics, I'll run a rainbow variety-pack post with everyone's suggestions!

Please Note: Given the situation in Russia, I'm thinking we should keep it to either people who are no longer living in Russia or are historical. I'd hate to create a list that then would be used against people by a repressive, anti-LGBTQ regime.

Having said that, there is a lot of Queer Russian heritage to explore and so many LGBTQ Russians we can celebrate!

***

Bonus:

Check out this just-over three minute video with highlights - and some archival footage of the Ballets Russes! - from the 2010 exhibition on Diaghilev at London's Victoria and Albert Museum:



***

Take Action:

Spread the word, that dance - modern dance - as it exists today, owes much to a Gay Russian man - Sergei Diaghilev.

Definitely something to celebrate!

Sergei Eisenstein! Day 5 of our Celebration of Russian LGBTQ Pride: An Olympic Counter-Programming Event #OlympicShame #russianPride

Sergei Eisenstein, Filmmaking Legend

Sergei Eisenstein inspecting a film strip, ca. 1927, featured image on the Stanford University Film Studies Library webpage

Sergei Eisenstein was, as the Gene Siskel Film Center puts it, "one of the giants of film history."

Sergei came up with the idea of the montage, he was Russian - at the time Russia was called the Soviet Union (or USSR), so he was considered "Soviet," - and he was a gay.

Here's a clip from one of his most famous films, "Battleship Potemkin" (Bronenosets Potyomkin)



Even 89 years later, it's a remarkable piece of filmmaking that grabs me and doesn't let me go. (And it was a silent movie!)

Here's the section on Sergei from pg. 361 in the chapter, "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture: The Impact of the October Revolution" by Simon Karlinsky in "Hidden from History: Reclaiming the Gay and Lesbian Past" edited by Martin Duberman, Martha Vicinus and George Chauncey, Jr.

Another major figure whom the Soviet authorities tried to keep in a lifelong closet was the great filmmaker Sergei Eisenstein. Eisenstein may have internalized the homophobia of the Russian and international Communist movements, as when he told the Soviet critic Sergei Tretiakov that if it were not for Marx, Lenin, and Freud, he would have ended up as "another Oscar Wilde."

(That's footnoted as from pg 119 of Marie Seton's "Sergei M. Eisenstein," revised ed. (London: Dennis Dobson, 1978, originally published in 1952 by The Bodley Head.) Back to the paragraph on Sergei from "Hidden from History,"

But he did yield to his gay desires when visiting Berlin and Paris and even more so during his 1930-1932 stay in Mexico to make a film, where he became openly gay and almost caused an international scandal. The Soviet government blackmailed him into returning to Moscow by threatening to disclose his private life. Before he was allowed to make another film, he had to submit to that Soviet cure-all for homosexuality: marriage. His friend and assistant Pera Attasheva volunteered to go through the ceremony, though they never lived together.

I have to say I don't love that language of "yeilding to gay desires" - especially as it's a negative spin on finally stopping to pretend to be someone you are not. If Sergei was finally able to be his authentic self in Mexico, that's something to cheer.

There's another footnote to that paragraph in "Hidden From History," which lists four other sources on Sergei Eisenstein's being gay, including:

Stan Brakhage, "Film Biographies" (Berekeley: Turtle Island, 1977), pg. 98-99, where Kenneth Rexroth reports a conversation with Eisenstein in which the director admitted he was forced to return to the Soviet Union by a threat to expose his sex life;

Thomas Waugh, "A Fag-Spotter's Guide to Eisenstein," Body Politic, no. 35, July/August 1977, an excellent demonstration of homo-erotic imagery in Eisenstein's films

Sergei being gay is also cited in this film review by David Thomson in the UK paper The Guardian of "Battleship Potemkin" - which in 1958 was voted, by an international jury meeting in Brussels, as "the greatest picture ever made."

...Eisenstein was gay and bursting to get out of the closet and out of the Soviet Union. Indeed, he dreamed of going to California. In 1930, he arrived in Hollywood, but it was the start of his personal disaster. Helped by the author Upton Sinclair, he made a ravishing documentary in Mexico, but Moscow disowned the project.

Interestingly, in the footnote back in "Hidden from History," Edmund Wilson's "Eisenstein in Hollywood" in Wilson's "The American Earthquake" (New York: Doubleday, 1958) pg. 367-413 cites,

"...the role of the American pro-Communist writer Upton Sinclair in cutting off the funds for Eisenstein's Mexican film project and denouncing him to Stalin when Sinclair fournd out about the director's sex life."

While Upton Sinclair's role in outing Sergei is fascinating, the discussion being all about who Eisenstein had "sex" with sort of ignores the fact that being gay is about being a guy who can fall in love with another guy, or a gal who can fall in love with another gal.

Let's focus on Sergei falling in love with another guy when he was in Mexico, okay?

Healthy grown-up relationships can include sex, but to reduce all gay, lesbian and bi relationships to being just about sex is a misrepresentation - just as reducing all heteroSEXual relationships to being just about sex would be.

Not surprisingly, there is no mention of Sergei Eisenstein being gay in this bio at the Russian Archives, nor is it mentioned in the Reuters obituary that ran in the New York Times on Feb 12, 1948.

A screen shot of the entry on Sergei Eisenstein in "Queers in History"

Happily, Sergei Eisenstein is featured on page 152 of "Queers in History," which includes the additional information that:

Eisenstein's unexpurgated diaries, published in 1984 as "Immoral Memories," record his infatuations with many young men, including his assistant, Grigori Alexandrov.

Here's a picture from 1925 of, left to right, Grigori, Sergei, Walt Disney, and Eduard Tisse, who worked with Sergei as his cinematographer.

Sergei (center left) wrote in his diaries about his crush on his assistant, Grigori (far left.)
They're pictured here with Walt Disney (center right) and Sergei's Cinematographer, Tisse (far right)

The film-focused biography of Sergei on the Gene Siskel Film Center site ends with these words:

"It is time to rediscover Sergei Eisenstein, not simply as a textbook exemplar of "Soviet Montage," but as one of film history's most spectacular and exhilarating stylists, able to mobilize the entire arsenal of cinema's resources--editing, mise-en-scène, music, documentary, and artifice--with a dazzling virtuosity that has never been surpassed."

And I think it's time to rediscover - and celebrate - Sergei Eisenstein as a gay man, too!

***

Add To The Celebration:

Who are the Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Trans and Queer Russians you'd like to celebrate? Tell me your favorites in comments, or by twitter, and on the final day of the Olympics, I'll run a rainbow variety-pack post with everyone's suggestions!

Please Note: Given the situation in Russia, I'm thinking we should keep it to either people who are no longer living in Russia or are historical. I'd hate to create a list that then would be used against people by a repressive, anti-LGBTQ regime.

Having said that, there is a lot of Queer Russian heritage to explore and so many LGBTQ Russians we can celebrate!


***

Bonus:

Check out this great article by Michael Regula at Advocate.com on "Why The End of Communism Didn't End AntiGay Hate In Russia"

It includes this:

“If Russia for a long time was not safe for LGBT people, it’s a bit different now that the government is actually taking steps to enshrine that homophobia in the law,” explains Morris, executive director of the Washington, D.C.-based LGBT group Immigration Equality. “And I think that’s especially scary for people in Russia who are trying to get out.”

Immigration Equality works to end discrimination in U.S. immigration law, and helps win asylum for those fleeing persecution based on their sexual orientation, gender identity, or HIV status. The organization’s staff has witnessed the impact of Russia’s growing political and cultural homophobia. Morris reports a “dramatically higher increase” in asylum applications from Russia in the past year. Calls to the organization’s free immigration advice hotline tripled in September alone.

Morris says Immigration Equality is currently working on 45 Russian cases."

***

Take Action:

Consider supporting (by raising money for, sending money to, or spreading word about) organizations that help Asylum-seekers (People fleeing Russia and other homelands where it is dangerous for them to be their authentic LGBTQ selves, who want to be able to stay in safer countries.)

The organization mentioned in the Advocate article helping LGBTQ Russians escape and stay here in the USA is Immigration Equality - they've even started a "Russia Emergency Fund."

Check it out and see what you can do to help!

The Chuckchi, Koryak and Kamchadal! Day 4 of our Celebration of Russian LGBTQ Pride: An Olympic Counter-Programming Event #OlympicShame #RussianPride

A Siberian Shaman

Photo from here.

In Russian Siberia, three indigenous nomadic peoples - The Chuckchi [Chukchi], Koryak and Kamchadal - embrace a third gender.

As reported at PBS' great resource: A Map of Gender-Diverse Cultures Throughout The World,

"Chuckchi (Siberia)

"The Chuckchi (and neighboring indigenous peoples including the Koryak, and the Kamchadal) are a nomadic, shamanic people who embrace a third gender. Generally shamans are biologically male with some adoption of female roles and appearance who married men but also were not subject to the social limitations placed on women. Third gender Chuckchi could accompany men on the hunt, as well as take care of family."

So cool to know!

Here's more from the pbs-linked website of Raven Kaldera. Alhough it has a pretty negative spin on being gender non-conforming and not playing by the "gender rules," it does provides more detail about how the third gender was recognized and functioned in these societies:

If you look at the research on shamanism worldwide - and especially that of the subarctic circumpolar shamanisms, from Siberia to the Inuit - you find, over and over, the disturbingly frequent presence of spirit-workers who transgressed gender roles and indulged in unusual sexual practices. In some cultures, just showing evidence of these behaviors was considered a sign that a child was bound to be a spirit-worker of some sort.

This was remarked on particularly in Siberian shamanism, specifically among the Chukchi, Koryak, and Kamchadal, and across the Bering Strait with the Inuit. While Siberia may seem to be a long way in the minds of many people, from Scandinavia or even Finland, there are many things that the circumpolar subarctic shamanic traditions have in common, much more so than shamanic traditions from further south. …

Interviews with these "transformed shamans" report that the spirits informed the shamans in question that they were required to put on the clothing and take up the jobs of the opposite sex; in some cases, they lived their whole life in this way, including taking lovers appropriate to their role, and in some cases the male-to-female shamans would ritually mime childbirth. (Even here, however, the "special" role of these shamans as still not playing by the gender rules can be seen; a "shaman-wife" of this type did not have to observe the taboos of women, but could accompany their husband to battle, and rather than taking their husband's name, sometimes the husband took theirs instead.) Sometimes one also finds reports of male-to-female shamans who changed gender later in life, but remained husbands to their wives and fathers to their children, merely adopting female clothing and household jobs. Some merely donned women's clothing during ceremonies.

There's more on the Chukchi people at this site, where I learned they call themselves the Lygoravetlat, which means "genuine people."

And also at this site on Siberian Shamanism, that quotes from Yuri Rythkeu in National Geographic [February 1983],

"The Chukchi are a people who used to herd reindeer on the tundra and set up coastal settlements on the Bering Sea and other coastal polar areas. Originally they were nomads who hunted wild reindeer but over time evolved into two groups: 1) Chavchu (nomadic reindeer herders), some of whom who rode reindeers and others who didn’t; and 2) maritime settlers who settled along the coast and hunted sea animals."

A Chukchi shaman was "was the preserver of tradition and cultural experience. He was meteorologist, physician, philosopher, and ideologist—a one-man Academy of Sciences. His success depended on his skill at prognosticating the presence of game, determining the route of the reindeer herds, and predicting the weather well in advance. In order to do all this , he must above all be an intelligent and knowledgeable man."

Despite the male pronoun used above, it's fascinating to learn more about what people in this third-gender role did in their culture.

Knowing that indigenous people in Russia saw - and still see - gender differently than the binary (and dominant) Russian and Western culture's view that you're-either-a-guy-or-a-girl is inspiring. People who combine male and female qualities, roles and attributes to form their own gender identity feels very similar to the "Gender Queer" identities being claimed by younger people in the LGBTQ community today.

And knowing that Russia has this history of indigenous gender non-conformity - an honored and sacred position among their society - in the Chukchi, the Koryak and the Kamchadal? That's something to celebrate!

***

Add To The Celebration:

Who are the Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Trans and Queer Russians you'd like to celebrate? Tell me your favorites in comments, or by twitter, and on the final day of the Olympics, I'll run a rainbow variety-pack post with everyone's suggestions!

Please Note: Given the situation in Russia, I'm thinking we should keep it to either people who are no longer living in Russia or are historical. I'd hate to create a list that then would be used against people by a repressive, anti-LGBTQ regime.

Having said that, there is a lot of Queer Russian heritage to explore and so many LGBTQ Russians we can celebrate!

***

Take Action (and today's bonus video!):

Get the Olympic sponsors that count you as a customer to know that you expect them to stand up and speak out in support of Russia's LGBTQ community.

Here are the main ten sponsors of the Sochi Olympic shame:

I LOVE this grand-standingUP moment, as reported in the International Business Times, of European Parliament Member Michael Cashman cutting his Visa Card To Protest Sochi.

“The discrimination, violence and human rights attack by [Russian President Vladimir] Putin are entirely unacceptable. Attacks on lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans people are equally unacceptable,” Michael Cashman, a British Labour MEP representing the English region of the West Midlands, said. “I trust the athletes to speak out in Sochi, but I condemn sponsors like McDonald's, Coca-Cola and Visa for their continued support of the Games. I will boycott the sponsors, starting now, with Visa. Madame President, not in my name!” He then proceeded to pull out of his pocket a Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) card and a pair of scissors, cutting it in half.

Here's the video:



Go, Michael!

Now each of us has to figure out how WE can stand UP and have our voice heard, too!

Tsar Peter The Great! Day 3 of our Celebration of Russian LGBTQ Pride: An Olympic Counter-Programming Event #OlympicShame #RussianPride

Peter The Great

Born in 1672 and crowned Tsar when he was ten, Peter grew up to become the guy who:

In 1721, proclaimed Russia an empire and was accorded the title of Emperor of All Russia, Great Father of the Fatherland, and "the Great."

Modernized the Russian alphabet, introduced the Julian calendar (how most of the world keeps track of time now), and established the first Russian newspaper

Opened Russia to the West, sending Russians to Europe to learn arts, crafts and skills to bring back and inviting European engineers, shipbuilders, architects, craftsmen and merchants to come be part of modernizing Russia

Made beards illegal as part of his drive to 'modernize' Russia, because "in Europe smooth cheeks, bare chins and expertly twirled moustaches were all the rage." Crazy as it sounds, "Beard patrols would knock on the houses of local bearded men and forced them to shave or pay the extortionate ‘beard tax’.")

Expanded Russia's territory through wars, changed how the army, navy and government was structured, moved the capital of Russia from Moscow to St. Petersburg and...

Was bisexual.

Oh, and he was over six-and-a-half feet tall.

Did I mention he had love affairs with women and men?

While the info about Peter the Great's relationships with women is wide-spread (he married twice and had 11 children) you won't read about his love affairs with men in the biography here, or here, but it's mentioned:

In the great chapter by Simon Karlinsky, "Russia's Gay Literature and Culture: The Impact of the October Revolution" in "Hidden From History: Reclaiming The Gay & Lesbian Past," Edited by Martin Duberman, Martha Vicinus and George Chauncey, Jr.

It's brought up in a discussion of how the first laws against male gay love happened during his reign. In 1706, his German military advisors drafted a new military law against gay men loving each other, and while the penalty was burning at the stake,

"However, the tsar, who was known to dabble in bisexuality on occasion, soon mitigated this penalty and there are no known instances when it was applied... The consensus of Russian historians is that the military regulations of 1706 and 1716 pertained only to soliders on active duty and did not concern the rest of the population."

The same story about Peter having relationships with men, too, is cited on page 157 of "Women in Russia and Ukraine," edited by Rosalind J. Marsh.

"The punishment for 'unnatural lechery' - burning at the stake - first appeared in 1706 in Peter the Great's military code, composed on the Swedish model. Yet in 1716, Peter, himself not averse to bisexual relations, watered down the punishment, replacing it with lifelong exile (in the event of the use of violence), and that only for military personnel."

Which sounds more like the law's intent was to prohibit rape more than consensual intimacy between two men.

Peter being Bisexual also talked about at this website, where Frank Sanello writes:

Peter the Great, an open bisexual, promoted his stable-boy lover to prince and governor of Russia's Baltic states.

Peter had managed to cow Russia's aristocracy into submission, and unlike Edward II's assassins, the Russian nobility did not object to Peter treating his Stable Boy Charming like a prince, literally.

In another article, Frank explains that

"in his 1980 Pulitzer-Prize winning biography, Peter the Great, Robert K. Massie denied Peter was bisexual while at the same time admitting that the tsar and his favorite courtier, Alexander Menshikov, a handsome stable boy Peter promoted to prince and governor of Russia’s Baltic states, took naps together, during which Peter used his favorite’s stomach as a pillow to rest his head on"

In the Russiapedia entry "Prominent Russians: Aleksandr Menshikov" Peter and Aleksandr's relationship -and whether it was a romantic love affair - is openly discussed:

Although Peter and Aleksandr often competed with each other to catch the attention of young, pretty daughters of aristocrats, historians even in Peter’s times wondered whether Menshikov and the Tsar had a romantic relationship themselves. One described their relations as “more love than friendship”, and the two would often sulk and fight, sometimes literally, with several accounts of Peter punching Menshikov until he bled. Menshikov was known in the court as the only man who could soften the Tsar’s violent temper (often alcohol-induced), and the relationship between the two never appears to have flagged, right up to Peter’s death.

For two years after Peter's death, Aleksandr pretty much ruled Russia. But then, after Peter's heir turned against him, Aleksandr was stripped of his power and exiled to Siberia, where he died two years later. (That's from this bio, which calls Aleksandr the "good friend and companion" of Peter the Great.)

It's a shame that as part of the Olympic opening ceremony, when, as the British Express put it, "The floor of the stadium was then transformed into a raging sea depicting the reign of former emperor Peter the Great during the era of Imperial Russia" the fact the Peter was a man who loved women and men was hidden.

But we can talk about it - and tell the world!

Because knowing that one the most famous leaders of Russia in history was bisexual? That's something to celebrate!

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Take Action:

Check out the flow of Olympic-themed tweets over at twitter, and chime in with your own supportive-to-LGBTQ-Russian comments of your own! The Olympics in Sochi are Putin's attempt to spotlight how awesome Russia is - but the Russia he wants to create is one without gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender or queer history or people. Let's remind him - and the world - that Russia is great not despite LGBTQ Russians, but because of them, too!

Some hashtags to co-opt:

#Olympics #Sochi #sochiproblems #sochi2014 #olympicgames


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Add To The Celebration:

Who are the Gay, Lesbian, Bi, Trans and Queer Russians you'd like to celebrate? Add your favorites in comments, and on the final day of the Olympics, I'll run a rainbow variety-pack post with everyone's suggestions!

Please Note: Given the situation in Russia, I'm thinking we should keep it to either people who are no longer living in Russia or are historical. I'd hate to create a list that then would be used against people by a repressive, anti-LGBTQ regime.

Having said that, there is a lot of Queer Russian heritage to explore and so many LGBTQ Russians we can celebrate!

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Your Bonus:

Check out this performance from before the broadcast Olympic opening ceremony. It's members of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs choir (No kidding) - and they're performing, as NBC put it: "a rousing rendition of Daft Punk's 'Get Lucky'"

You can click this link to check out the choir's Olympics performance, but NBC hasn't made it embeddable. I did find this version on youtube:



It's a great reminder that under all their military uniforms and hetero posturing and external stern-ness (in turns both personal and political) Russian people are just like the rest of us. Some are straight, some are queer, some go to bed early, and some are up all night to get lucky.