What do discriminations against the LGBT community in Eastern Europe reveal ?
Illustrator Nato Tardieu
06.03.2020 By Deborah Rouach
LGBT rights are a marker of europeanity and take part in the symbolic borders definition of the European Union. However in Eastern Europe, the development of a political and religious discourse against the LGBT community is attracting an increasing part of society. Thus, the issue of LGBT rights has shifted the symbolic boundaries within the European Union itself, marking a break between Eastern and Western Europe.
A growing anti-LGBT political movement in Eastern Europe
In recent years several Eastern European Union countries have openly declared their intolerance towards the LGBT community. In Poland, 2019 marks a turning point on the issue of sexual minorities in the country. In March 2019, the conservative religious movement of the government conquered the conservative communities [1]According to the Eurobarometre, ILGA Europe, nearly 31,6 % of Polish population lives in communities that voted this text. of the East of the country where a declaration, without legal value, established areas free from “LGBT ideology”. This text placed itself in reaction to the adoption in February 2019 of an LGBT municipal charter in Warsaw which establishes anti-discriminatory measures. There is therefore a growing polarization in Polish society as regards national identity values and the question of the rights of people from sexual minorities. In October 2019, the preservation of traditional values in Polish society became the spearhead of the legislative campaign of the nationalist conservative party PiS supported by the influential Catholic Church. Homophobia openly assumed and claimed by political and religious powers contributes to increasing persecutions suffered by LGBT people in Poland, as shown by gay prides under police protection.
In Eastern Europe, the fight against the claims of sexual minorities has helped to strengthen the alliance between conservative government parties, neoconservative Catholic movements and far-right organisations. In this sense, the referendum held in Romania in 2018 to try to institutionalise the ban on marriage for homosexual couples had seen the creation of a coalition between the Orthodox Church and evangelical movements, without however succeeding in obtaining more than 30% of the votes. In Bulgaria, evangelical movements have moved closer to far-right ministers in the government against gender issues. In Hungary, Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s conservative family policy marked a break with the country’s progressivism following the inclusion in the Constitution in 2012 of a heterosexual definition of marriage only. Since then, Viktor Orban and his party have continued to attack the LGBT community, which has contributed to the violence perpetrated by neo-Nazi movements on people from sexual minorities.
Source : ILGA Europe
How to explain this increasing intolerance towards the LGBT community ?
The decline in rights for LGBT people and anti-LGBT intolerance in Eastern Europe can be explained by various factors proper to these countries. First of all, it should be remembered that there was no sexual liberation in this region, formerly included in the USSR, strongly marked by the conservative values of Christianity which perceives homosexuality as a perverting evil in society. According to a Pew Research Center survey conducted between 2015 and 2017, religion is considered to be a central element of national identity in Central and Eastern Europe. The influence of religious powers has a significant impact on the worrying development of society’s mentalities in these countries, all the more when religious and political powers come together. This coalition is also helping to strengthen this war of values. Generally speaking, gender issues are controversial and seen as an ideology threatening national identity in Eastern Europe. In addition, the strong reactions provoked among the countries of Eastern Europe concerning the Istanbul Convention adopted by the Council of Europe in 2011 which evokes the concept of gender demonstrates the relatively low threshold of tolerance of the political authorities in Eastern Europe. One must also take into account the demographic decline and the departure of young people to understand the crystallisation of Eastern Europe governments fears in relation to questions of sexuality.
A crisis of European values
Resistance to certain markers of European identity by countries of Eastern Europe, including LGBT rights, is not recent. It was expressed following their accession to the European Union in 2004, demanding from them that they appropriate new values and in particular that they adapt their legislation in favor of equality for people from sexual minorities. For some countries it was seen as an imposed choice representing a threat to the nation. Thus the lack of uniformity in the European Union “community of values” highlights the cultural boundaries between Eastern and Western countries regarding LGBT rights. Far from being frozen, its borders are constantly evolving in the wake of crises that redraw and strengthen the definition of national identity.
Equal rights of LGBT people, considered as one aspect of the European Union identity construction, are now a source of identity crisis. Identity crises can occur as a result of external events, like the migration issue, provoking a questioning of the identity system and a renewed need to reaffirm its difference from different people, especially LGBT people. These European strongholds of conservative traditional values endanger the values of the European Union and widen the cultural divide which now separates the countries of East and West, and tends to increase over time.
Source : Special Eurobarometer 493 – “Discrimination in the European Union”. Fieldwork: May 2019
Source : Special Eurobarometer 493 – ” Discrimination in the European Union “. Fieldwork : May 2019
Source : Special Eurobarometer 493 – ” Discrimination in the European Union”. Fieldwork : May 2019
What can we consider for the years to come ? The development to be expected of LGBT people rights in Eastern Europe depends on several elements : the political orientation of future governments, the hold of the religious in the political and private sphere, the vitality of civil society and the possible crises that will affect these countries. It is also the responsibility of the European authorities to put in place coercive measures against countries which attempt, following the example of Bulgaria, Croatia, Hungary, Slovakia, Poland, to block the Court’s case-law European Union of Human Rights or the Court of Justice of the European Union by including the prohibition of same-sex marriage in their Constitution. European courts have so far refused to force countries to comply with laws protecting LGBT people and their right to equality, so they must now speak out against discriminatory measures against the LGBT community within the European Union.
1. D’après l’Eurobaromètre, ILGA Europe, près de 31,6 % de la population polonaise se trouve dans les collectivités ayant voté ce texte.
Sources
CHASTAND Jean-Baptiste, IWANIUK Jakub, HIVERT Anne-Françoise, « En Europe de l’Est, la guerre du genre est déclarée », 21 février 2020, Le Monde, disponible sur : https://www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2020/02/21/europe-de-l-est-la-guerre-du-genre-est-declaree_6030359_3210.html
DIAMANT Jeff et GARDNER Scott, « In EU, there’s an East-West divide over religious minorities, gay marriage, national identity », 29 octobre 2018, Pew Research Center, disponible sur : https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/10/29/east-west-divide-within-the-eu-on-issues-including-minorities-gay-marriage-and-national-identity/
Étude demandée par la Commission européenne, Eurobarometer on Discrimination 2019 : The social acceptance of LGBTI people in the EU, National Data, 23 septembre 2019.
LIPKA Michael et MASCI David, « Where Europe stands on gay marriage and civil unions », 28 octobre 2019, Pew Research Center, disponible sur : https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/10/28/where-europe-stands-on-gay-marriage-and-civil-unions/
SLOOTMAECKERS Koen, Constructing EU Identity through LGBT Equality Promotion: Crises and Shifting Othering Processes in the EU Enlargement, Political Studies Review, Université de Londres, 2019.
To cite this article : Deborah Rouach , ” What do discriminations against the LGBT community reveal in Eastern Europe ? “, 06.03.2020, Gender in Geopolitics Institute.
References
| ↑1 | According to the Eurobarometre, ILGA Europe, nearly 31,6 % of Polish population lives in communities that voted this text. |
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