November 2021 - Page 3

The Center for Social Justice is Hosting the Third Queer Forum in a Row

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On November 11-12, 2021, the Center for Social Justice will host its third queer forum in a row. This year the main topic of the forum is “Crisis, post-crisis and prospects of queer emancipation in Georgia.” The first day of the Queer Forum was held on November 11 in the physical space, and on November 12, attendees can attend the event through ZOOM.

“This year’s Queer Forum provides an understandinf of the place queer bodies in post-crisis Georgia, the political manipulation of the disappearance and emergence of queer groups from public space, the persistence of queer groups’ trauma and how trauma and pain memory is transformed and should be transformed.”

The nature and forms of queer resistance practices – their benefit and harm, as well as the goals of the violent groups in conflict with them and the reasons for their emergence – will be discussed in the panel discussions. Discussing these issues should facilitate the development of alternative visions and strategies from dominant and disciplined activist practices.

The Queer Forum is a hybrid of academic and activist space that opens up a platform for critical discussion and multifaceted discussion. The Queer Forum aims to facilitate the creation of an alternative educational space and the mobilization of activist groups. Consequently, the conference can be especially valuable for groups and individuals interested in Queer and feminist politics, activism and the social sciences.

Speakers of Philosophy, Social Sciences and Gender Studies from Georgia and Eastern European countries participate in the 2-day cycle of public lectures on the Queer Forum.

Bozan Bilic works on LGBTQ activism, LGBTQ-affirmative psychotherapy, non-heterosexuality and gender variation in the post-Yugoslav space. Bojab Bilic is a researcher at the Faculty of Gender Studies, Philosophy and Education at the University of Vienna, and a Professor of Gender and Southeast European Social Movements at the University of Bologna, School of Political Science.

Andrea Peto is a historian and professor in the Department of Gender Studies at the Central European University (CEU) (Vienna, Austria). She is an affiliate researcher at the CEU Institute for Democracy in Budapest and a Doctor of Science from the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Her work on gender, politics, the Holocaust, and war has been translated into 23 languages. In 2018, she was awarded the ALLEA Madame de Stael Prize for Cultural Values. Peto is also an Honorary Doctor from the University of Sodertorn (Stockholm, Sweden). Notable among her recent works are: The Women of the Arrow Cross Party. Invisible Hungarian Perpetrators in the Second World War. Palgrave, Macmillan, 2020. Also, Forgotten Massacre: Budapest 1944. DeGruyter, 2021.

Source: Center for Social Justice

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Demna Gvasalia is the Winner of the CFDA Awards

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Georgian designer Demna Gvasalia is the winner of the most prestigious award in the world of fashion, the award of the American Fashion Designers Council. He became the winner in the category – International Designer of the Year for Women.

The CFDA Board was chaired by Tom Ford and, along with Demna, nominated in this category: Daniel Lee – Bottega Veneta, Raf Simmons and Miuccia Prada – Prada, Pierpaolo Piccolo – Valentino, Simon Jacmus – JACQUEMUS.

Demna Gvasalia is the creative director of Balenciaga and he received this award for the first time in 2017.

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Queer Life After the Stonewall Uprising – Paradise in New York in the 70’s

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On May 18, 1981, the New York Native, the only gay newspaper in New York, published an article on a deadly disease that would later be called AIDS. This article completely changed the life of the queer community in New York and began a multi-year battle with the disease that killed many queer people. But a few years before the virus spread, the 1969 Stonewall Uprising made the streets of New York look like a paradise, a new generation of queer people enjoying freedom, no longer needing to live in the shadows and constantly hiding.

The Stonewall Uprising not only had a positive impact on Queer society but also on art, making New York a mecca of art, culture and creativity. The streets were filled with happy and joyful people creating new currents of art, telling stories with new interpretations. Bars, clubs and parks were filled with the sounds of hip-hop, punk and disco. Artistic groups took over abandoned buildings and turned them into art galleries. Life was easier, creating art and saving oneself, the air was also charged differently. A new generation of artists freed art from captivity and took it out of white galleries to the streets where everyone could enjoy it.

Stanley Steller’s photographic lens retains unique shots from those years, and at the same time, the Brooklyn-born artist remembers well his childhood, the lives of queer people before the Stonewall Uprising of the 1950s and 1960s. He remembers the dark shadow that was on all the queer people, “At the age of 10, the media told me that I was horrible and I should feel lucky if someone decided not to kill me, once they understood my orientation. We almost did not exist. ” After Coming out, Steller decided to explore New York well and realized that the place of queer people was almost nowhere in town, and everything changed in the 1970s, he remembers the day when he felt it. Walking down the street with an older man, the world was full of love and romance and he realized that at last the dark time was a thing of the past.

The dark times and the hostile society took away a lot from Stanley Steller, but gave him the most precious thing – a passion for photography. The first camera the artist bought in 1976, “Some people get involved in sports, some do music, I wanted to take photos,” he wanted to use his photos to answer questions about what gay life means and where it is.

In the 1970s, while filming LGBT + people, he realized that he was living in a truly amazing time. “Christopher Street was a paradise,” he says. “Suddenly I realized that I was part of a great story. As soon as I started taking photos, I realized that I was saving the most remarkable time in the history of stoneware on my photoshoot.”

Stellar mainly portrayed the lives of queer people in the West Village, also referred to as the Eden period, the years of freedom – when everyone in New York had the opportunity to live their lives the way they wanted to. “I had a friend who opened a store in New York and called it ‘Now.’

The store did not work for a long time, but it was not the main thing, the main thing was that for the first time in history we felt that we could, we could be proud, we could turn on the light and tell people – come on! I am very lucky to have shared this degree of freedom, I am happy to have lived in that time. We are not Alexander the Great, nor the Michelangels, nor the Rock Hudson, we were ordinary children who rode in subway cars every day to find freedom, love, friendship, and people.

Source: Dazed

Photo: სტენლი სტელარი

Translation: ზურა აბაშიძე

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Harvey Milk – A Ship Named After a Gay Rights Activist in the United States Navy

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The U.S. Navy has named the ship after a gay rights activist, Harvey Milk. In the 1950s, due to his sexuality, Milk was forced to quit his job.

The ship Harvey Milk sailed off the coast of San Diego. The procession was attended by the Secretary of the Navy, Carlos del Toro, and Harvey Milk’s nephew, Stewart.

Harvey Milk is one of six ships named after U.S. civil rights activists. Among them are former chief judge Earl Warren and slain presidential candidate Robert Kennedy.

Harvey Milk was a lifeguard and lieutenant on a lifeboat, but in 1955, after a two-week interrogation about his sexuality, he was forced to quit his job. He later became one of the first openly gay politicians in the United States to be elected to the San Francisco Supervisory Board in 1977. In 1978, he was shot dead by Dan White, a former city overseer. They often had controversies over various issues.

At Harvey Milk’s launch ceremony, Del Toro said it was wrong for Milk to be forced to “hide a very important part of his life” while in the Navy.

“For a very long time, sailors like Lieutenant Milk were forced to stay in the shadows. Worse even, they were expelled from the Navy. This injustice is part of the history of our navy, but it is also remarkable that all those who continue to fight this injustice.” Said Del Toro.

Source: bbc.com

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Activism and the Fashion Industry at the Show Marking the 100th Anniversary of Gucci

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In Los Angeles, Gucci presented the fashion show “Love Parade” to mark the 100th anniversary of its existence. The parade on Hollywood Boulevard was dedicated to the mother of Gucci’s creative director Alessandro Michele, who worked in the film industry and, according to Michele, taught her to “worship beauty.”

For the show, parallel with his love for the classic world of Hollywood, Michele gave the boulevard the hint of a Greek temple, where celebrities appeared as mythological characters and modern idols. Among them were Jared Leto, Macaulay Calkin, Phoebe Bridgers and Canadian-born activist Janaya Future Khan.

Jared Leto

Macaulay Calkin

Phoebe Bridgers

Khan, who is gender nonconforming , co-founded Black Lives Matter Toronto and advocated for a campaign to achieve greater equality in fashion, partnering with Gucci-like brands to increase the diversity of shows.

When asked what was the significance of the speech at the fashion show with a binder, he said – “It is not just an impact on the fashion industry, it is an impact on the world. This is the scale for which we must all fight. In general, what social media and fashion do is a final the project. Buying binders for trans people and using them for a long time is an integral part of the transition, but we do not see this process. So I think it’s really wonderful to present a less visible category on one of the highest fashion scales. ”

Nowadays, fashion is gradually becoming more and more focused on diversity and inclusion. We recently saw Elliott Page at the Balenciaga Spring 2022 show, Domenic Jackson at the Mugler parade, and Ariel Nicholson, the first trans woman to hit the cover of American Vogue.

Eliot Page

Dominic Jackson

Ariel Nicholson

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Russian Rupaul’s Drag Race Without LGBTQ + Themes

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A few weeks ago, a show similar to Rupaul’s Drag Race appeared on Russian television. The name of the show is “Royal Cobras” and unlike in many other countries where contestants, show hosts, mentors and jury members talk about the problems and challenges of the LGBT + community, the Russian version refuses to talk about it, who created the Rupaul show and drag culture in general.

In the Russian version, like the American Rupaul’s Drag Race, you will meet Lip Sync contests, comedic sketches and fashionable, fantastic hats, but the show’s creator decided to turn his back on Russian LGBT + people and voicing their problems.

The show’s creator and Instagram influencer is Nastia Ivleva, also hosts the show. 36 Drag Queens take part in the show, the show consists of 7 episodes in each 6 Drag Queens compete with each other and the winner of it moves to the final episode and continues to fight for the victory. The winner of the show will receive 1,000,000 rubles. The introduction to the first episode of the show states that “the show is not aimed at promoting non-traditional sexual attitudes.”

In an interview with The Moscow Times, Nikita Andrianov, an LGBT + activist, said that the Russian versions of the Rupoli drag race was not designed to empower LGBT + people, as the show nowhere mentions that drag culture and similar shows were created by LGBT + people.

Criticism has also surfaced around the show’s creator, Nastya Ivleeva, who is heterosexual and around whom the show’s drama is set. Blogger, model and influencer Nikita Hi says in an interview with one of the Russian publications that although Ivleva has been working with Russian Drag Queens for a long time, it still does not justify the fact that the central figure in the show is Nastia and the jury is made up of heterosexuals who have no qualifications.

According to the activist, the show is a superficial display of drag culture and heterosexual people are trying to take away what queer people have been working on for many years.

Rupaul’s Drag Race is an American reality show co-created and hosted by Rupaul. The show features up to 15 drag queens each season, with participants competing in a variety of competitions in each episode, with viewers watching 13 seasons of the show to date. A similar show has been set up in various countries, including Canada, the United Kingdom, Thailand, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Spain, Italy, and Brazil. The show plays a huge role in strengthening the queer community and developing a culture of drag.

Watch the first episode of the Russian “Royal Cobras”:

 

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There will be a Film Adaptation of Tamta Melashvili’s “Blackbird, Blackbird Blackberry”

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There will be a Film Adaptation of Tamta Melashvili’s “Blackbird, Blackbird Blackberry”, according to the weekly American magazine Variety.

Georgian director Elene Naveriani will work on the film, who has already done two full-length films “Wet Sand” and “I am a drop of sunshine on the earth.” On the screenplay, along with Elene Naverian, worked Nicholas Mdivani.

As Elene Naverian told Variety, after reading Tamta Melashvili’s book, she realized how powerful it would be to see the book on the screen. The director also says that “Eter carries a revolutionary message in her body that every body deserves love and is beautiful no matter what… Eter is a feminist in nature, without knowing it.”

Tamta Melashvili’s third novel was published in 2021 and we read in its annotation: “A middle-aged, lonely woman lives in a small town and works in her own shop. Her monotonous, restless life seems to be threatened by nothing, but one day, a sudden incident happens and her orderly life is turned upside down. The woman, terrified of death, makes a decision that she would not dare to do at any other time and embark on an unexpected love adventure. ”

Tamta Melashvili is a modern Georgian author, has written three novels, “Calculation”, “East” and “Blackberry Blackberry”. Her books have been translated into German, Russian, Croatian, Albanian and Macedonian.

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Queer Love, Dance Floor and Euthanasia – 10 New LGBTQ+ Movies

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The year 2020 was a very difficult year for the independent cinema. 2 years after the Covid Pandemic has started, we’ve got a number of closed movie theaters, stopped production and the rise of online streaming services.

 

However, despite all this, quite a few LGBTQ+ themed movies were produced in the last 2 years. Here are 10 films that portray various LGBTQ+ issues:

 

Maschile singolare (2021) Italy

Maschile singolare is a 2021 film by Italian directors Alessandro Guida and Mateo Pilat. It tells a story of a young gay man, Antonio, who decides to start a new life after divorcing his husband, Lorenco.

The movie beautifully portrays relationship difficulties and asks a question once again: Is it okay to give up one’s own future and independence for a marriage?

 

Firebird (2020), Estonia, UK

Firebird is another queer movie that premiered this spring, that tells a story of forbidden love. Sergey and Roman are soldiers in the USSR army during the cold war, as they develop feelings toward each other.

The main role in the melodrama is played by Tom Prior, with some unforgettable scenes. The film has received some positive reviews from the film critics.

 

My First Summer (2020) Australia

My First Summer is a 2020 film of coming of age genre, that tells a story of 2 adolescent girls that fall in love. 16-year-old Claudia that is brought up away from the outside world is going through a tough time. Her mother has passed away and she is trying to deal with the loss. Everything changes after she meets Grace.

 

Well Rounded (2020) Canada

Well Rounded is a 61-minute documentary, the creator and director of which is a Canadian comedian Candy Palmater. The documentary tells stories about LGBTQ+ people that apart from homophobia are dealing with racism and aggressive attitudes toward overweight people. The stories told in the documentary are horrible at first glance, but at the same time, telling these stories out loud is revolutionary, liberating, radical, and will inevitably bring positive results in the future.

 

Cured (2021) America

1950ies and 1960ies were extremely difficult times for the American and non-American queer society. During this time being a LGBTQ+ community member meant that a person could lose their job, be exiled from the society and at worst – have to go through the shock treatment.

 

Cured is a documentary in which gender researchers, activists and historians discuss these decades. Despite this, the movie shows some unique footage that has never been accessible to the public before and stories of the people that fought for the freedom of the queer community at those times.

 

Cowboys (2021) America

Cowboys is another by the director Anna Kerrigan. It’s about one American family, the father of which is trying to protect his transgender child both from the world that is not friendly with such people and from the mother, who finds it difficult to accept her little boy.

 

In this cliché-free movie, besides remarkable acting, we see beautiful landscapes of montana, and such topics as: mental health, the problems of young transgender individuals and the process of acceptance in families.

 

Where Love Lives (2021) UK 

Where Love Lives is another documentary that tells us the history of the legendary club Glitterbox, the dance floor and the meaning of those queer places that are a safe haven for the LGBTQ+ individuals.

 

In this movie, the pioneers of the dance floor and DJs – Honey Dijon, TeTe Bang, Lucy Fizz da Jellybean tell us about their experience. We also see the actor of Pose, Bill Porter, who says that the only thing that saved his life was the dance floor.

 

The Dose (La Daosis) (2020) – Spain

The Dose is an Argentine thriller released in 2020. The action in the film takes place in the palliative department and the main character is Marcos, a night shift caretaker who secretly helps sick patients with euthanasia. The action in the homoerotic mystical thriller intensifies after young Gabriel starts working in the clinic, who is categorically against euthanasia and towards whom Marcos experiences conflicting feelings.

 

Kiss Me Before It Blows Up (Kiss Me Kosher) (2020) Germany, Israel

Kiss Me Before It Blows Up ისრაელი რეჟისორის, შირელ პელეგის 2020 წლის ფილმია, რომელიც გენდერის, რელიგიის, რასისა და ქვიარ სიყვარულის საინტერესო გადააზრებას გვთავაზობს. ფილმში მოქმედება თელ-ავივში მიმდინარეობს, ბარის მეპატრონე შირა გადაწყვეტს, რომ თავის ებრაულ ოჯახს გააცნოს გერმანელი საცოლე, მარია, რაც ოჯახის წევრებს შორის კონფლიქტს იწვევს და ქორწინების მართებულობას ეჭვქვეშ აყენებს.

Sweetheart (2021) UK 

One of the highlights of the Glasgow Film Festival is the comedy Sweetheart coming of age, which tells the story of 17-year-old AJ who does not want to spend a vacation with her family at the beach, where there is no Wi-Fi and no entertainment for the weird 17-year-old AJ.

AJ is doomed to spend days with her family in boredom, however everything changes after the girl meets Isla and she develops some romantic feelings towards her.

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If I Could Change the Past, Instead of 21, I would Come Out at 16-17 – Yuval Noach Harari

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Israeli-born Harari, 45, received his doctorate from Oxford University. He is the author of bestsellers: Sapiens – A Short History of Mankind; Homo Deus – A Brief History of Tomorrow; 21 lessons for the 21st century; Sapiens – Graphic History, Volume I. Next week his next book, Sapiens – Graphic History Volume II, Pillars of Civilizations will be published. Harari lives with his husband near Tel Aviv and gives history lectures at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Photograph: Jonas Holthaus/Laif/Camera Press

When were you happiest?

Now. My expectations are more tailored to reality than they were 20 or 10 years ago.

What is your biggest fear?

We will destroy humanity in such a way that we can not even comprehend what we have lost.

What are your earliest memories?

My earliest recollection of history is the First Lebanon War and the Falkland War. I was six years old then. I remember watching the sinking of the ship HMS Sheffield on TV, which made a big impression on me.

Which living person do you admire and why?

On a personal level, my friend who is a single mother raising two children in this Covid era is a real hero. From the historical persona, Mikhail Gorbachev, who, I think, saved the world from World War III.

A character trait that you do not like in yourself.

All properties have positive and negative potential, the main thing is to learn how to use it. For example, anger and justice are one and the same – get angry or seek justice.

What is the most valuable thing you own?

My body.

Describe yourself in three words.

I think I can not describe anyone in three words.

What would be your superpower?

I can see things as they really are.

What do you dislike most about your appearance?

I find it hard to smile, especially if I am asked. I’m a little tired of all the photos.

Can you pick any lost item to revive what would you choose?

I would save the coral reefs, they have not disappeared yet, though it seems that they will.

What is your worst habit?

I think I do not express enough gratitude to the people around me, however, I think they already know how I appreciate them.

What scares you in old age?

Loss of mental capacity.

A book that you have not read and are ashamed of.

None. I do not think you must read any book.

Who did you want to be when you were growing up?

Someone who is loved.

The worst thing that was ever told to you.

I spent years meditating to get rid of such things. I think I succeeded.

What is it that makes you happy and makes you feel guilty about it?

I do not feel guilty about pleasure.

What do you owe your parents?

Many thanks. They were always with me. Sometimes they did not know how to help me, or what to do, but they always did their best, even when I was young and I did a lot of stupid things in front of them.

What or who is the biggest love of your life?

My husband, Itzik. Although we are both from the same small town in Israel, we met each other 20 years ago on one of the dating sites. We got married in 2010 in Toronto.

Your worst job.

When I was 16, I used to work in a factory during the summer holidays, where industrial valves were made. I was a manufacturer of industrial valves which is much worse than a historian.

The biggest disappointment.

I still can not understand what life is. When I was young, I thought I would at least find someone who understood this. I am already 45 years old and there is a great chance that I will never meet such a person.

If you could change the past, what would you change?

I would have come out at the age of 16-17 and not – 21.

When was the last time you cried and why?

A few years ago, my dog ​​died. We were vacationing in Greece, he had left us with a friend and was bitten by a snake. We went back, though we were late.

When was the last time you changed your mind about something very important?

This year, about Covid. With regard to key issues, I believe in the need for global cooperation, watching the world realize last year that it is much, much more difficult than I thought. Maybe even impossible.

When were you closest to death?

I was 13 years old when the bus almost took hit me. Also during the Gulf War in 1991, an Iraqi rocket landed near my house.

The most important lesson that life has taught you.

That everything changes, people are never satisfied and all identities are fiction.

What happens when we die?

I wrote quite a lot about it. I think consciousness is not a solid thing, but we have a feeling that it is the same as it was a minute ago, a day or a year ago, but in reality, it is not at all clear what connects this minute consciousness with the consciousness of the future. If we could understand this, we would also understand what happens when we die. Of course, I do not understand this, so I do not know.

Tell us the secret…

The people who run the world do not understand this.

Source: theguardian.com

Photo on main: Photograph: Antonio Olmos for the Observer New Review

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Matasi Vashakidze’s Fight for Happiness

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I am Matasi Vashakidze, 32 years old, caring, fair and non-conflict loving person

Inadmissibility of Oneself.

I had a very good childhood. Yes, it was the dark 90s, a bad period for the country, but I still remember it well – in the summer, with my sister and cousin, I was out all day, playing …

Understanding that I was not a hetero woman was the hardest part for me. I think everyone except me realized this, I was the last one because I had so much locked in my brain and it all seemed so unacceptable to me, I even admitted nothing to myself. The first time I liked a girl, I was at school. At the level of feelings, it did not seem strange to me and I thought it was just friendship. Until the age of 19-20, I did not even say to myself that I liked girls. I did not meet guys and I almost never talked about them,  I did not talk at all. I also had relationship experience just because everyone had a boyfriend and I thought because everyone had, I had to as well.

During my life in Georgia, I did not have relations with any member of the community, with any organization, I did not know anyone. Probably because of my fears. Nor did I experience oppression because of my orientation, no one knew.

Leaving Georgia and Coming out

I have been away from Georgia for 4 years now and I live in Spain. The main reason why I decided to leave was homophobia, even though I did not come out during my life in Georgia and I did not tell anyone about myself at all. I was afraid of Coming out – I was afraid that my family would break their ties with me, I would lose my job… At the same time, my job was related to the university, I was working at the university and it was a common stereotype that “young people are being perverted” and so on. It would create problems for me. I do not know exactly how but it would.

What is your biggest fear when Coming out? Probably that they will say – that’s unfortunate, i don’t want to be in contact with you anymore. This is why this process is so stressful. You still have the option to be told that. Maybe you will even get a worse answer.

A year after arriving in Spain, I started Coming out and now I do with almost everyone. It was very difficult for me, I did it with different people almost every day and it was very stressful for me, I was full of emotions. For example, I wrote to my mother – I did not have the courage to call me and say so. At first, she did not write anything for a few seconds, then she sent me voice messages, you do not have to worry, come and I will solve everything. She thought I needed something, but did not offer to go to a psychologist. She was confused, it was very difficult, she could not understand what was happening, but the passage of time helped her. Today I have a normal relationship with my mother and family in general.

Reactions were different – from friends, some told me they already knew. There were also negative reactions, I lost a few relatives – I was directly told that “society in Georgia is not ready for this and what are we going to do.” I also lost a friend, it turned out to be so unacceptable of me, It turned out as if the person is only sexual orientation. I also had cases when I was told that yes, tolerance, something, something … and the next day, they shared conspiracies about Pride on Facebook, why they should not allow Pride, etc. I try to get rid of such people, I do not need anything from them.

When I remember my emotions at that time, I was heartbroken. It turns out that as a human being, I did not exist for them, my qualities, positive or negative, meant nothing and the only thing that mattered was that I liked girls.

Living in Spain and Getting Married

Spain is today one of the most tolerant countries towards the LGBT community, and the legislation is the least discriminatory. I am not saying that it is not discriminatory, because there is still a difference in some issues, for example, when you want to have a child and you are going to use artificial insemination with the help of a clinic, they don’t ask heterosexual couples to be married they ask us though. People’s attitude towards queer people is basically very ordinary, nobody cares, nobody cares, nobody cares – no one will hate you for it and no one will fall in love with you for it.

My wife and I met each other three years ago on one of the dating sites, then we fell in love and soon moved in together. Two years later we decided to get married precisely because of the baby, we wanted to have a child and it would all be formally easier.

 

 

 

 

 

We got married, then we started going to the clinic, we had several unsuccessful attempts, but thanks to science, we will soon have a little one. We were together in Georgia and my family knows her, they accepted her normally. Now my mother is also looking forward to her granddaughter.

 

 

 

“The day will come in Georgia when we will hold the pride without any problems”

The more I know about the history of Spain in this regard, the more I hope that the same will happen in Georgia. About 50 years ago, the situation was similar here legally, in terms of people’s mentality, but it has changed, and since it has changed here, I think it will gradually become possible in Georgia as well.

I think the biggest role in this should be played by the state, first of all, the law should give us equality. Sex education is necessary in schools, children can not have no idea about it, and in sex education it is very easy to talk about LGBT issues, that the relationship of queer people is normal, they can also have sex, sex does not happen only between men and women.

I think it is very important to hold Pride – for the public to see that we exist, that we are ordinary people and that we too often fall victim to stereotypes. They think we are senders, aliens, we are not Georgians … It is also important for the next generation to see that they are not alone. I know how hard it is when you know none of the community members, you feel very alone and you are excluded from everyone.

Pride helps to slowly change public opinion. If we wait until the society changes its mind, it will not happen by itself, it should happen with such events, get used to it and no longer get annoyed. Once, I am sure, there will come a day in Georgia when we will be able to hold a Pride in the street without any problems.

Obstacles of `Queer Women

In terms of equality, Georgia is in a very bad state. Even in the sense that the wages of women and men differ in the same positions. I myself had the feeling that I would go much further in my career if I were a man – I saw guys who did almost nothing and worked in higher positions.

As for the problems of queer women, for example, now I have such an obstacle – when I come to Georgia, Georgia will not recognize my marriage, we will have a child soon and I do not know who will be considered a mother, me or my wife. We even write both parents on the birth certificate, but I do not count in that legislation as a mother because I do not have a child. It turns out that my parents are not considered grandparents either. That is, if I bring a child to Georgia alone and a problem arises, I may not even be allowed into the hospital.

Also, queer women living in Georgia have a security problem, after the recent events, homophobia is in its heyday, and considering that, I would probably be very scared.

Damage

I look at it from today’s perspective, if you do not have freedom when you are who you are, you are the same as the dead. Now I would prefer to be killed, even by Pride raiders, than lie. Since I got out of there, I will never go back. It really is suffering and torture.

 

When I came out to my sister, after a while she told me I thought you were boring and it turns out you were depressed, I was so locked in myself. Imagine my sister, whom I have known all my life, thought i was a lifeless wagon. It is very difficult when I played  with everyone, nothing made me happy, I realized that I was living a lie and leading a double life. When I got here, I was so stressed, even though I could see and know that people here had no problem with it, I still managed to Come out. I was scared here too and said nothing. It took me about a year to get out of the situation.

Never lose hope

I want to tell the queers not to lose hope. I could never have imagined that i could come out, but I did and I felt what human life is like. Definitely have to look for ways how they can be released. Most importantly, be in harmony with yourself, if you deceive yourself, it will be very difficult, be happy.

Some choose to stay in Georgia, and this is a great deal of courage and bravery, especially if they have come out – they are in danger, they still do not give up and stay. Queer people have to fight everywhere, the difference is that in some places this fight is for direct survival, as, for example, in Georgia, and in some places – it is for equality.

First of all, they should change their environment least for a while, to see how much difference it is between a normal environment and what they have. If they can do that, I think no one can bring them back. “Returning” does not mean returning to Georgia, I mean returning to the same situation where they were before.

The interview was prepared with the support of the Women in Georgia Foundation (WFG)

Author: Nino Urushadze

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