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Bread. 13 June 2008
Rainbow rising in the Western sky
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Why? There is Europe and there is Europe. While virtually all of Western Europe has become accepting of gay people, the countries of the ex-Soviet bloc remain quite homophobic. Many of their citizens, having grown up in the communist era when conformity was prized, find diversity to be unsettling. Pockets of economic distress also bring out xenophobic behaviour, when those who feel disadvantaged by the new, liberalised economy take to bashing lesbians and gays. Picking on a disadvantaged group whom they can bully is a form of psychological compensation for the inferiority they feel day in day out. Hence, unlike Gay Pride marches in Western capitals which have become flamboyant celebrations, those east of the former iron curtain don't have the luxury to be just pure fun. First of all, there are very basic issues to protest about. Secondly, the numbers of gays and lesbians brave enough to come out of the closet and march are small and the threat of being physically attacked by anti-gay groups is real. Police often stand by and do nothing. In previous years, anti-gay groups have disrupted the tiny gay pride parades in Riga, throwing bags of excrement at the marchers. This year, as a gesture of solidarity, the UK government instructed its embassy there to raise the rainbow flag on Pride Day.
A week later, the same flag was shipped to Warsaw where it flew again at the British embassy to mark Poland's Pride Day. The Polish government is also homophobic, most notably for its witch-hunt of gay teachers. (Now, doesn't that sound familiar?) In May, the UK Foreign Office (that's the equivalent of the Foreign Ministry) told all 261 embassies, high commissions and other diplomatic posts to add to their regular tasks the monitoring of gay equality in the countries where they operate. An instruction "toolkit" was sent out to diplomatic missions with information on the official British policy on gay rights, and instructions in how to "provide added value to equality and non-discrimination work." "Governments have an obligation to promote equality in the enjoyment of human rights, as well as not to discriminate in their application," the document states. "Frequently there is discrimination in the enjoyment of key rights, even in countries where the criminal laws are neutral. Tackling this would require the building up of local coalitions of non-state actors to elaborate action plans for each country, as well as working locally with like-minded states. This would not just apply to issues like the state of the criminal law, but also to freedom of association and assembly, freedom of expression and privacy." No doubt, countries like Singapore would fume at this "interference" in domestic affairs, asserting the exclusive right to have whatever laws and policies a government sees fits for its own people. But frankly, this is a dated concept. The world does not stop at a country's borders. A new sense of interconnected humanity has emerged. If we welcome the world's attention and aid when people are starving to death in far off places due to natural disasters or misgovernance, so by the same token, we cannot say "you should not care" when it comes to other examples of people being discriminated against. 'Tis the season for gay pride parades. Some of them are truly huge, and it's been interesting watching how our main English newspaper, the Straits Times, deals with these stories. In past years, it's been very simple: Do not carry the stories.
This year, however, I have noticed a slightly different approach. Stories from news agencies are carried in the online version under "latest news", but not repeated in the following day's print edition. I suppose the pressure of digital media is one reason for that. If news about Gay Pride is all over other news portals, it would be too glaring an omission if the Straits Times didn't carry it either. But why not the print edition then? Most likely an editorial judgement is made that these stories are not newsworthy enough to justify finite print space, but I'm sure there are also political considerations. One possibility is that the editors and their political masters might want to make the distinction between the elite who read cybernews and are "intelligent" enough not to be "influenced" by the "western liberal" ideas found there, and the "heartlanders" who read the print newspapers who either don't want to see such news or aren't able to cope with such mind-bending ideas. This is of course an extremely condescending way of looking at people, but given the track record of our government, such an attitude is entirely in character. Another possibility is that the top honchos consider the print edition as somehow more authoritative than an online version, and that if readers should see news stories about gay parades in print, then they would think the government is "endorsing" such a thing. It always amuses me how such a conception of media reveals three things: (1) the rather archaic idea that a physical thing has more "meaning" than a virtual object, (2) how in a sense, the government and its media affiliates are believing their own propaganda that digital speak is irresponsible, so it's fine if stuff like pride parades are relegated to the online version of the Straits Times, and (3) how newspapers are meant to be authoritative. The third observation is particularly curious to me because I sense in it a contradiction between two different meanings of "authoritative". One is to signify that which is authorised, in this case, by the government. The other is to mean that which is of good reputation. It's intellectual laziness to confuse the
two, yet we see it every day. If the newspaper chooses not to carry
stories about Pride parades lest it be seen as endorsement -- i.e. going
by the first meaning of being "authoritative" -- then
the sheer selectivity of news that must necessarily result undercuts its
attempt to be anything like the second meaning of
"authoritative" -- a reliable, trustworthy and comprehensive source of
information.
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Footnotes None Addenda None
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This is a photo of the British embassy in Riga, Latvia. As you can see, it
is flying a rainbow flag, a universal symbol of gay equality.
