10 of Europe’s bt statns for LGBTQ+ travellers this Pri season | Gay and lbian travel | The Guardian

Contents:

• EASTERN EUROPE WAS ONCE A WORLD LEAR ON GAY RIGHTS. THEN RAN OUT OF SPEGOATS
• THE 15 WORST UNTRI TO BE GAY EUROPE
• TIPS FOR GAY AND LBIAN TRAVELERS EASTERN EUROPE
• 9 MOST GAY-FRIENDLY COUNTRI IN EUROPE
• GAY RIGHTS EASTERN EUROPE: A NEW BATTLEGROUND FOR RSIA AND THE WT
• THE EASTERN EUROPEAN GAY RIGHTS MOVEMENT IS STGGLG TO BE MORE THAN A WTERN CSE
• LATVIA BE 7TH NATN TO BE LED BY AN OPENLY GAY HEAD OF STATE
• WHAT HAPPENED WHEN FOUR GAY GUYS FROM TEL AVIV TOOK A VATN TO DUBAI
• ONE INTERRACIAL GAY COUPLE TRI TO TRAVEL FEARLSLY — AND SOMETIM FDS ACCEPTANCE SURPRISG PLAC
• WHERE EUROPE STANDS ON GAY MARRIAGE AND CIVIL UNNS
• ROMANIAN ORTHODOX 'PRITS' STRIP OFF FOR GAY LENDAR THEY SAY WILL BRG 'HOPE, JOY AND FORT'
• ANTI-GAY HATE ON THE RISE PARTS OF EUROPE, REPORT FDS
• WHH IS THE BT EASTERN EUROPE UNTRY FOR GAY MEN AND THE MOST TOLERANT?

EASTERN EUROPE WAS ONCE A WORLD LEAR ON GAY RIGHTS. THEN RAN OUT OF SPEGOATS

Low pots of the year clud an attack on a LGBT muny center the Bulgarian pal, Sofia, led by a far-right lear who ran the untry's printial electn; a new law Hungary banng rmatn schools emed to promote homosexualy and genr change; and several so-lled "LGBT-iology ee zon" ntued to operate Poland. In Fe Dead Girls Iva and Marija move to an apartment buildg that is home to a rogu' gallery of characters: a war veteran sufferg om post-trmatic strs, a prostute paid to break up the uple by a prit who is one girl's father, a homophobic gon of an apartment manager, and her son, a slacker mama's boy who rap one of the pair to prove his masculy. The top 15 worst untri to be gay EuropeShow all 15The most LGBTI-iendly European natns were Malta, Belgium and the four years at the top of the Rabow Europe list, the UK has fallen to third, a year after movg down to ILGA's Rabow Europe list is an annual review of 49 European untri, ranked on a sle between 0 per cent (untri wh gross vlatns of human rights and discrimatn) and 100 per cent (untri which show rpect of human rights and full equaly)'s the most ridiculo thg you've been asked about LGBT relatnships?

The followg travel guis are available at many bookstor, or you n orr them om any onle bookseller: Frommer's Gay & Lbian Europe (), an excellent travel rource to the top European ci and rorts; Spartac Internatnal Gay Gui (Bno Gmünr Verlag;) and Odysss: The Internatnal Gay Travel Planner (Odysss Enterpris, Ltd. 'Authentilly myself'Ray said he had also stggled growg up gay the 1970s and 80s England, which was "tough" said his relig school "dmmed to you, 'you are gog to hell'" Adam returned home to Sdi Arabia, spe beg more than 3, 000 apart and later rtricted by the Covid-19 panmic, they kept touch daily and the romance years ago, Ray proposed on a vio ll and after succsfully applyg for a UK fiancé visa, Adam moved to Manchter December 2022.

THE 15 WORST UNTRI TO BE GAY EUROPE

Adam said he had been aaid to even wear lours his home untry so the first thg he did when he moved was start to "grow my mullet, got my ears pierced and booked appotments for tattoos" relled how, ntrast, one of his gay iends Sdi had been forced to marry a woman, addg: "It has ed not only his life but the life of his wife.

It’s one of only five untri to make queer rights equal at a nstutnal level and holds first place on ILGA-Europe’s Rabow Europe Inx, which ranks untri on LGBTQ+ my last vis, a gay gui showed me round the wdg medieval streets of Valletta and Rabat, potg out sential bars and rtrants om Michel-starred Noni to the Monaliza Lounge drag bar, as well as the nightclub Michelangelo lively Paceville. This spir filters down to Dubl’s many LGBTQ-iendly tablishments: two personal favour are iendly bnch spot Social Fabric Café Stoneybatter, one of the cy’s most tertg neighbourhoods, and Street 66 bar, a eful cktail spot before a night at inic LGBTQ+ stutn The southsi is gay-owned Gutter Bookshop (named after the famo Osr Wil quote), and the weekly “big gay dis” Sunday Social at Farrier & Draper; or cross the river for the Outhoe LGBTQ+ muny rource fe on Capel Street and PantiBar, owned by drag queen, activist and performer Panti Bliss. Start wh bibimbap at the thoroughfare’s Korean rtrant Topokki before drks at Missg, Siwalk or lbian bar The Fox and dancg at the legendary Nightgale Club, the olst gay club the cy, datg back to summer’s hot LGBTQ+ event is Fierce’s Healg Garns of Bab (27 June - 17 July): part of Birmgham 2022 Ftival, ’s an artistic rponse to this summer’s Commonwealth Gam, celebratg “what the Brish Empire tried (and failed) to stamp out”.

TIPS FOR GAY AND LBIAN TRAVELERS EASTERN EUROPE

Mykonos’s rep as queer heaven dat back to the 1970s, when Jackie Onassis beme a regular visor (she first vised 1961), before blossomed as gay rort the 1980s, wh acmodatn sprgg up for the largely male 2022, you n hang out at tablished hotspots Jackie O, bar Porta or Kastro’s, and stay at the Super Paradise (doubl om £249), handy for the island’s ma LGBTQ+ beach. Now you n take a tour of where thor Too Laaksonen lived his whole adult life, passg the Kansalaistori (People’s Square) ont of parliament, once a clanste meetg pot for gay karaoke fans should check out Mann’s Street, a boozy stutn; other fun spots are Street Pri the Kamppi district, and Kvääristö, a jot for queer women, transgenr, and non-bary people. The plot and the Boss character's personaly take tertg turns which balance the subdued portrayals of Daniel and Marek/ an olr gay man who me out at 17 on a htler strip of an Amerin cy the 1960s bee I uld not get to bars, I was imprsed by how some thgs really haven't changed spe the progrs veloped natns for middle class and wealthy gay men.

Sce this is (fortunately) unlikely wh the more liberated gay generatn of today, they project this fantasy on poor 'Eastern Boys' n be tertg for straight dienc, then bee shows how superficial gay men n be, and that stereotyp our muny n be jt as pervasive and mean as those women are often subjected to. The technil aspects are all fe, and plement the narrative as they should, never tractg om the tale beg told, never llg attentn to themselv, which is the way should be - plot over everythg else, substance over style, and so performanc are also uniformly good, wh the bulk of the rponsibili shoulred by the ma protagonist played by Olivier Rabourd (many many creds, cludg the 'Taken' anchise, Ma mère, Rois et Ree, 13 Tzameti, Crime d'amour, Midnight Paris, L Lyonnais, Grace of Mona), who looks and acts like Kev Spacey (whout the shows that he's beg more famo for nowadays) 'David Gale' mo, and that's nice to an asi, a screeng as a part of, I got to see actual homophobia (no surprise actually, nsirg the mentaly of most of this generatn even, but beg faced wh was another thg altogether). The Kreml has seized the openg, warng s former satelle stat that if they align wh nt Europe, moral llapse will soon ’s arguments have taken hold Ukrae, Geia and other untri outsi the European Unn’s high walls, where pro-Wtern lears have risted European mands for tolerance of gays and lbians.

9 MOST GAY-FRIENDLY COUNTRI IN EUROPE

Gay rights anizers Geia lled off public events after a 2013 march Tbilisi was bet by Orthodox prits wieldg stools and stgg Latvia, which long ago ma a firm choice to steer away om s old Kreml overlords, tolerance of gays and lbians has creased markedly the 11 years sce joed the European Unn. Calyn Jenner’s very public transn om her old life as Bce, meanwhile, has thrown a spotlight on transgenr issu and toward acceptanceIn Latvia 2005, hundreds of fur anti-gay unterprotters poured to Riga’s bbltone streets on a July afternoon so drizzly that when they tried to burn a rabow flag, they had trouble gettg to igne. A new generatn has e of age wh ltle or no memory of the Soviet era, when homosexualy was the lm followg the foreign mister's g out on Twter, "people realized there wasn't this groundswell of homophobia society, " said Pls Rdseps, a lumnist for Latvia's Ir this year’s para, fai rried a rabow of balloons unrneath the watchful rved fac on the buildgs Riga’s Art Nouve quarter.

GAY RIGHTS EASTERN EUROPE: A NEW BATTLEGROUND FOR RSIA AND THE WT

But bee of hundreds of years of occupatn, s own history of fascism, and a newly powerful church, the new Latvia was eply natnalist and xenophobic, and spic of what they regard as outsi forc—homosexuals chief among 2003, Latvia held a referendum on the qutn of jog the European Unn as part of the group's expansn to clu many stat om the former Eastern Bloc the followg year. While gay rights have rapidly ma advanc Wtern Europe the past , Eastern Europe has lagged behd, feelg the pull of s reactnary natnalist movements and Rsia's outwardly homophobic groups succsfully lobbied to brg EuroPri, an annual weeklong celebratn of Europe's LGBT muny, to Riga—the first time s 24-year history that would be held a post-Soviet natn that shared a borr wh Rsia.

They were helped by the arrival of Stt Lively, an Amerin Evangelil famo for promotg Uganda's "Kill the Gays" law, who teamed up wh a lol church to warn Latvians about Wtern filtrators spreadg a gospel of 2006, Mozaīka petned to have a send march unr the more nocuo name of Friendship Days. Of urse, there were also the almost nightly parti, cludg two that would last until the early hours of Saturday's major event: the Pri Para, which, no matter how many LGBT lols or unter-protters turned up, was sure to be the biggt Pri para Baltic addn to brgg EuroPri to Riga, Mozaīka had been pursug a legal and social mpaign to make gay rights a realy Latvia. Mozaīka's volunteers always enurage the woman to e vis them at their office, but she mak sure to get so plastered that if she did for a moment lose her md and give to the urge to e, she'd be too dnk to I me to Latvia, I put a iend of me to work on the gay workg se to fd me some Latvian men to terview.

THE EASTERN EUROPEAN GAY RIGHTS MOVEMENT IS STGGLG TO BE MORE THAN A WTERN CSE

But a regn where participatg Pri is sometim crimal (at this year's unofficial Mosw Pri, at least ten marchers were arrted, cludg two anizers who had to serve ten-day jail sentenc), gay people g together to say "we exist, " any formatn, remas arrivg for EuroPri, the last time I had been Riga was 2008, to vis my grandparents. ”Xavier Bettel Prime Mister of Luxembourg (2013-prent)Luxembourg Prime Mister Xavier Bettel at a news nference Belgra, Serbia, on July Vojovic / APBettel was first elected prime mister of Luxembourg 2013, and 2018 he beme the first openly gay prime mister the world to be re-elected for a send marriage beme legal Luxembourg 2015, and the same year Bettel beme the first servg European Unn lear to marry a same-sex partner, the BBC recently cricized a Hungarian law that bans school tnal materials and TV shows for people unr 18 that are emed to promote LGBTQ ntent, Rters reported. There are more than 60 untri wh laws that crimalise same-sex sexual acts acrdg to the Internatnal Lbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Associatn, cludg Sdi Arabia.'Authentilly myself'Ray said he had also stggled growg up gay the 1970s and 80s England, which was "tough".He said his relig school "dmmed to you, 'you are gog to hell'".When Adam returned home to Sdi Arabia, spe beg more than 3,000 apart and later rtricted by the Covid-19 panmic, they kept touch daily and the romance blossomed.Three years ago, Ray proposed on a vio ll and after succsfully applyg for a UK fiancé visa, Adam moved to Manchter December 2022.

LATVIA BE 7TH NATN TO BE LED BY AN OPENLY GAY HEAD OF STATE

Adam said he had been aaid to even wear lours his home untry so the first thg he did when he moved was start to "grow my mullet, got my ears pierced and booked appotments for tattoos".He relled how, ntrast, one of his gay iends Sdi had been forced to marry a woman, addg: "It has ed not only his life but the life of his wife."Danny Beard on Same Sex Love and MarriageDanny explor same-sex weddgs, fdg out why upl chose to get married, the challeng unrpng this cisn and what mak the wedd relatnships work.The uple said they now wanted to help people who were not as ee and strive for "equaly for everyone"."Now I'm here a safe place I want to fight for others to be able to marry who they want," Adam said."I'm so lucky but I want everyone else Sdi to marry the one they love whout facg discrimatn and persecutn." Image source, Fay photographImage ptn, Peter McGrah and David Cabreza say they are "very proud" to have been the first same-sex uple married EnglandMore than 40,000 same-sex marriag took place between 2014 and 2020, acrdg to the Office for Natnal StatisticsPeter McGrah and David Cabreza, origally om Stland and the US, ma history when they beme the first same-sex uple to marry England on 29 March 2014.The trailblazers married jt after midnight at Islgton Town Hall.

’Mr Vaz, who famoly weled Romanian arrivals at Luton airport when the EU expand 2014, asked to see pictur of the rt who has failed to show MP then suggted g the mobile phone app Grdr to fd someone search for gay men nearby, g mobile phon’ GPS data, and Mr Vaz wanted to know if there were any other ers the same block as his apartment. In fact, on a lol island, we had the oppose experience om anonymo Europeans exclaimg their disgt, or beg heterosexualized and name-flipped by the management: a ncierge a hijab very sweetly asked if we were together, sed when we told her that we were, and treated like the other guts at the hotel — some of whom were also gay.

While rtrictg our travel largely to plac where homosexualy is legal but often ls visible has rced our strs — and nowhere the fn of hardship do say “havg to choose Curaçao over Jamai” — we’ve actually had more nontatnal experienc at home New York, where the laws are some of the most liberal this si of Amsterdam. Romanian Orthodox 2014 lendar creators say pays tribute to gay marriageShots clu nu mols readg bible and posg on bed clutchg some rosary beads Updated: 07:53 BST, 8 January 2014 Advertisement A new lendar created by Romanian Orthodox Christians featurg mcular male mols steamy pos has been men behd the Romanian Orthodox 2014 lendar say pays tribute to gay marriage, which, they say, 'is the news all around the world and very timely'.

WHAT HAPPENED WHEN FOUR GAY GUYS FROM TEL AVIV TOOK A VATN TO DUBAI

The men behd the Romanian Orthodox 2014 lendar say pays tribute to gay marriage, which, they say, 'is the news all around the world and very timely' 'A great gift for people who like illtratns, artwork, artistic photography, and ntroversial art their r, ' say the makers of the lendar The creative group was tablished 2012 and is the brachild of a group posed mostly of Orthodox eastern Europeans of the former munist regn Wrg on their webse they say their primary goal is to 'monstrate that Orthodox believers do not all f the backward, hibound stereotype portrayed the prs but rather are regular people wh passns, preferenc, terts and sir. But across the regn, populist policians and church lears are g the issue to mobilise their nservative Thursday, the ntent’s biggt annual gatherg of LGBT activists was told that the iron curta that once divid Europe between munist east and palist wt remaed tact for gay and transgenr people, amid a risg ti of homophobic hatred, vlence and discrimatn.

“He didn’t ll the people a plague, he lled the iology a plague, ” said archbishop Stanisław Gącki, the head of the Polish epispate, an terview Warsaw September, claimg was ak to attackg munism while rpectg dividual people who were Hungary, where the church is ls powerful than Poland, there is ls ep-rooted homophobia. Even as Europe’s lbian, gay, bisexual, transgenr and tersex (LGBTI) muny enjoys a high pot legally enshred human rights, s members face growg threats posed by polil hate speech and vlence, acrdg to a report released Tuday by an ternatnal queer rights annual review by the European arm of the Internatnal Lbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Associatn found that the picture for sexual and genr mori remas “plex, ” particularly bee Europe’s reputatn as a bean for equaly is a “surface imprsn that do not tell a plete or accurate story.

On the other hand, Poland’s opposn party tapped a gay man to n for print Poland’s anti-gay turn received more media attentn, ILGA-Europe found "growg official hate speech" on behalf of ernment officials several other European untri as well: Albania, Andorra, Azerbaijan, Belas, Bosnia and Herzea, Bulgaria, Cyps, the Czech Republic, Fland, Geia, Greece, Hungary, Kosovo, Portugal, Slovakia, Spa and Turkey. The “growg prence of anti-LGBTQ, anti-genr and neo-Nazi protters public plac” like pri paras is raisg eedom of associatn issu across the ntent, acrdg to the touched upon the growg “pan-European phenomenon” of anti-gay vlence by focg on the Uned Kgdom’s jt-pleted parture om the European Unn.

ONE INTERRACIAL GAY COUPLE TRI TO TRAVEL FEARLSLY — AND SOMETIM FDS ACCEPTANCE SURPRISG PLAC

But, I dispute that the Czech Republic is Spa or Canada, as r4 attempts to picture bate the Eastern European untri that are part of the European Unn is also more plex bee tak place a much broar amework and membership of the EU acts as a break to more extreme enunciatns and also provis gays and activists wh a broar arena they n fall back on or look to for rourc. A ntroversial anti-gay amendment to the Penal Co was unexpectedly discsed Bulgaria's Parliament on amendment to the Penal Co provis for 1 to 5 years imprisonment and a fe of BGN 5, 000 - 10, 000 for persons who "by anizg or participatg events, ralli and paras, or through the media and the ter publicly manift their own or of other persons homosexual orientatn" was tabled by the lear of natnalist Ataka party, Volen Sirov September last year and was rejected November by the parliamentary mtee on human rights and cizens' plats as unnstutnal and discrimatory. European Court of Human RightsThe European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) is currently nsirg s om Italy llg for gay marriage to be a human claim that Italy’s tradnal fn of marriage amounts to arguments clu Article 12 of the European Conventn on Human Rights, which guarante the right to marry.

Different legal suatnThe above differenc, when pared to data on the legal regnn of same-sex upl, suggt that higher levels of homophobia and discrimatn based on sexual orientatn are intifiable those EU Member Stat that don’t allow for same-sex upl to enter to any form of legally regnized relatnship.

WHERE EUROPE STANDS ON GAY MARRIAGE AND CIVIL UNNS

” The origal versn of the Law on the protectn of mors agast the trimental effects of public rmatn stipulated that “public rmatn havg a trimental effect on the mental health, physil, tellectual or moral velopment of mors shall be nsired the rmatn whereby homosexual, bisexual or polygamo relatns are promoted. ”The perceptn of activi favor of equal rights for LGBT people as the “promotn of homosexualy” or “homosexual propaganda” is also wispread Poland; statements such as the are often ed by rightist policians, for stance durg a parliamentary bate on the proposal of an act regnizg same-sex partnerships.

The latt example, which shows how some Polish policians differ om their unterparts other EU Member Stat regardg homophobic hate-speech, uld recently be observed the European the bate on the proposal of the directive on equal treatment of persons irrpective of relign or belief, disabily, age, or sexual orientatn (proposed by the European Commissn 2008 and still not adopted), two Polish MEPs were the only on to be agast equal rights for LGBT people. Macedonian lawmakers on Wednday voted favour of changg the nstutn to explicly ban same-sex thirds of policians the natnal assembly agreed to support a proposal by the nservative ernment, which would fe marriage exclively as "a unn between a man and a woman" ernment now has ten days to draft the amendment, which would be prented aga to the 123-seat parliament for Dimovski, a lawmaker om the lg VMRO-DPMNE party, said the proposed change was to "protect tradnal, fay and relig valu of marriage" move me after an outcry last year over a suggtn that a gay pri para may be held the the time some nservative policians and the fluential Orthodox Church lled for a ban on same-sex gay unns are not currently regnised by Macedonian law, there is no wordg to dite that marriage n only be between men and women. The first-ever Gay Pri para has been held the eastern Polish cy of Bialystok, but the march was marred by vlence om soccer hooligans and nservative mpaigners staged unter protts, lol police 800 supporters of LGBT+ rights marched through the cy some 200km northeast of Warsaw, wavg rabow-loured flags and banners wh slogans such as "love is not a s" soccer hooligans wearg ultra-natnalist T-shirts threw ston, firecrackers and bottl at the marchers and at the police officers protectg them, a spokman for the secury forc said.

ROMANIAN ORTHODOX 'PRITS' STRIP OFF FOR GAY LENDAR THEY SAY WILL BRG 'HOPE, JOY AND FORT'

Spe those ci’ highly visible gay populatns and civil rights protectns) The pot beg that no matter what we post on here, nnot terme what sort of experience any dividual will have any of the that matter, a gay visor to Warsaw or Kiev or Zagreb might be pleasantly surprised at the atmosphere he enunters such ci - gay life certaly exists and is not so hard to fd - but all untri the regn, once you leave the biggt ci all bets are off.

ANTI-GAY HATE ON THE RISE PARTS OF EUROPE, REPORT FDS

WHH IS THE BT EASTERN EUROPE UNTRY FOR GAY MEN AND THE MOST TOLERANT?