Could Poland's Controversial LGBT-Free Zon Fally Be Consigned To History? - Towleroad Gay News

Contents:

• POLAND WILL NOT LET EU 'FORCE' TO ALLOWG GAY MARRIAG, SAYS JTICE MISTER
• EASTERN EUROPE WAS ONCE A WORLD LEAR ON GAY RIGHTS. THEN RAN OUT OF SPEGOATS
• MANY BRONS HAVE CHANGED THEIR MDS ON GAY MARRIAGE
• FOR POLAND'S GAY COMMUNY, A SHIFT IN PUBLIC ATTUS, IF NOT LAWS
• EUROPE’S EPENG DIVI ON GAY RIGHTS
• POLAND’S POPULISTS PICK A NEW TOP ENEMY: GAY PEOPLE
• EASTERN AND WTERN EUROPE DIVID OVER GAY MARRIAGE, HOMOSEXUALY
• WHAT’S IT LIKE TO BE GAY … POLAND?
• POLISH JTICE MISTER: ‘UNACCEPTABLE’ FOR EU TO FORCE POLAND TO EMBRACE GAY MARRIAGE
• ALL EU UNTRI MT REGNISE RIGHTS OF GAY SPO, ECJ L
• POLAND TO BAN GAYS OM ADOPTG, EVEN AS SGLE PARENTS
• TWENTY YEARS SCE THE FIRST GAY MARRIAG, THE FIGHT FOR RIGHTS EUROPE GO ON
• THE REVOLUTNARY WAR HERO WHO WAS OPENLY GAY
• GERMAN URT REJECTS SE TO ALLOW GAY ADOPTN ON TECHNILY
• 5 SAFT PLAC FOR GAY TRAVELERS IN 2019 (AND THE MOST DANGERO)

POLAND WILL NOT LET EU 'FORCE' TO ALLOWG GAY MARRIAG, SAYS JTICE MISTER

REUTERS/Kacper Pempel/File PhotoWARSAW (Rters) - Poland’s jtice mister said on Monday the European Unn may be a posn to force Warsaw to legalize gay marriage if EU lears make fancial aid ndnal on upholdg mocratic norms, and warned that this was talks Bssels on the next EU budget and an enomic revery plan, some lears have mand that payouts be blocked to member stat which the executive European Commissn (EC) ems to be unrmg mocratic valu. Gay marriag are illegal Poland and Print Andrzej Duda was re-elected this month after sayg he would not allow adoptns by gay upl or perm class on gay rights state rights activist Alicja Sienkiewicz of the Lubl Equaly March Associatn, which supports lbian, gay, bisexual and transgenr people, said members of the LGBT muny were beg portrayed as enemi of the state. Hungary’s hardle natnalist ernment passed a new law earlier this month banng ntent that “promot” homosexualy and genr change om beg shared wh children, effectively prohibg any discsn of LGBTQ them schools.

“There’s a real regrsn happeng many different untri, and rights that had been regnized are now beg challenged, ” said Evelyne Paradis, the executive director of the European branch of the Internatnal Lbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Associatn (ILGA-Europe).

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

“You have plac like Germany, France, Spa where 85% or more say that homosexualy should be accepted by society and then once you’re past the dividg le, on the other si of the former Iron Curta, those numbers beg to fall pretty rapidly and then get even lower as you go to Rsia, ” he said. “When you look at the former Eastern bloc, the untri had a long tradn of really progrsive legislatn towards LGBTQ rights, Poland for stance crimalized homosexualy 1932, which is really, really early, ” Kościańska said. Enjoy more d and podsts on iOS or browser do not support the <d> row began wh a claratn favour of lbian, gay, bisexual and transgenr (LGBT) rights signed by Rafal Trzaskowski, Warsaw’s newly elected liberal mayor, Febary.

MANY BRONS HAVE CHANGED THEIR MDS ON GAY MARRIAGE

Third, wh 8%, is Wsna (Sprg), a new left-wg party that wants to legalise gay article appeared the Europe sectn of the prt edn unr the headle "Fay first"Europe May 4th 2019In Spa’s electn, the Socialists w the most seatsGermany’s chancellor, Angela Merkel, is takg her time to retireNorwegians spect an quisive whale is workg for the KremlPoland’s lg party nonts the “LGBT dictatorship”Why Emmanuel Macron wants to abolish ENA, France’s most ele llegeFrom the May 4th 2019 ednDisver stori om this sectn and more the list of ntents Explore the edn. " He adds that many gay, lbian, bisexual and transgenr Pol have recently emigrated to pe Tuchow, a town of 6, 500 people found medieval tim, which has also clared self ee of "LGBT iology", I meet a gay teenager a lol park. Still, that don't mean is easy to be gay this part of Poland, 100km east of ptn, Poland has been lled the worst untry the EU for LGBT rights"Once, when my boyiend and I were holdg hands", he says, "we heard a few people shoutg nam at .

Crics say PiS has an anti-gay LGBT rights group ILGA-Europe says Poland is the worst-performg untry the EU terms of LGBT rights, an x published last won a majory parliament wh a nservative-natnalist agenda strong on Catholic valu, cludg support for tradnal fai and opposn to gay marriage. Speakg to supporters Brzeg, southwtern Poland, Mr Duda said "parents are rponsible for the sexual tn of their children, " and " is not possible for any stutns to terfere the way parents raise their children" 10 June he signed a "Fay Charter" of electn proposals, cludg pledg to prevent gay upl om marryg or adoptg children and to ban teachg about LGBT issu schools. It has often h out at gay rights and what lls “LGBT iology”, rhetoric that is popular wh parts of s base and the Catholic other thgs, Duda’s new charter pledg no support for gay marriage or adoptn by gay upl, wh Duda scribg the latter as part of “a foreign iology”.

FOR POLAND'S GAY COMMUNY, A SHIFT IN PUBLIC ATTUS, IF NOT LAWS

It also seeks to “ban the propagatn of LGBT iology” schools and public stutns – language remiscent of a notor Rsian law targetg so-lled “gay propaganda” has been a ncerted effort to portray the centrist Trzaskowski as an anti-Polish radil.

Photograph: Czarek Sokołowski/APIn a statement addrsed to Duda this week, Poland’s Campaign Agast Homophobia said: “Mr Print, let say out loudly and clearly once aga: there is no such thg as ‘LGBT iology’, ’s jt a homophobic nstct. While gays and lbians have never had the legal right to marry or to form civil unns Poland, as is permted much of Europe, many felt nfint until not long ago that Polish society was beg more acceptg and that those rights would one day have stead faced a fur backlash om the Roman Catholic Church and the ernment unr the lg Law and Jtice party.

EUROPE’S EPENG DIVI ON GAY RIGHTS

Sign up to get the rt, cludg news om around the globe, tertg ias and opns to know, sent to your box every a Febary asslt on a same-sex uple at a Rome tra statn, lls heightened for what Italy lacked: A hate crime law to bat homophobia. “Two young men beaten up for a kiss, ” lamented Nila Zgaretti, ernor of Laz, the Italian regn where Rome happened next beme a se study of how gay rights have surged to the foreont of Europe’s culture wars.

POLAND’S POPULISTS PICK A NEW TOP ENEMY: GAY PEOPLE

” The Vatin etted that Catholic schools might need to hold events for a natnal anti-homophobia day, cryg gement on eedom of a showdown last week, the Italian Senate rejected the bill an act that roed nservative lawmakers to a standg ovatn. Neverthels, the heated LBGTQ bate on the ntent suggts that equal rights are not que the done al the Wt that some gay activists once thought, particularly as the movement has broaned s foc to clu genr inty — a hot-button topic that has riled the right on both sis of the Atlantic for years.

EASTERN AND WTERN EUROPE DIVID OVER GAY MARRIAGE, HOMOSEXUALY

But European far-right lears like Holland’s Geert Wilrs and France’s Le Pen have more often targeted migrants, not gay people, even labelg themselv as protectors of the LBGTQ muny om what they scribe as the dangers posed by Islamist fundamentalism.

’s tegry than Poland and Hungary, where anti-gay legislative efforts backed by right-wg ernments have been challenged by untri are now at the heart of the bate not only over “re European valu, ” but whether they n and should rema wh the European 's parliament has bated a proposed law to ban LGBT paras and other "promotn" of bill, which is a cizens' iative, received backg om some lg party MPs but led opposn MPs to leave the chamber prott Not om Poland ?? (@notompoland) October 29, 2021. Facg a tough challenge om a uned opposn electns next year, the tocratic Print Viktor Orban — who long promoted “Christian valu” while largely reag om a Poland-like war on gay rights — is now apparently lculatg that the issue is a polil wner. “The anti-gay mpaign Hungary me out of almost nowhere this summer; ’s as if they cut and pasted the issue om the Polish ernment, ” Peter Kreko, director of Polil Capal Instute, a Budapt-based thk tank, told me.

The term “homosexualy, ” while sometim nsired anachronistic the current era, is the most applible and easily translatable term to e when askg this qutn across societi and languag and has been ed other cross-natnal studi, cludg the World Valu Survey.

WHAT’S IT LIKE TO BE GAY … POLAND?

Dpe major chang laws and norms surroundg the issue of same-sex marriage and the rights of LGBT people around the world, public opn on the acceptance of homosexualy society remas sharply divid by untry, regn and enomic velopment. However, while took nearly 15 years for acceptance to rise 13 pots om 2000 to jt before the feral legalizatn of gay marriage June 2015, there was a near equal rise acceptance jt the four years sce legalizatn. In South Korea, for example, those who classify themselv on the iologil left are more than twice as likely to say homosexualy is acceptable than those on the iologil right (a 39-percentage-pot difference).

POLISH JTICE MISTER: ‘UNACCEPTABLE’ FOR EU TO FORCE POLAND TO EMBRACE GAY MARRIAGE

And Poland, supporters of the erng PiS (Law and Jtice), which has explicly targeted gay rights as anathema to tradnal Polish valu, are 23 percentage pots ls likely to say that homosexualy should be accepted by society than those who do not support the erng party. But even untri like France and Germany where acceptance of homosexualy is high, there are differenc between supporters and non-supporters of key right-wg populist parti such as Natnal Rally France and Alternative for Germany (AfD). In 25 of the 34 untri surveyed, those who say relign is “somewhat, ” “not too” or “not at all” important their liv are more likely to say that homosexualy should be accepted than those who say relign is “very” important.

[2][3] Poland provis LGBT people wh the same rights as heterosexuals certa areas: gay and bisexual men are allowed to donate blood, gays and bisexuals are allowed to serve openly the Polish Armed Forc, and transgenr people are allowed to change their legal genr followg certa requirements cludg unrgog hormone replacement therapy.

Gay Marriage⚭✖ Foreign same-sex marriag regnized onlyChangg Genr✔ Legal, surgery not requiredNon-bary genr regnn✖ Not legally regnizedDiscrimatn✖ Illegal some ntextsEmployment Discrimatn✔ Sexual orientatn and genr intyHog DiscrimatnN/AConversn Therapy✖ Not banned. However, openly gay personnel would face social difficulty, pecially for higher ranks, as for "mandg staff - officers and high-rankg NCOs - admtg to same-sex attractn would mean losg rpect - quali whout which you simply nnot be a manr" donatns by MSMs Poland?

ALL EU UNTRI MT REGNISE RIGHTS OF GAY SPO, ECJ L

WARSAW, July 20 (Rters) - Poland’s jtice mister said on Monday the European Unn may be a posn to force Warsaw to legalize gay marriage if EU lears make fancial aid ndnal on upholdg mocratic norms, and warned that this was unacceptable.

Secretary of State Hillary Clton marshalled support the UN Human Rights Council, the succsor to the Human Rights Commtee, for the rolutn on human rights, sexual orientatn, and genr inty, famoly proclaimg that “gay rights are human rights.” In 2016, the uncil adopted another rolutn that lled on member stat to protect agast vlence and discrimatn based on sexual orientatn and genr inty and tablished the office of an pennt expert to asss implementatn of the protectns worldwi. In Poland and Hungary, the e of homophobic rhetoric and legislatn by reactnary polil parti that have recently assumed power prompted the European Commissn 2020 to ny some fundg to member stat that do not rpect LGBTQ+ rights and to take steps toward cludg homophobic hate crim on a list of major offens.

POLAND TO BAN GAYS OM ADOPTG, EVEN AS SGLE PARENTS

The Tmp admistratn’s approach to LGBTQ+ rights volved appotg several openly gay men to high-rankg diplomatic and natnal secury posns and overseeg a largely rhetoril mpaign to crimalize homosexualy worldwi, which fell short of s objectiv. The print has already nomated Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, to lead the Department of Transportatn, which would make Buttigieg the first openly gay bet member if nfirmed by the Senate. He do not want other young people to suffer as he did, so he weled the cisn by the mayor of Warsaw to troduce a claratn last month aimed at promotg the backlash to the claratn has left him ’s erng party, Law and Jtice, has seized on the claratn and the issue of gay rights s mpaigng for European Unn electns May and for natnal electns this the party once attacked migrants as a threat to the soul of the untry, gay people have bee s public enemy No.

1 recent Limowicz for The New York TimIt is part of a growg trend across eastern and central Europe, where natnalist and populist parti are creasgly turng to cultural issu — and attacks on gay people — to rally their Romania, where the ernment tried and failed to change the Constutn to ban same-sex marriage, to Hungary, where homosexuals are vilified as a threat to tradnal fai, the letters L. “While migratn is important for some voters, is not the only battleground for vot ahead of the European Parliament electns, ” the group said a Trzaskowski, the Warsaw mayor, said he did not believe attackg gay people would prove as effective as the mpaign agast migrants. “The majory of the Polish people will not buy the ia that homosexuals endanger our culture or valu, ” he Limowicz for The New York TimAn openly gay ndidate, Robert Biedron, formed a new liberal party and has found wispread support for his msage, cludg outsi urban centers.

A recent public opn poll nducted by Ipsos for the news outlet found that 56 percent of Pol did not oppose civil partnerships; two years ago, was 52 the same time, though, Pol rema steadfastly opposed to adoptn by gay upl, wh only 18 percent support. Oktawiz Chrzanowski, 36, who played a key role helpg draft the Warsaw claratn, and his partner, Hubert Sobecki, said one of the most sid parts of the ernment mpaign was an effort to pat homosexualy as a danger to children. The cross-ntental divi has led to talk about whether the Netherlands might grant asylum to gay and lbian Rsians seekg to pe that untry’s anti-homosexual “propaganda” law – a measure passed this past June by a 436-0 vote the Rsian parliament.

TWENTY YEARS SCE THE FIRST GAY MARRIAG, THE FIGHT FOR RIGHTS EUROPE GO ON

Wh the health mistry tent on creatg a special mtee rponsible for “curg” gays, police pilg a database on gays and the gay muny, and the ombudsman for children preparg a list of jobs unf for homosexuals, thoands of LGBTQ Pol took advantage of their EU cizenship and left for the Uned Kgdom. “There is a real risk that we may fd ourselv a suatn where the EC (European Commissn) will effectively force to troduce the so-lled homosexual marriag wh the right to adopt children, ” Zbigniew Zbro told a news nference Monday, Rters reports. Poland’s right-wg Law and Jtice Party and Print Andrzej Duda were reelected last week part bee of their pledg to ban gay upl om adoptg children and forbiddg schools om teachg about civil rights for homosexuals.

EU untri that have not legalised gay marriage mt rpect the rincy rights of same-sex spo who want to live together their terrory, the European urt of jtice has led, a move hailed as a victory for human ECJ said member stat mt regnise the rights of all married upl to ee movement, no matter their genr or sexual lg me rponse to a se which Romanian thori were acced of discrimatg agast Adrian Coman, who wanted to be able to live his home untry wh his Amerin hband, Claibourn Robert Haton, wh whom he had been livg for four years the US before they married Bssels 2010.

THE REVOLUTNARY WAR HERO WHO WAS OPENLY GAY

Opposn to same-sex relatnships n be strong Romania, where homosexualy was crimalised ’s father, Liviu, told the Associated Prs he was pleased wh the lg, which would make some aspects of their liv easier.

Romanița Iordache, the vice-print of the Romanian gay rights anisatn Accept, said: “Startg om this moment onward, Romanian thori now have an obligatn to rpect the [ECJ] cisn, and ensure rincy rights and mimal regnn for all same-sex fai a siar suatn.

BRUSSELS/WARSAW (Rters) - People livg same-sex upl will be barred om adoptg children Poland even as sgle parents, unr a new law announced on Thursday by a natnalist lg party which has ma anti-gay polici a major part of s erng announcement is likely to tensify a clash between Poland and the European Unn over LGBT rights, which the EU says mt be rpected all member stat, but which Poland lls a threat to s Roman Catholic culture and a purely domtic Polish ernment announced s plan for the adoptn ban hours before lawmakers the European parliament adopted a major gay rights rolutn that was seen as a direct rebe to Warsaw’s recent already allows only oppose sex upl or sgle people to adopt children. ) people livg habatn wh a person of the same sex uld not adopt a child, so a homosexual uple will not be able to adopt a child, ” said Deputy Jtice Mister Michal said the purpose of the measure was to protect children: “It’s about a child’s safety, about s wellbeg, ” he said.

GERMAN URT REJECTS SE TO ALLOW GAY ADOPTN ON TECHNILY

Children serve a home, ” activist Bartosz Staszewski told ’s curbs on gay rights, which are beg mimicked nearby Hungary, are among several issu that have created ictn between the EU and right wg ernments power those two ex-munist member untri. It clared all EU terrory to be an “LGBTIQ Freedom Zone”, a clear rebuttal to the “LGBT-ee” signatn ed ’s lg Law and Jtice Party (PiS) says gay rights are a threat to the tradnal liftyle one of the most Catholic untri Europe. Its crics say has turned to polics of bigotry to clg to power, particularly sce an electn last year, which PiS cumbent Print Andrzej Duda narrowly won wh an appeal to nservative voters that emphasised anti-gay msag.

Although 76% of cizens agree that gay, lbian and bisexual people should have the same rights as heterosexual people, most untri do not offer full regnn of same-sex fai, and many others LGBTIQ+ people still face discrimatn and prejudice bee of their sexual orientatn and genr inty. Usg populatn data om the Netherlands, Mazrekaj, De Wte, and Cab (2020) intified over one ln children born between 1998 and 2007, of which 2, 971 lived wh same-sex parents (2, 786 lbian and 185 gay male parents). Amsterdam has marked 20 years sce the world’s first gay marriag by floatg an flatable pk ke wh ndl spoutg rabow flam down the years ago on April 1, the cy was host to a historic event when the mayor married four upl the cy hall and the Netherlands beme the first untry the world to legally regnise same-sex celebratns on Thursday mark a tone after two s when LGBT rights have flourished many parts of Europe and further afield, wh 16 untri wtern Europe havg now legalised same-sex activists warn that the work is not done.

Reasons to be hopefulOne untry Europe that has been held up as an example of turng around attus and laws affectg the LGBT muny is sexual activy was only crimalised 1993 what was at the time a eply Catholic 2015, followg a referendum on the issue, same-sex marriage was enshred the untry's last Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, was only the fourth openly gay head of ernment or head of state the Fagan, the CEO of LGBT Ireland, says the anniversary of the first same-sex marriag is a e for "ut celebratn", but adds "the road to equaly remas a stggle".

5 SAFT PLAC FOR GAY TRAVELERS IN 2019 (AND THE MOST DANGERO)

"In the se of an tend marriage between two people of the same sex, if one of the spo is a natnal of one of the untri, the state registrar shall not solemnise the marriage, " the statement 11 untri, which have signed agreements wh France, are mostly former Yugoslav republics, where gay marriage is prohibed. KARLSRUHE, Germany (Rters) - Germany’s Constutnal Court on Friday threw out a se to grant gay upl the right to jotly adopt a child on a technily, but gay rights activists noted that a lg by the same urt last Febary effectively allowed .

Prently Germany gay marriage is not allowed and gay upl nnot jotly adopt a Febary however the Constutnal Court granted gay dividuals the right to adopt a child already adopted by their civil partner, unr a practice known as ‘succsive adoptn’. “The Berl District Court has barely nsired the relevant lerature and the lg of the Constutnal Court s referral, ” said the urt a statement Germany’s Lbian and Gay Associatn said regretted the urt would not make a lg, but add took heart om the fact that the urt clearly supported the equal treatment of same-sex upl. The journalists looked at the top 150 most-vised untri the world by the number of g tourists, then ranked them g eight factors, cludg laws agast gay relatnships, legal protectn agast discrimatn and more.

“In 2018, India managed to annul Sectn 377, a Brish lonial-era law prohibg ‘unnatural acts, ’ orr to legalize nsensual gay sex, ” says Fergson, who pots out that ancient Indian lerature such as the Mahabharata and Ramayana have many referenc to LGBTQ+ hero cludg transgenr warrrs and two queens who ma love orr for one queen to get pregnant wh an heir for their kgdom. Unfortunately, thgs may soon be gettg even worse for the LGBTQ+ muny, as the Ugandan ernment has recently lled to retroduce an anti-homosexualy bill, which would clu the ath penalty for same-sex acts, the midst of the recent murr of a gay Ugandan activist.