Georgia passes sweeping ‘LGBT propaganda’ law that could see Pride flags and events banned --[Reported by Umva mag]

The Georgian government has approved a draconian “family values and protection of minors” bill which will effectively curb LGBTQ+ rights in the former Soviet republic.

The LGBT Propaganda bill, which will give authorities the legal right to ban Pride events and flags, was passed by lawmakers on Tuesday (17 September). The law, approved 84-0 after the opposition party boycotted the vote, also seeks to ban gender-affirming care, LGBTQ+ people’s right to adopt, and nullifies same-sex marriages performed on Georgian territory.

Proponents of the bill argued that safeguards needed to be put in place to protect so-called “traditional moral standards” in the country, where the conservative Orthodox Church is highly influential.

The legislation mirrors Russia’s so-called LGBT Propaganda law, adopted several years ago, which bans public displays of LGBTQ+ flags or identities, as well as depictions of queer people in the media.

The new bill still has to be signed into law by Georgia’s president, Salome Zourabichvili, who has been a vocal opponent of the legislation and the Georgian Dream Party, the country’s ruling political party.

Zourabichvili, whose powers are mainly ceremonial, said she planned to block the bill, but Georgian Dream are believed to have enough seats in parliament to override the veto.

Tamara Jakeli, the director of Tbilisi Pride, described the bill as “the most terrible thing to happen to the LGBT community in Georgia”.

Speaking to Reuters, she said: “We will most likely have to shut down. There is no way for us to continue functioning.”

Public opinion of queer people in the country is low, with a World Values survey in 2022 finding that more than 91 per cent of Georgians think homosexuality is unjustifiable. Independent, community-based Equaldex ranks Georgia 104th of 196 countries in its LGBTQ+ rights index, just one spot above North Korea.

While the country’s constitution doesn’t explicitly ban same-sex marriage, stating that union “is based on the legal equality and free will of the spouses,” the nation’s civil code clarifies that it as a “voluntary union between a man and a woman”. The new legislation codifies this definition of and makes it explicitly clear.

Jakeli told Reuters that the only way Georgians could reverse the decision would be to vote the ruling party out in October’s elections.

“The only way we can survive in this country and have any progress on LGBT rights is for us to go in great numbers to the elections and vote for change,” she said.

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