Vancouver romance author commends EU ruling against Russian gay propaganda law
Roshini Nair | CBC News | Posted: June 22, 2017 10:00 PM | Last Updated: June 22, 2017
Robert Joseph Green's short story, 'The Blue Door,' widely used as protest symbol by Russian LGBT community
A Vancouver author — who became an unlikely participant in Russia's LGBTQ human rights protests — is elated after the European Court of Human Rights ruled Tuesday against the country's controversial gay propaganda laws.
On June 20 the court ruled a Russian law banning the promotion of homosexuality to minors breached European treaty rules.
The Russian laws — passed in 2013 ahead of the 2014 Sochi Olympics — regard any attempt to promote homosexuality to minors as illegal.
In practice, the laws were used broadly to quash gay pride marches and protests and intimidate the LGBT community.
Robert Joseph Greene, a Vancouver-based author who writes gay romance fiction, became embroiled in the protest movement when one of his short stories, The Blue Door, was translated into Russian.
The Blue Door is a fairy-tale set in Russia about a tsar who declares his three sons can marry anyone of their choosing. One of his sons chooses to marry his male partner.
"That's how I got pulled into the fray because then the Russian media said 'aha, this is the reason why we need these laws. [The story] is targeting kids to make them homosexual,'" he said.
"That is furthest from the truth. The real reason I wrote them is because gays and lesbians have been robbed of our fairytale stories. Let's create some."
Greene said The Blue Door became a symbol of resistance.
"In one situation, an activist was arrested for reading my story in front of a children's library," he said.
Greene — who says he's never even been to Russia — said he started receiving a flood of Russian messages to his author Facebook page.
"I got all this hate mail so my publisher and I had to go to Google Translate and see [what] all these people [were] yelling at me," he said.
Greene said he also got desperate messages from young, queer people asking for help.
"If this is the tiny crack that will lead to the trickle that will lead to the flow of freedom of expression for the LGBTQ community in Russia, so be it, I will help them," Greene said, adding he has given the story's rights to the Russian public for free to do as they choose.
Russia said it will appeal the EU ruling within three months.
Listen to the interview with Robert Joseph Greene on CBC's The Early Edition: