The Georgian Orthodox Church + ultra-nationalist thugs try to stop Tibilisi Pride

Georgia in Eastern Europe and once part of the USSR, may be an independent country, but its attitude to the LGBTQ community is just as violently homophobic as that of Russia itself. When they started to organize Pride Celebrations in Tbilisi, the Capital, this year the Georgian Orthodox Church were up in arms.

They went as far as issuing a statement asking the European Parliament Intergroup on LGBT+ Rights as well as the heads of embassies in Georgia to “refrain from supporting and encouraging Tbilisi Pride”. The statement said: “The organizers of the planned ‘Pride‘ are propagating a non-traditional way of life under the guise of protecting human rights… [Pride] conflicts with socially recognized moral norms and aims to legalize grave sin.”

The Church added that it is “unacceptable to admit sin and try to influence others”, and said the march “confuses universal values… which has a drastic negative impact on the psyche of minors and undermines the best interests of children”. They called on the Georgian Government to ban Pride outright

The United Nations system in Georgia, issued a joint statement of support for Pride along with the Delegation of the European Union to Georgia, the Embassies to Georgia of Austria, Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Israel, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States, and the Head of the EU Monitoring Mission in Georgia.

The four-day event went ahead and will finish with a “March of Dignity” on July 5th. Meanwhile, twenty people were detained as Georgian ultranationalists attempted to disrupt a film screening at the opening of the Pride. Outside the July 1 screening, protesters clashed with law enforcement personnel and threw stones and eggs, with some resisting arrest

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