Беларусь Гей Прайд · Минский гей-прайд

The tradition & historical record

Minsk Pride (Belarusian: Беларусь Гей Прайд, romanized: Belarus Gey Prayd) is a gay pride parade in Minsk, Belarus. This is a festival in support of tolerance for gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgender people in Belarus. ¹

The first Belarusian Pride Festival "Belarus Gay Pride" was held in Minsk from 6 to 9 September 1999. "Belarus Gay Pride" 1999 was organized by the Belarusian League for Sexual Equality "Lambda" and the magazine for gays and lesbians "Forum Lambda". The festival programme included a seminar for journalists on "Lesbians and gay men in the media", conference on the rights of gays and lesbians in Belarus and in the world, the exhibition of photographs and films taken homosexuals, competition "Mr. Gay Belarus" and competition "Transmission". During one of parties in the club burst the raided by riot police and frisked the contestants "Transmission". In the events of "Belarus Gay Pride" was attended by about 500 people. ¹

In the period from 7 to 10 September 2000 in Minsk was held second Pride festival "Belarus Gay Pride" 2000. "Belarus Gay Pride" 2000 supported by prominent figures Belarusian culture, almost all of the artists stated in the programme, have agreed free to participate in the events in support of the rights of gays and lesbians. The planned march "Belarus Gay Pride" 2000, was banned by the authorities 24 hours before its scheduled start. The rationale for denial of the march was that the organizers failed to obtain a permit to march on time. Most of the activities were banned under the pressure of the Russian Orthodox Church. Thus, not been displayed a collection of clothes, were abolished appearances Minsk and international artists, not take place contest "Miss DIVA-2000" and the first championship of Belarus on a male strip show. Furthermore, the authorities did everything possible to prevent the planned activities planned. On 7 September in the "Aquarium" club, hosting the opening of "Belarus Gay Pride" 2000, was raided by police. After 15 minutes of an art performance the lights went out, and the police ordered participants to leave the premises. The police then pursued participants in the streets of the city. The next day, the authorities closed "Belarus Gay Pride" 2000 press centre, ordering an evacuation and cessation of operations, as well as the cancellation of all activities being held at the House of Culture, such as workshops and film screenings. According to the director of the House of Culture, it was closed to all visitors for alleged technical reasons. Screening of films on LGBT themes in the city's cinemas were also cancelled. ¹

From 2 to 9 September 2001 in Minsk hosted the third Pride Festival in support of tolerance towards LGBT "Belarus Gay Pride" 2001. During the Pride festival in Minsk cinema "Victory" was screened movies of the famous French director François Ozon, organized by Minsk "Cinema club". Were shown 4 film by François Ozon's such as "Sitcom", "Criminal Lovers", "Under the Sand", "Drops of rain on hot stones". The movie screenings had great success. Before showing the latest film, leader of the Belarusian League for Sexual Equality "Lambda" Edward Tarletski, spoke a word of thanks to all who helped organize and conduct these screenings. September 5 held a public action in memory of gay victims of the Nazis on the site of the former concentration camp "Trostenets" near Minsk. The first speech was by Edward Tarletski. Не said that in Belarus we have a special attitude to the problem of Nazism, because even by the estimates of Soviet historians, which are usually lowered, about 25% of Belarusians were murdered by fascists during the Second World War. Also underlined that the nazi persecution of homosexuals mostly was silenced in Belarus from Soviet times till now, also said that we need to do a lot of work to reveal the names of this heroes and obstacles of their death and hope that holding the actions like this will initiate Belarusian LGBT movement activists to work more hard for it. September 7 in Minsk was held "Love-parade" public action a third Pride Festival "Belarus Gay Pride" 2001. ¹

In 2002, a few days before "Belarus Gay Pride" 2002, the leader of the Belarusian League for Sexual Equality "Lambda" Edward Tarletsky was summoned to the police station in Minsk. At the police station he was told that if the gay pride parade takes place, the police will not take any responsibility for the consequences. The police also threatened to Edward Tarletsky criminal prosecution, if a street pride parade to take place. Festival of gays and lesbians "Belarus Gay Pride" 2002 was held in Minsk in September and was organized by the Belarusian League for Sexual Equality "Lambda", the magazine for gays and lesbians "Forum Lambda" and the Belarusian gay site "ApaGay". It was the fourth festival in the history of the LGBT movement in Belarus. The aim of the festival was to draw public attention to the existence of gays and lesbians. However, unlike in previous festivals, the program "Belarus Gay Pride" 2002 was not a march through the streets of Minsk. During the festival hosted a conference "Homosexuality in Belarus", Fashion Show Night, lecture "French literature and homosexuality", lesbian party, final transvestite contest "Miss DIVA-2002", evening of poetry and a concert "Musicians against homophobia". ¹

October 11, 2008 in Minsk hosted the LGBT Pride, the motto of which was the slogan, "Be able to be! Be able to love! Be able to proud." The march was timed to the International Day of Coming out. The parade was organized by the Belarusian Initiative for Sexual and Gender Equality. In the parade was attended by representatives of the initiative, also the public action supported movements "Antifa" and "Socialist Resistance". The action was initiated LGBT activists Siarhei Androsenka and Yuri Kozachenko. The participants the pride parade marched from Yakub Kolas to October Square, the procession ended at the park near the building of the Presidential Administration of the Republic of Belarus. In Pride parade was attended by about 30 people. ¹

The text above is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Minsk Pride”, available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 licence. ¹

Minsk Gay Pride is annual LGBT event in Minsk, Belarus, according to the structured record cited below. This entry was generated automatically from that record and has not yet been reviewed by a person familiar with the tradition. ²

The source record links this tradition to 1 external register, which can be verified through the citation. ²