More from Joseph's sage commentator, Da Russophile: http://darussophile.com/2012/08/08/its-a-culture-war-stupid It’s A Culture War, Stupid Posted on August 8, 2012
One of the things that most annoys me about Western coverage of St.-Petersburg’s law against homosexual propaganda to minors, the case against Pussy Riot, etc., is how it is almost always presented as a show-down between “liberated” and “creative” Russians and the macho dictator Putin. In reality, of course, it’s a culture war – and as a result the majority is on the conservative side of the spectrum and the government merely accedes to this fact. This is the case with Pussy Riot. It is also the case with the anti-homosexual laws. According to the polls, which no Western journalist cares about for all his feigned concern for the opinions of “ordinary Russians”, 14% of Russians support homosexual marriages, 84% oppose; 8% want to allow gay parades, 82% are against. Three quarters consider homosexuality to be a deviancy, a disease, or a mental illness. (clip) This character, one Antony Karlin, describes himself as follows on his "about" page: As regards Russian politics, I make no secret that I’m a pro-Putin conservative. I consider Charles de Gaulle to have done a great job, and consider Putin to be a comparable figure in vision and stature. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
