Russia Doesn't Quite Know How To React To U.S. 'Gayification' Movement By Tom Balmforth June 29, 2015
MOSCOW -- One lawmaker wants Facebook banned for being rainbow-flag friendly.
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And a prominent Russian Orthodox priest is warning that the United States is out to "steal your soul."
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In the wake of the U.S. ruling, the thought of Russian children possibly viewing a photograph tinged with the colors of the rainbow spurred Milonov to speak out.
"This is a gross violation of Russian legislation," he told the Russia News Service radio station. "Facebook does not have age restrictions. It's not possible to control how many underage users there are. Therefore, it is entirely normal to cut off Facebook on Russian territory."
It was not the only call to block Facebook.
On June 25, in anticipation of the Supreme Court ruling, a senator in the Russian Federation Council called on state media watchdog Roskomnadzor to block the social network for circulating "gay propaganda" in the form of emoticons and emojis.
Senator Mikhail Markhenko told Izvestia that on offer were tiny images -- popularly used by social media users to comment on posts -- showing men with men, women with women, and the rainbow flag. Such subliminal "propaganda" risked subliminally warping the minds of younger generations, he argued, and were thus incompatible with Russian law.
Aleksei Lisovenko, a municipal lawmaker in Moscow, on June 29 called for the rainbow flag to be added to a list of "banned symbols" and outlawed altogether.
"Since last century, the USA has been destroying entire states through color revolutions under the guise of 'democratization'," Lisovenko wrote on Facebook. "Now they've added to their arsenal 'gayification' -- a new method of interfering in the affairs of sovereign states."
