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Al Letson: From the Center For Investigative Reporting and PRX, this is Reveal. I'm Al Letson.

Lyosha Gorshkov know what it's like to be gay in Russia.

Lyosha Gorshkov: I had to leave because otherwise, I will be beaten up and killed. Because I already had before, some issues with physical abuse and violence.

Al Letson: He fled Russia in 2015 when he was 29 years old.

[00:00:30] Lyosha Gorshkov: I packed my suitcase and left country for the United States.

Al Letson: But even he was shocked when he heard reports of police in the Russian Republic of Chechnya rounding up gay men and torturing them.

Lyosha Gorshkov: The head of Chechnya opened up some sort of concentration camps where they do a lot of weird stuff, like beating them by electroshock, trying to actually rape them, trying to beat them up until they fainted.

[00:01:00] Al Letson: The independent newspaper, Novaya Gazeta, broke the story a few weeks ago. It reported the Chechen police have detained and tortured more than 100 gay men, and that three people have been killed. We spoke to Svetlana Zakharova of the LGBT network in Saint Petersburg, who confirms what the paper found.

Svetlana Zakhar: We reported about, like, hundreds people detained and tortured. And, in the end of March, we created a hotline especially for people in Chechnya who were afraid for their life. And by now, already 60 people contacted us and all those people are telling horrible stories.

[00:01:30] Al Letson: Svetlana says Chechnya is an ultra traditional society with strong Islamic values.

Svetlana Zakhar: Russia itself is a very homophobic place, but Chechnya is probably, for LGBT person, is a worse place to be, because it's absolutely impossible not only to be LGBT activists, but it's impossible to be publicly open gay there.

[00:02:00] Al Letson: She says in Chechnya, having a gay relative is seen as a stain on the entire family or clan.

Svetlana Zakhar: There is such thing as honor killing in Chechnya, and it means that family members are considered to kill homosexual person because this person put too much shame on the whole family. But now, it's like a campaign against homosexual people there.

Al Letson: Local authorities say the whole story is made up and claim homosexuals don't even exist in the region. Svetlana's group is helping people flee Chechnya and Russia, which is dangerous work.

[00:02:30] Svetlana Zakhar: So, basically we organize the evacuation process. We emigrate people from Chechnya, first of all, from the region. And then we provide accommodation, medical support, of course, psychological support, because people are scared to death. And we also try to organize emigration outside of Russia.

Al Letson: But she won't tell us exactly how they do it.

[00:03:00] Svetlana Zakhar: We keep this information the top secret for security reason because emigration process is still going, and we don't want to put at additional risk those people who are still in Chechnya and who want to get out of there.

Al Letson: That's where Lyosha can help. He works with a group called RUSA LGBT in New York City. They help people who have fled Russia and neighboring countries, including some people from Chechnya.

It seems like life for the LGBT community in Russia is tough, but in Chechnya, it's brutal.

[00:03:30] Lyosha Gorshkov: It's brutal. You're right. When I got to know some people from there, they told me stories you could not believe. Because yes, you experienced violence and some government watching you, but what is happening in Chechnya with gay people who are so afraid to hang out. They are so afraid, they don't use any internet because it could be tracked by the government.

[00:04:00] They are invisible, totally.

Al Letson: Before he fled Russia, Lyosha was working as a university professor and he was openly gay. He says everything changed when Vladimir Putin pushed through a repressive anti-gay propaganda law in 2014.

Lyosha Gorshkov: All of a sudden, government body, like secret police, would turn to us and try to threat us, try to suppress our activities. And when I got those problems at my university and some articles came out blaming myself and my colleagues for spreading sodomy and propaganda of pedophilia, I understood that it was a critical point, and I had to leave.

[00:04:30] Al Letson: Lyosha thinks that Putin's campaign against the LGBT community also led to the attacks on gay men in Chechnya.

[00:05:00] Lyosha Gorshkov: I believe so. Absolutely. It's number one reason, because otherwise, without a green light from the federal government, they never will do it. They never will do it without any fear to be punished, to be persecuted. It's literally the impact and the cost.

[00:05:30] Al Letson: We first reported last fall on how dangerous it is to be gay in Russia with Coda Story, a new media venture that does in-depth crisis reporting. We're going to revisit those stories today, starting with reporter Amy Mackinnon, who takes us to St. Petersburg.

Amy Mackinnon: My tickets were booked and I was packing my bag when I received a message from a friend in St. Petersburg: a journalist, Dmitry Tsilikin, had been murdered.

[00:06:00] Russia can be a dangerous place for journalists. Over the years, dozens have been killed for getting on the wrong side of corrupt politicians and gang bosses. But this explanation just didn't fit for Dmitry.

He was an arts reporter. He reviewed the city's ballet and opera. But Dmitry's friends and local media believe that Dmitry was killed because he was gay.

When I arrived in St. Petersburg, I seek out Dmitry's friends and colleagues to find out more about what happened. Tatiana Moskvina was best friends with Dmitry since college. And when I meet her at her home, she is visibly still in shock.

[00:06:30] Tatiana Moskvin: (speaking in a foreign language)

Translator, Tat: (translating) When I try and imagine that our neat, intelligent Dmitry was killed with a knife in the tidy apartment where I have been. He cleaned it twice a week. Everything had its place. Books, CDs ... A vase of flowers was carefully placed on the window sill. I cannot imagine that apartment covered in blood.

[00:07:00] Amy Mackinnon: Police believe Dmitry met his killer on an online dating site and invited the man to his apartment. Homophobic vigilantes have been known to prowl these sites, luring gay men and women out on dates only to humiliate, attack, or even kill them.

When the police found Dmitry, he was lying in a pool of blood with multiple stab wounds. His killer had taken his cell phone, his laptop, and house keys, leaving him trapped to bleed to death in his own home.

[00:07:30] By the time I meet Tatiana, the police have arrested a 21-year-old student, Sergei Kosyrev, on suspicion of murder. Local media reported that during police questioning, he said that his life was quote "a crusade against certain social groups", and that he'd asked to be referred to as "the Cleaner." Kosyrev's lawyer has dismissed these statements as total nonsense, but Tatiana believes the police have got their guy.

[00:08:00] "The case is closed," she tells me with a heavy sigh.

Tatiana Moskvin: (speaking in a foreign language)

Translator, Tat: (translating) Imagine, all his life, Dmitry wrote about art and culture, and he ended up in the crime pages.

Amy Mackinnon: I go to the offices of St. Petersburg Delovoy, where Dmitry worked for years. It's the city's leading business paper, and it's well-known for its independent stance.

[00:08:30] When I meet with Dmitry's editor, another Dmitry, Dmitri Grozny, he blames politicians and state-owned media for stirring up this hatred.

Dmitri Grozny: (speaking in a foreign language)

Translator, Dmi: (translating) In Russia now, there is such a concentrated amount of hatred. At any given time, you can just turn on the TV and watch the news. It's Orwellian. They're fomenting hate where they tell people to hate their neighbors, and unfortunately, it's directed towards gay people.

[00:09:00] Amy Mackinnon: I head to St. Isaac's Square, a busy plaza in the center of the city that is emblematic of St. Petersburg's imperial style and is dominated by Mariinsky Palace, built by Tsar Nicholas as a gift to his daughter. It's now home to the St. Petersburg city legislature.

I'm here to meet a member of the assembly, Vitaly Milonov. In 2012, he became the face of homophobia here when he masterminded the city's infamous gay propaganda law. The law is so vaguely worded and bizarre that it can be difficult to explain.

[00:09:30] It's based on the assumption that LGBT people propagandize to children by supposedly spreading their ideas to them. So the law prohibits any public portrayals of LGBT issues in a positive or even neutral way. So that means no articles in magazines, no gay characters on TV, no support for LGBT kids in school, nothing.

The St. Petersburg law paved the way for a nationwide ban one year later. Milonov-

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Speaker 1: ... pave the way for a nationwide ban one year later. [Milanov 00:10:03] is also the guy who said that gay athletes could be arrested at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia.

He's a busy man, but he readily agrees to meet me in his office. While I wait, I chat with some of his staff members, two giggly interns and his assistant, [Ilia 00:10:23]. I ask them what they think of their bosses sponsorship of the gay propaganda law.

Speaker 5: Like spring's first day ... like the sunshine. Homophobic's are beautiful, that's a rainbow.

[00:10:30] Speaker 1: Just in case you didn't catch that, Ilia is comparing homophobia to spring's first day. He says it is a beautiful thing, like a rainbow. I get the signal that Milanov is ready, and I'm shown to his office.

Before I continue, I just want to give a quick heads up. Milanov is known for making controversial statements, so I'm expecting to hear some of the slurs and hate-speech that he is infamous for. He shifts uncomfortably in his chair, and scarcely makes eye contact during our interview.

[00:11:00] Why did you feel it was necessary to introduce such a bill?

Rolotov: We have to face moral dangers, moral factors of present-world ... Like homosexual propaganda, which is a disgusting, immoral disease of a modern, anti-Christian society.

[00:11:30] Speaker 1: Milanov is a devoutly religious man. The walls of his room are lined with religious icons, and a black flag which reads, "Orthodoxy or Death," hangs behind his desk.

There is no nationwide monitoring of hate crimes committed against LGBT people in Russia. Local and international rights groups piece together what they can, and both have reported a sharp increase in homophobic and transphobic violence, as the gay propaganda law was passed.

Human Rights Watch blames this violence on the anti-gay rhetoric coming from politicians and state media. I ask Milanov what he makes of this.

Rolotov: Human Rights Watch is a cheap piece of ***bleep***, I'm sorry for my French. We have known of serious figures of [inaudible 00:12:26]- of violence against homosexuals.

[00:12:30] There is quite a big number of criminal cases, that are conducted with the homosexuals, because many homosexuals - at the same time - they love little kids.

Speaker 1: Do you have any evidence of that?

Speaker 5: Yeah, sure, absolutely.

Speaker 1: Where?

Speaker 5: It's justice statistics.

Speaker 1: This anti-gay myth is standard rhetoric, not just in Russia, but anywhere the people are attacking the LGBT community. In St. Petersburg, these kind of statements have inspired violence against LGBT people ... the kind of violence that police believe lead to the murder of [Dimitri Seleakin 00:13:07], which I ask about next.

[00:13:00] If I could give you a very recent example, right here in St. Petersburg, I'm sure you've heard about the murder of journalist Dimitri Seleakin, who was stabbed in his apartment. It's believed that this was motivated by the fact that he was gay.

Speaker 5: There's just ...

Speaker 1: The young man who killed him ...

Speaker 5: I know this case.

Speaker 1: Local media have reported that he was an admirer of yours.

[00:13:30] Speaker 5: This guy- what happened with him- this old faggot got acquainted via the internet with a young guy. He invited him to his house, either to rape him ... At least the main reason for this invitation was sexual harassment.

Speaker 1: But that's not what the police believe, at all. They think that the suspected murderer set up the date with Dimitri, with the intention to kill him.

[00:14:00] My interview with Milanov goes on for awhile, and he continues to spout the hate-filled propaganda that has turned this cultured city into the epicenter of the anti-gay movement in Russia.

The next day, I managed to set up an interview with one of the city's most infamous anti-gay vigilantes, [Tward Rolotov 00:14:27]. Like Dimitri's suspected killer, he also calls himself, "The Cleaner."

[00:14:30] Rolotov has not been known to be violent, but he does seek to destroy the livelihoods of LGBT people, by combing through the social media accounts of St. Petersburg teachers, singling out the ones he suspects of being gay, and reporting them to their schools.

We agree to meet at his office in the District Council building, but as I'm in the taxi on my way there, he messages me with a different meeting point. This last minute switch makes me nervous. We meet at his rented office, a cramped and claustrophobic room. The rest of the building seems to be empty.

[00:15:00] As I walk in, I notice a camera set up on a tripod, so that he can film whatever happens next. Rolotov's assistant, a tall man in a roll neck sweatshirt, sits in the corner of the room, and fixes a silent stare on us.

[00:15:30] The feeling that maybe I've been set up doesn't seem so paranoid anymore, given how many journalists have been attacked for their reporting, here in Russia. I ask Rolotov to introduce himself, and he jumps straight to the point.

Rolotov: The fight for the unifying moral issues of traditional family values, for faith, for the Fatherland, for the [right of 00:15:51] statehood.

Speaker 1: Rolotov is deeply proud of his work, and boasts about how many teachers he claims to have gotten fired.

Rolotov: At first it was 29, but now it's more like 50. Some [went through the scandal 00:16:06], went through the courts. The more prudent perverts, who understands that they're Russian, chose to [quiz 00:16:00] themselves.

[00:16:00] Speaker 1: It's not actually illegal in Russia to be a teacher if you're gay, but if a teacher is publicly outed the stigma is so strong, that they won't last long in their position.

Rolotov speaks with such a single-minded hatred of LGBT people, that at one point he actually breaks out into a sweat. When I ask what he thinks of the attacks on LGBT people in the city, he says he doesn't condone violence against homosexuals, but he certainly doesn't condemn it, either.

Rolotov: Well, [inaudible 00:16:49]. Why are we always talking about gay people as victims? Why are we not talking about the actions of these homosexuals? These lesbians and faggots? What they do to provoke correction?

[00:16:30] Speaker 1: Halfway through the interview, I notice a handgun sitting on the table next to him. I'm too afraid to ask what it's for.

[00:17:00] By the time I leave, I am so on edge that I head straight to a Dive bar across the street, and settle my nerves with a shot of vodka. I'm glad the interview is over, but it's not long before I bump into Rolotov again.

[00:17:30] I'm here in St. Petersburg on the 15th of April, it's actually the Day of Silence. There is an international day, used by LGBT activists in many countries, as kind of a day of remembrance for people who have been killed, or harassed, or bullied for being gay.

Local activists have organized a meeting here in the center of St. Petersburg, in front of the train station. Events like this are quite often broken up by skinheads, or by the police, so I'm interested to see how this is going to go. There's already a very heavy police presence. I can see a truck of the [Amman 00:17:59], which is Russian special forces, sitting out front.

[00:18:00] Tward Rolotov, who we met yesterday has shown up, to disrupt the event. He's got a broom with a toy rat hanging off it. The toy rat is holding rainbow flags, and he's walking around telling people watching that these are perverts.

So there's a group of two dozen or so young activists. I watch them put duct tape over their mouths. It's a symbolic gesture of silence. They walk down the city's main street [inaudible 00:18:34] [Prospect 00:18:34]. Along the way, I get chatting to Mark, an activist for a local LGBT group called, "Coming Out."

[00:18:30] Mark's job today is to document any acts of hate speech or homophobic violence at the demonstration. As a transgender person himself, Mark is at an even greater risk of being harassed or attacked on the street. He tells me that at today's protest, someone has already verbally attacked one of their activists.

[00:19:00] "Who was it? Who tried to attack him?"

Speaker 4: Just some [real 00:19:08] guy. He was very young. He was speaking in just some government propaganda. "We are orthodox country. We have traditions. You have no place here."

Speaker 1: Does it frighten you?

Speaker 4: No, not now. I was very frightened before, but then my friend committed suicide because of homophobia. Then I [decide 00:20:00] that silence will not help anyone, and I must speak for myself, and for those who cannot speak themselves.

[00:19:30] Speaker 1: Just moments after we speak, the police show up with a loud speaker, telling everyone that the protest is illegal. In Russia, to hold any kind of protest or demonstration which involves more than just one person, you have to go to the city to get a special permit.

[00:20:00] Out of nowhere, the police just rush other protesters and line them up against the wall.

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Amy: Out of nowhere, the police just rush at the protesters and line them up against the wall. Some of them stand with their mouths still taped up in silence, but others try and reason with the police. And then seemingly at random, seven of the activists are just picked out of the lineup and taken away to police vans parked around the corner.

The next day, I head down to one of the city's small LGBT community centers. It's in the heart of the city, but tucked away in a basement unmarked. You'd never guess it was here.

[00:20:30] I'm greeted by a veteran of the city's LGBT activist movement, Alexei. He has asked that we don't use his last name, out of fear he could be targeted. It's a humble space, three rooms and hardly any furniture. But despite their tiny budget, they've done what they can to make it cozy.

A number of young activists from the center were arrested in yesterday's demonstration. They were charged $200 each for participating in an unsanctioned protest. That's a small fortune in a country where the national minimum wage is just $109 per month.

[00:21:00] They've gathered here tonight to discuss what happened yesterday. They've asked for privacy, so I step into the next room to have a chat with Alexei.

Alexei: It's very important to us to protect the right to be who we are. As for me? I have got so much support. I'm ready to help to the people around in return.

[00:21:30] Amy: It's been a long week in St. Petersburg and I am exhausted by all the hatred that I have seen. But when I ask Alexei if he has hope for the future, he says he does.

Alexei: Hope? I do. I do.

Amy: Despite everything that's going on, he speaks with such determination, such optimism, that his voice begins to crack.

[00:22:00] Alexei: We are at risk, but my optimism helps me to believe that everything will be good sooner or later. Not now, not in a year, not in three years, but in twenty years, everything will be fine. I'm sure.

Al Letson: That report was from Amy MacKinnon of Coda Story. Since the story first aired, Sergei Kosarev pled guilty to murdering journalist Dmitry Tsilikin. The murder investigation concluded that the killing wasn't a hate crime, just the result of a quarrel. And remember Vitaly Milonov? He was a controversial local politician that Amy spoke with. Well, he's gone on to become a member of the Russian National Parliament. In the past couple of months, he's made headlines for anti-Semitism, wanting to investigate the Freemasons, and suggesting the new Power Rangers movie be banned.

[00:23:00] The crackdown on the gay community in St. Petersburg became a blueprint for Vladimir Putin's national policy, a policy that's finding support from religious activists in our own backyard. That's next on Reveal. From the Center of Investigative Reporting and PRX.

[00:23:30] Advertisment: Today's show's sponsored by TalkSpace, the online therapy company. For as little as $32 a week, you can work with an experienced, licensed therapist, handpicked just for you. On TalkSpace you can send texts, audio and video messages to your therapist, and talk about your life or just work on feeling just a little bit happier.

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[00:24:00] Al Letson: From the Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX. This is Reveal. I'm Al Letson.

The kind of gay bashing we just heard about isn't just happening in St. Petersburg. Over the past few years, it's become common across Russia and even in some of the neighboring countries. Here to help us understand why this is happening is Natalia Antelava from Coda Story, our partner in this episode. Welcome Natalia.

[00:24:30] Natalia: Thanks, good to be here.

Al Letson: So, the anti-gay movement, is this a product of zealous local politicians? Or is it something bigger than that?

Natalia: I think this is one of the things we were trying to understand when we started this deep dive into what we call the LGBT crisis in Russia and in the neighboring countries. Trying to understand what is it that is truly driving it. And yes, while the violence has been carried out by local vigilantes, people who have always hated gays. The question we really wanted to answer is really, "Why now?" Why weren't gays being attached to this extent back in the 1990's when the crime was much higher in Russia than today. So what is it that's making it such an issue now?

[00:25:00] I think one of the things we found out is that really this hatred against gay people goes always back up to the Kremlin and to Vladimir Putin.

[00:25:30] Al Letson: Now does that have to do with Vladimir Putin's image of being a very manly man? Is it something that he's just pushing against because you know LGBT doesn't really jibe with him riding around with no shirt on and wrestling bears and that type of thing?

Natalia: Sure, that's part of it for sure. We know the public persona of Putin that is projected. I think the question is whether, Is Putin homophobic himself? And personally, I don't think he is because there are plenty of people in his government who are gay. So no, I don't think he's personally, necessarily a homophobe.

[00:26:00] Al Letson: So if it's not homophobia then, what is it?

Natalia: I think it's some pretty clever political thinking and strategizing. I think what Vladimir Putin has managed to do is turn homophobia into an instrument for strengthening his power. To understand how he did it, I think one thing that we need to understand is what happened in Russia in 2011. Here, let me play you this bit of audio. [crowd screaming/riot sounds]

[00:26:30] Al Letson: So, what's happening here? It sounds like a riot.

Natalia: It is a riot. It's the sound of the Russian police clashing with protesters back in 2011, beating them with batons, arresting them, pushing them into cars. This happened after tens of thousands of people took to the streets of Moscow after Vladimir Putin's party won parliamentary elections in 2011. Opposition back then said that Putin rigged the election and stole the victory. The Russians who were already fed up with this deep seeded cronyism and corruption in the Russian government decided to come out into the streets. These were in fact the biggest protests since the collapse of the Soviet Union. There was a massive crack down on all sorts of descent. The Western media was very much focused on the anti-gay legislation, on the anti-gay rhetoric, and that diverted the media's attention from the real crackdown that was happening.

[00:27:30] Al Letson: So let me get this straight. Basically what you're saying is that is a bait and switch. Like he's focusing eyes on the LGBT issue, but he's actually arresting democratic protestors who are probably more of a threat to his reign than LGBT people?

[00:28:00] Natalia: Absolutely. The anti-gay legislation was, in a way, a diversion tactic for Putin. He calculated that the western media would become obsessed with the anti-gay legislation, which they did. There were hundreds and hundreds of stories dedicated to the anti-gay legislation and only a handful dedicated to that real crackdown on dissent that happened. So on one hand, the anti-gay rhetoric coming from the Kremlin, certainly unleashed a very frightening violence against gay people in Russia, but at the same time, it was a little bit of a diversion tactic in order to really clam down on political descent that was threatening Putin's rule.

[00:28:30] Al Letson: So this strategy that Putin has put together, it sounds like it's really working out for him.

Natalia: It looks like it really is. And it's incredible that homophobia can be a political strategy. Vladimir Putin seems to prove that it works. It worked for him at home. He has crashed the political descent. He has created an enemy at home that gays are seen as our enemy at home. After an exit in Crimea, and his intervention in Syria, his popularity has soared to the unprecedented 89%.

[00:29:00] What's really interesting, in my opinion, is that he has also managed to use this anti-gay rhetoric, this homophobia, to spread Russia's influence outside of its borders. And it's happening everywhere in the former Soviet Union, including the country where I am based, Georgia, where I recently attended a very curious international event.

[00:29:30] Natalia: It's a very windy day and I am in a taxi heading into Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia. This is the main highway that leads from the airport into the city. From the first glance, it's a pretty regular, four lane road, slightly dilapidated buildings on both sides.

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Speaker 1: So it's slightly dilapidated, buildings on both sides. Some of them have been spruced up, there's an apartment complex that's been painted bright pink to the right of me. But the rest of it is really the landscape that you pretty much get in any post-Soviet country.

What is unusual about this road, though, is its name. This is George W. Bush Highway. That's right. And down here is the man himself, waving and smiling from a giant poster just as we turn into the city.

[00:30:30] Speaker 2: My American friends find it totally bizarre that there is a major road here named after their controversial and not exactly internationally loved President. But Georgians, at least at the time, thought it was a great idea.

In 2005, Bush became the first US President ever to visit this tiny country. Hundreds of thousands of people came out to greet him.

George W. Bush: Laura and I were in the neighborhood, we thought we'd swing by and say [foreign language 00:31:06].

[00:31:00] Speaker 2: The visit was meant, above all else, to send a signal to the Kremlin. This was one superpower, the US, telling a former superpower that Georgia was now part of the Western world.

George W. Bush: You claimed your liberty, and because you acted, Georgia is today both sovereign and free, and a beacon of liberty for this region and the world.

Speaker 4: [foreign language 00:31:38]

[00:31:30] Speaker 2: Moscow was annoyed, Tbilisi was ecstatic. But today the dynamic here is shifting. Georgia is still very pro-American, but the anti-Russian sentiment has softened, because many Georgians like what Putin has to say about traditional values. His anti-LGBT rhetoric is spreading to Georgia in a big way and with it, Russia's influence here is enjoying a comeback.

[00:32:00] In May, I went to this conference in Tbilisi. It was organized by the World Congress of Families, which is an international organization that considers itself pro-family. Its anti-gay agenda sounds like something dreamt up by the Kremlin, but the group is based in Illinois.

[00:32:30] Hundreds of guests from all over the world filled the main conference hall in the city. Most of them were American. They came together to talk about ways to save the world from what they call the threat of homosexuality. Throughout the four days, there was a lot of praise for Moscow and for President Putin. Here's Allan Carlson, the founder and president of the organiZation.

Allan Carlson: I wish the president of my country was forceful in promoting and saying the right thing regarding family values, and also in protecting his country's interests as Putin is for Russia.

[00:33:00] Speaker 2: He says Russia now plays a key role in pushing their values globally.

Allan Carlson: And what kind of message are they trying to fit into our children, and we know the answer.

Speaker 2: Some of Putin's closest allies were at the meeting, like Alexey Komov. He's developed Moscow's growing connections with far right groups in Europe, and more and more with anti-abortion, anti-gay activists in the United States. He speaks several languages and charms the crowd with his wide smile and boyish good looks. He's giving a PowerPoint presentation, and this is not a joke, about what he calls satanic messages spread by Disney and Hollywood.

[00:33:30] Alexey Komov: Look at the toys for boys, like almost half of all the toys that are being offered in modern shops for our children are, you know, monsters and vampires, et cetera.

[00:34:00] Speaker 2: Komov says Russia on the other hand, is a pioneer in adopting what he calls pro-family laws, like banning any positive depiction of homosexuality on Russian TV. Afterwards, I tried several times to get Komov to tell me more about his government's policies.

[00:34:30] Tell me why you don't want to talk to me.

Alexey Komov: You want to make a propaganda out of this program, so I don't want to participate in your efforts, why should I? I'm a free person, I can refuse, right?

Speaker 2: Of course.

Alexey Komov: So please, don't bug me.

Speaker 2: I go back to Allan Carlson to ask him whether the fact that Putin's allies are so prominent at the event undermines the organization's supposedly apolitical nature.

[00:35:00] I understand that the Congress wants to distance itself from President Putin and his policies, and yet some of his strongest proponents, strongest supporters are present here. How do you walk that fine line? How do you embrace them without being seen as a tool for Moscow?

Allan Carlson: Well, you're right, it is a fine line. The World Congress of Families does not endorse political actions, let's say, like the annexation of Crimea. We also don't condemn it. We're trying to avoid being sucked into those kinds of political questions.

Levan Vasadze: [foreign language 00:35:45]

[00:35:30] Speaker 2: The things I was hearing at the conference mirror what you hear on Russia's state-controlled television.

This, for example, is Levan Vesadze. He's considered the most famous homophobe in Georgia. He does a lot of business in Russian, and is the one who brought this event to Tbilisi.

Levan Vasadze: [foreign language 00:36:07]

[00:36:00] Speaker 2: Here are three main points he made during his speech. Western liberalism is destroying the world, homosexuality is part of the American agenda, and the west has lost Georgia and must back off.

[00:36:30] Speaker after speaker takes the stage, and all of them say the same basic things. A German delegate says homosexuality has to be eradicated. A Russian representative calls the LGBT movement a new form of dictatorship, and this is Josiah Trenham, an Eastern Orthodox priest from California.

Josiah Trenham: And I have witnessed my nation disgrace itself before God and men. My counsel to beloved Georgians is this: stand firm in your faith against the LGBT revolution. Do not give in or your cities will become like San Francisco, where there are 80,000 more dogs in the city limits than there are children. Tell the LGBT-tolerant tyrants this lavender mafia, these homofascists, these rainbow radicals, that they are not welcome to promote their anti-religious and anti-civilizational propaganda in your nation.

[00:37:30] Speaker 2: And then, as he stands on stage in this packed concert hall, Father Trenham gives his interpretation of a passage from the Quran that he says calls for killing gay people. Even more shocking to me than what he's saying is the fact that people next to me start clapping.

Josiah Trenham: Muhammad is recorded as ordering the execution of anyone practicing sodomy. "If you find anyone doing as Lot's people did, kill the one who does it and the one to whom it is done." It's recorded in the Hadith. [inaudible 00:38:10]

[00:38:00] Speaker 2: As I listened to this, I wonder if he would dare to make this speech in the US, so after he's done talking, I pull him aside and ask him.

Josiah Trenham: Absolutely, I'm bewildered a bit by your question. Why would you ask me a question like that?

Speaker 2: The reason I ask you this question is because personally I thought your speech was very controversial.

[00:38:30] Josiah Trenham: What was controversial about my speech?

Speaker 2: Well, quite a few statements, but in particular there was a moment when you read from one of the the scriptures, I think it was the Hadith, about gays being killed.

Josiah Trenham: Yes.

Speaker 2: And people applauded.

Josiah Trenham: That particular reference you make is when I referred to the seventh Surah of the Quran, in which Islam presents homosexuality not just as a sin but as a crime, and as a capital crime, and there were some people who clapped and I was not happy with that, and if you noticed, I immediately continued my talk. I allowed no time for the clapping whatsoever.

[00:39:00] Speaker 2: And yet you didn't stop and say, "I don't want you to be clapping." You didn't emphasize, and a lot of people took that as an incitement of violence in a country which is known for really bad violence against the LGBT community.

[00:39:30] Josiah Trenham: You're suggesting things to me about Georgia that I do not agree with and do not accept. It's been my experience that those who are for provocation and violence are the LGBTs themselves, who are very aggressive and very openly mocking people of traditional faith, so the idea that somehow they are a threatened minority, I think that they are doing the threatening.

Section 4 of 5 [00:30:00 - 00:40:04]

Section 5 of 5 [00:40:00 - 00:53:07]

(NOTE: speaker names may be different in each section)

Father Trenham: ... minority, I think that they are doing the threatening.

N Antelava: Father Trenham doesn't have much time to talk, the conference is wrapping up, and everyone starts pouring out into the main street. The delegates are greeted by hundreds of local orthodox activists, as they all get ready to set off on a march across the city, carrying religious icons and signs quoting the bible.

[00:40:30] Just then, my phone rings. It's an LGBT activist whom I've interviewed before. He's panicking, because he says ten of his friends have just been arrested, for writing "love is equal" on the sidewalk only a few blocks away.

But here at the march there is a sense of celebration. I can see a woman from Germany who I talked to earlier and she told me that homosexuality was a dangerous infectious disease. Now she's chatting to a Georgian man who's holding an orthodox icon in a golden frame. And I start chatting with a tall, round faced man who turns out to represent an anti-abortion organization from Poland. He tells me why he thinks the Russian narrative is winning over the Western one.

[00:41:30] Speaker 3: The West has no idea how the Russian soul clicks, while the Russians have figured out Americans 100 percent. They know how to manipulate you, they're much better at it than you are. That's one thing. And you have to understand that, in the West, politicians are thinking in four year terms, you know?

Speaker 4: Re-election.

Speaker 3: Re-election and things like that. But in Russia, they think more like emperors.

[00:42:00] N Antelava: The procession swells as hundreds of people make their way down towards the very same square where George W. Bush spoke to crowds just over a decade ago. And just like then, they're Americans, and American flags, in the crowd here. Except now, they're waving in support of the idea that Russia is promoting.

[00:42:30] Al Letson: That story from Natalia Antelava of Coda Story, who's been looking at how Vladimir Putin and his government have been selling their message to the Russian people. When we come back, we'll look at Putin's propaganda machine. This is Reveal, from the Center for Investigative Reporting, and PRX.

[00:43:00] Julia B. Chan: Hey there listeners, Julia B. Chan here, Reveal's Digital Editor. As you've been hearing this hour, hateful anti-gay rhetoric is heard often in Russia; in speeches by politicians, and daily on television. These campaigns are unleashing a wave of vigilante violence against the gay community. On our website right now we have a photo essay that looks at both sides of this violence. Go to revealnews.org/lgbt to see the rage of Russian homophobia, and the resilience of those affected by it. Again, that's revealnews.org/lgbt.

Al Letson: From the Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX, this is Reveal, I'm Al Letson. All this hour, we've been revisiting stories about the LGBT community in Russia, and how they've become a target of politicians and vigilantes. These days it's dangerous to be gay, lesbian, transgender or bisexual in Russia. People have lost jobs, they've been harassed, physically attacked, and in some cases even killed because of who they are. This month, we learned about a targeted campaign against the LGBT community in the Russian republic of Chechnya. An independent newspaper reported that gay men there are being rounded up, taken to detention centers, and tortured. Natalia Antelava of Coda Story has been covering the anti-gay movement in Russia. Last fall when we first aired this story, I asked her how Vladimir Putin is spreading homophobic rhetoric throughout the country.

[00:44:30] N Antelava: Well a very simple answer to that is Russian television. I have watched a lot of Russian TV in the past few months and I have come to the conclusion that it's completely impossible to understand what is happening in Russia today without actually watching Russian TV. What happens when you do watch it is that you're transported into a parallel reality. All of the main channels are controlled by the Kremlin, and a lot of what happens on Russian television in that parallel reality is a very extreme homophobic rhetoric. There are dozens and dozens of examples that I could play you but here's one example and I'll translate what they say. (Translates:) "Today we will discuss how the Western expansion of sin into Russia is dangerous, how this problem stopped being about gender and became political. Western European sodomites," and this is how the Russians refer to homosexuals on television, "are attempting to penetrate Russia, and create a protest movement here among our Russian perverts."

[00:46:00] This is not some marginal channel, this is prime time program on one of the main, most popular channels in Russia. Millions of people watch it, and all of the television is state controlled, and there is a very strong sense that is created by Russian TV that Russia is under attack, that it's under siege, and that the west is waging a war and that bizarre as it sounds that homosexuality is one of the main instruments for the west in this attack against Russia.

[00:46:30] Al Letson: So what does the state funded media use to prove that the west is attacking Russia?

N Antelava: You know they all live in a slightly post factual world where facts don't matter as much as the narratives. And all these narratives are based on myths, and if you dig deeper into the myths there is a kind of some little bit of kind of factual information that is then kind of ballooned and packaged into lies. We tried at Coda Story, we tried to dig in into a few of the very dominant myths, because there's some things that have really become part of the public discourse.

[00:48:00] Recently I was speaking to a Georgian orthodox priest who said to me, "Do you know that in Europe children are forced to masturbate from age four?" And these are things that are broadcast on state TV, and then are repeated by thousands of people across the region, and they kind of become accepted narratives. They're myths that replace facts. But all of them have a little bit, like a little grain of truth, somewhere in them is like a little seed of kind of a fact that then grows out to this myth. And for example this story about the masturbation is that apparently there is a world health organization document that says that children from about age three or age four can be seen as touching their genitalia and it's completely normal. And this in Russia somehow has turned into children being forced to masturbate from age four. And this happens again and again with all sorts of stories, with all sorts of myths that are presented as facts and are used in this narrative that Russia is under attack from the West.

Al Letson: So it's clear that Vladimir Putin is using his anti-LGBT agenda to basically solidify his rule in Russia, and also to make the Western world the Bogeyman that he can fight up against. So we know how that's played out in Russia but what does that mean in a larger context for the world?

[00:48:30] N Antelava: I think the really, really important thing to understand is that all of this stuff that is being said on Russian TV, all of them have very, very real impact on the world that we live in. One of the big conflicts today in the world is the conflict over Ukraine, it has changed the balance of power, it has changed Russia's relationship with Europe, and Russia's relationship with the United States. It has had huge consequences, it has really affected the war in Syria, it's all interconnected. And yet I can't begin to tell you how much that anti-gay rhetoric, what a role it played in the Ukraine conflict.

[00:49:00] In the beginning of the, I covered the Ukraine war for throughout, and I was always amazed that every time people who wanted to break away from Ukraine, who would say to me, and I quote, "We need to fight, because if we don't, these homo-fascists from Europe will come and force us into homosexual marriages."

[00:49:30] Al Letson: Wow.

N Antelava: And this is being said to me in the middle of a real war when real people are dying.

Al Letson: Natalia, one final question before we go. Here in the United States, obviously there are issues with LGBT rights and obviously there are vigilantes who do crazy, ridiculous things here. But nothing on the scale of what feels like state sponsored terrorism against a community. And I'm just curious for you, as a reporter and editor working on these type of stories, what's that like? What's that like to hear these stories day in, day out; to go to a war torn area and understand that the media is fueling this anti LGBT agenda that really has very little to do with LGBT people?

[00:50:00] N Antelava: Mostly it's hugely frustrating, because you do feel like they're two parallel realities and they're two bubbles, and people are very much choosing sides and not speaking to each other. And it's very hard to imagine a way out of it, and I think it's very frustrating to see the Western media really struggle with covering it, because I don't think then the Western media has fully realized what they're dealing with.

[00:50:30] Al Letson: Natalia Antelava of Coda Story, thank you so much for bringing us this piece.

N Antelava: My pleasure, thanks a lot.

[00:51:00] Al Letson: Our show today was reported by our partners at Coda Story, a new media venture that does in-depth crisis reporting. You can learn more about their coverage of the anti-gay movement in Russia by visiting revealnews.org.

[00:51:30] And this is the part where I get to tell you about one of my favorite podcasts, it's one of the original true crime podcasts: Criminal from our friends at Radiotopia. So Criminal is hosted by the amazing Phoebe Judge. It's a show that tells stories about people who've done wrong, who've been wronged, or caught somewhere in the middle. Each episode focuses on someone's personal true life experience. Time Magazine calls it, "The purest true crime series," and New York Magazine says, "There are few shows that feel more alive," and more importantly, Al Letson says, "You need to go check this out right now." Every episode is different, some are funny, some are tragic, but they'll all change the way you look at the world around you. Learn more at thisiscriminal.com or subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

[00:52:00] Updates to this episode were produced by Julia B. Chan and edited by David Ritsher, Taki Telonidis was the Senior Editor, and Katharine Mieszkowski was our Lead Producer. Our sound design team is the wonder twins, my man J Breezy, that's Jim Briggs and Clare 'C Note' Mullen. Our Head of Studio's Christa Scharfenberg, Amy Pyle's our Editor in Chief, Susanne Reber is our Executive Editor and our Executive Producer is Kevin Sullivan. Our theme music is by Camerado: Lightning. Support for Reveal's provided by The Reva and David Logan Foundation, Fort Foundation, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, The John S. And James L. Knight Foundation, and The Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation.

[00:52:30] Reveal is a co-production of the Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX. I'm Al Letson and remember, there is always more to the story.