81-year-old Russian TV presenter launches stunning attack on country’s anti-gay laws
By Will Stroude
Veteran Russian broadcaster Vladimir Posner has launched a stunning attack on his home country’s anti-gay ‘propaganda’ laws, arguing they are completely pointless because it’s “impossible to make anyone gay”.
In a stirring interview with business-gazeta.ru, picked up by Gay Star News, the 81-year-old journalist – who spent much of his career as the Soviet Union’s main spokesperson to the West – told reporters in no uncertain terms that a person’s sexuality has “nothing to do” with anyone else, and that anti-gay legislation introduced by President Vladimir Putin back in 2013 should be overturned.
“What business is it of yours? It has nothing to do with you!” Posner said. “If two adult men want to sleep together, let them sleep. If you don’t like it, you don’t have to have sex with them.”
Asked about the LGBT community “imposing their culture” on Russia, he countered: “What does it mean to to ‘impose’? If I love women, but not men, who am I ‘imposing’?”
“It is no crime to be gay,” he added. “If you believe God made the world, well, 10% of the world’s population are gay. Are you going to argue with what God decided for 10% of the world?”
Probed about the “Western craze” of “young people wanting to change their sex”, he fired back the question itself was “ignorant”.
“No one would ever change their sex on a whim,” he replied. “It is not a craze at all.”
Born in Paris in 1934, Posner began his journalistic career in 1961 on Soviet Life magazine, before spending much of the Cold War presenting the nightly Radio Moscow News and Commentary programme.
Last year, he was honoured with one of GLAAD’s first ever Gold Medals for LGBT Inclusion last year following his outspoken defence of Russia’s LGBT community.
Vladimir, we salute you.
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