Queer in Russia: A Story of Sex, Self, and the Other

by Laurie Essig

In Queer in Russia Laurie Essig examines the formation of gay identity and community in the former Soviet Union. As a sociological fieldworker, she began her research during the late 1980s, before any kind of a public queer identity existed in that country. After a decade of conducting interviews, as well as observing and analyzing plays, books, pop music, and graffiti, Essig presents the first sustained study of how and why there was no Soviet gay community or even gay identity before perestroika and the degree to which this situation has—or has not—changed.
While male homosexual acts were criminalized in Russia before 1993, women attracted to women were policed by the medical community, who saw them less as criminals than as diseased persons potentially cured by drug therapy or transsexual surgery. After describing accounts of pre- perestroika persecution, Essig examines the more recent state of sexual identities in Russia. Although the fall of communism brought new freedom to Russian queers, there are still no signs of a mass movement forming around the issue, and few identify themselves as lesbians or gay men, even when they are involved in same-sex relations. Essig does reveal, however, vibrant manifestations of gay life found at the local level—in restaurants, discos, clubs, and cruising strips, in newspapers, journals, literature, and the theater. Concluding with a powerful exploration of the surprising affinities between some of Russia’s most prominent nationalists and its queers, Queer in Russia fills a gap in both Russian and cultural studies.

Genres: Nonfiction, LGBT, Queer, Russia, Politics

272 pages, Paperback

First published June 24, 1999

About the author

Laurie Essig teaches sociology at Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vermont. She has written for a variety of publications, including Legal Affairs, Salon, and the Chronicle of Higher Education. She blogs for the Chronicle's Brainstorm blog.

Reviews

[Marius · Rating 4 out of 5]

First and foremost, this book is an incredibly valuable historical document, being researched and written in the 90s in Russia, at a time when absolutely nothing was certain, and even less so the future of queers in the country. The author takes part in the queer activism of the time, seems to personally know all the important actors and describes the formational events of the movements. Even though the author is a scholar, the theory steps back, but through its connection to the actual events still makes powerful points.

Nevertheless, the author's account are extremely personal. Most of the information stems from her own experience or interviews with friends and acquaintances, only sometimes from newspaper articles. This gets problematic when she starts speculating about public figures' sexuality or very personally attacks the ignorant but probably well-meaning non-Russian organizers of workshops or festivals in Russia over a couple of pages.

The subjectivity culminates in the afterword, when the author reports a dream that she had, discussing it for probably half a page. Much of this personal account happens in the footnotes. And there are many of it - sometimes four in a sentence, resulting in 50 pages of footnotes for 175 pages of text, so you are basically skipping to the end of the book all the time.

Nevertheless, I have learned more from this book than from most non-fiction reports I have read. How homosexuality or queerness has historically been shaped as a subjectivity and not an identity in Russia, how queerness and nationalism went hand in hand in the 90s and why queer movements have never managed to establish queerness in the public discourse. This makes it an amazing read to understand today's Russia and its repressiveness against sexual minorities.

[Liza · Rating 5 out of 5]

I took the photo on the cover of this book. It's a fine book, too.

[Dmitry · Rating 2 out of 5]

(The English review is placed beneath the Russian one)

На сегодняшний момент книга полностью устарела, т.е. сегодня ситуация с ЛГБТ движением совершенно другая и более трагическая. Пускай и в 90-ых ситуация с правами ЛГБТ в России была не намного лучше, но по крайне мере прямого преследования за любые публикации на тему ЛГБТ не существовало. Действительно, автор в своей книге довольно точно передаёт общее настроение царивших тогда порядков. Однако даже в этом случаи книга не способна передать отношение общества и государства к гомосексуалистам.

Проблема в том, что эта книга не является академическим исследованием, а скорее напоминает персональный взгляд автора на то, как жилось гомосексуалам в столице России в то время. В этом смысле книга не способна ответить на вопрос, каково было настроение всего общества, а так же регионального правительства в отношении сексуальных меньшинств. Да и понять как власть и общество относилось к ЛГБТ даже в столице, тоже довольно трудно. Автор описывает собственные взаимоотношения как с гей-активистами, так и собственные ощущение. В этом смысле книга интересна только как личный взгляд автора.

С другой стороны, у меня возникло ощущение, что автор пыталась найти чёрную кошку в чёрной комнате, в которой этой кошки и нет. Я хочу сказать, что в 90-ые в России мало кого интересовала ЛГБТ тематика. Она действительно присутствовала в медиа, пускай никто из известных людей открыто не заявлял о своей гомосексуальной ориентации, однако ни общество, ни российская власть практически никак не преследовала этих людей (хотя да, были эксцессы). Но как мне показалось, именно эти преследования, нападки на ЛГБТ комьюнити и пыталась отыскать автор. Получилось не очень удачно, так как отрыто никто в то время против ЛГБТ не выступал. То, что в России тогда само ЛГБТ движение имело очень странные взгляды, порой выражающиеся в негативном отношении к самому ЛГБТ, а так же некий хаос внутри этого движения, в частности внутри российский ЛГБТ активистов, объясняется внезапно упавшей свободой и неумением и незнанием как быть открытым гомосексуалом в стране, в которой на протяжении веков гомосексуалов преследовали и репрессировали. В этом смысле мне абсолютно понятно непонимание автора, когда она столкнулась с российскими ЛГБТ активистами.

Но что это даёт сегодня – вот главный вопрос, который остаётся после прочтения книги. Сегодня любое упоминание об ЛГБТ чревато уголовным или административным наказанием из-за чего книги в нынешней России, если в них упоминаются гомосексуальные персонажи, цензурируются и то же самое происходит и с фильмами, когда из фильмов вырезаются целые куски только из-за присутствия персонажа-гомосексуалиста. Так что сегодня Россия в этом вопросе напоминает СССР, за исключением последнего шага который Россия ещё не сделала, а именно введение уголовное наказание за мужеложство. Как итог, книга интересна исключительно с исторической перспективы, т.е. какой была ситуация с ЛГБТ комьюнити в 90-ые, да и то, книга предлагает очень узкий т.е. персональный взгляд на эту тему.

Отдельно хочу процитировать единственный момент в книге который меня заинтересовал, но который никак не связан с ЛГБТ темой, но который важен с точки зрения той видимости сексуальных свобод, которая имелась в период правления Ельцина.

During the Emergency Rule that descended on Moscow after the 1993 attempted coup, the Yeltsin government temporarily shut down those newspapers it deemed "oppositional." Unexpectedly, the erotic newspaper Eshche (More) was shut down along with Pravda and Sovetskaia Rossiia. Forty thousand copies of the erotic paper were confiscated from the apartment of Zufar Gareev. The paper's publisher, Aleksei Kostin, was also arrested. According to press accounts, no official warrants were presented to justify either the arrest or the search. Two of the persons involved in the arrest did offer their own justifications. One, an arresting officer who did not give his name, said: " 'We should have destroyed the sexually anxious a long time ago.' " A certain Detective Matveev was even more to the point: "I ... am categorically against the sex act." After three days, Kostin was released, although the confiscated papers were never returned. After his release, Kostin managed to produce several more issues of the paper. Then, on 3 February I994, Kostin was arrested again. This time he was charged with violating Article 228 of the Criminal Code, which prohibits "the manufacture and sale of pornographic materials" and carries a prison term of three years. During the course of the arrest, a fax machine, private correspondence, and letters to the paper were taken. Even before any trial Kostin was placed in a general holding cell in Moscow's Butyrskii Prison. Kostin continued to be held in this cell, one described as so overcrowded that the prisoners are forced to sleep in three shifts.45 Even more shocking, Kostin remained in prison for over a year awaiting a trial, despite the fact that the Russian Processing Code only allows for a maximum pretrial imprisonment of nine months. Criminal proceedings were launched against the editor and a distributor of the paper.

The charge of pornography seemed ludicrous on several levels. First, Eshche can hardly be described as a marginal publication, especially given the number of other erotic/pornographic publications that can be bought at any metro station in Moscow. By comparison, Eshche seems much more like Playboy than Screw. Second, Kostin is the publisher (i.e., neither the creator nor distributor) of Eshche. Neither the paper's editor nor the persons selling it were immediately charged. Third, Kostin never received any warnings that his paper was in violation of the Criminal Code. In fact, Eshche had been legally registered with the Ministry of Publications for several years. Finally, Kostin's arrest seemed like a clear violation of the new laws protecting freedom of speech and the press.

Возможно, кому-то может показать, что данный случай не имеет большого значения, но на самом деле в России никогда и не было бизнеса, который бы занимался созданием или распространением порнографической продукции, поэтому подобных дел не так много. Но главное здесь не это, а то, что уже в самом начале так называемой «демократической» России эта демократичность была очень ограниченной, что и являлось предвестником скорого возврата к диктатуре.

По непонятной для меня причине все диктаторские режимы или как минимум большая их часть занимается преследованиями и репрессиями в отношении тех, кто производит и распространяет порнографическую продукцию и в этом смысле свобода или не свобода в вопросе производства и/или распространения порнографической продукции является хорошим маркером того, движется ли страна в сторону демократии и свободы или в сторону запретов, диктатуры, тоталитаризма или как минимум, консерватизма. Тогда мало кто обратил внимание на это дело, но сегодня это дело явственно сигнализирует, что сексуальная сторона жизни российского гражданина не является исключительно его частным делом, т.е. что российское государство считает правильным решать, какую эротическую (порнографическую) продукцию может гражданин потреблять, а какую ему запрещено. В этом смысле преследование ЛГБТ движения является последствием того, что в 90-ых годах так и не была дана сексуальная свобода российским гражданам, т.е. что даже в 90-ые годы российское государство считало нужным и важным регулировать, контролировать, а так же цензурировать сферу эротики и порнографии.




As of today, the book is completely outdated; that is, the situation regarding the LGBT movement is now entirely different and far more tragic. Although the situation regarding LGBT rights in Russia in the 1990s was not much better, at least there was no direct persecution for any publications on LGBT topics. Indeed, in his book, the author quite accurately captures the general mood of the times. However, even in this case, the book fails to convey the attitude of society and the state toward homosexuals.

The problem is that this book is not an academic study, but rather reflects the author’s personal perspective on what life was like for gay people in Russia’s capital at the time. In this sense, the book is unable to answer the question of what the general public’s attitude was—or that of the regional government—toward sexual minorities. And it is also quite difficult to understand how the authorities and society viewed LGBT people, even in the capital. The author describes his own relationships with gay activists as well as his own feelings. In this sense, the book is interesting only as the author’s personal perspective.

On the other hand, I got the impression that the author was trying to find a black cat in a dark room where there wasn’t one to begin with. What I mean is that in the 1990s, very few people in Russia were interested in LGBT issues. It was certainly present in the media, even if no famous people openly declared their homosexual orientation; however, neither society nor the Russian authorities persecuted these people in any meaningful way (though, yes, there were incidents). But it seemed to me that it was precisely this persecution, these attacks on the LGBT community, that the author was trying to uncover. It didn’t turn out very well, since no one was openly opposing the LGBT community at the time. The fact that the LGBT movement in Russia at that time held very peculiar views—sometimes expressed as a negative attitude toward the LGBT community itself—as well as a certain degree of chaos within the movement, particularly among Russian LGBT activists, can be explained by the sudden surge of freedom and the lack of skill and knowledge regarding how to be an openly gay person in a country where homosexuals had been persecuted and repressed for centuries. In this sense, I completely understand the author’s confusion when she encountered Russian LGBT activists.

But what does this achieve today? That is the main question that remains after reading the book. Today, any mention of LGBT people carries the risk of criminal or administrative punishment, which is why books in present-day Russia are censored if they feature homosexual characters, and the same thing happens with films, where entire scenes are cut simply because of the presence of a homosexual character. So today, Russia resembles the USSR in this regard, with the exception of the final step that Russia has not yet taken: the introduction of criminal punishment for sodomy. In conclusion, the book is interesting solely from a historical perspective—that is, regarding the situation of the LGBT community in the 1990s—and even then, the book offers a very narrow, i.e., personal, view on the subject.

I’d like to single out one particular point in the book that caught my interest—a point that has nothing to do with the LGBT issue, but which is significant in terms of the visibility of sexual freedoms that existed during Yeltsin’s presidency.

During the Emergency Rule that descended on Moscow after the 1993 attempted coup, the Yeltsin government temporarily shut down those newspapers it deemed "oppositional." Unexpectedly, the erotic newspaper Eshche (More) was shut down along with Pravda and Sovetskaia Rossiia. Forty thousand copies of the erotic paper were confiscated from the apartment of Zufar Gareev. The paper's publisher, Aleksei Kostin, was also arrested. According to press accounts, no official warrants were presented to justify either the arrest or the search. Two of the persons involved in the arrest did offer their own justifications. One, an arresting officer who did not give his name, said: " 'We should have destroyed the sexually anxious a long time ago.' " A certain Detective Matveev was even more to the point: "I ... am categorically against the sex act." After three days, Kostin was released, although the confiscated papers were never returned. After his release, Kostin managed to produce several more issues of the paper. Then, on 3 February I994, Kostin was arrested again. This time he was charged with violating Article 228 of the Criminal Code, which prohibits "the manufacture and sale of pornographic materials" and carries a prison term of three years. During the course of the arrest, a fax machine, private correspondence, and letters to the paper were taken. Even before any trial Kostin was placed in a general holding cell in Moscow's Butyrskii Prison. Kostin continued to be held in this cell, one described as so overcrowded that the prisoners are forced to sleep in three shifts.45 Even more shocking, Kostin remained in prison for over a year awaiting a trial, despite the fact that the Russian Processing Code only allows for a maximum pretrial imprisonment of nine months. Criminal proceedings were launched against the editor and a distributor of the paper.

The charge of pornography seemed ludicrous on several levels. First, Eshche can hardly be described as a marginal publication, especially given the number of other erotic/pornographic publications that can be bought at any metro station in Moscow. By comparison, Eshche seems much more like Playboy than Screw. Second, Kostin is the publisher (i.e., neither the creator nor distributor) of Eshche. Neither the paper's editor nor the persons selling it were immediately charged. Third, Kostin never received any warnings that his paper was in violation of the Criminal Code. In fact, Eshche had been legally registered with the Ministry of Publications for several years. Finally, Kostin's arrest seemed like a clear violation of the new laws protecting freedom of speech and the press.

Some might argue that this particular case is of little significance, but in reality, there has never been a business in Russia dedicated to the production or distribution of pornographic material, which is why there aren’t many such cases. But the main point here is not that, but rather that from the very beginning of so-called “democratic” Russia, this democracy was very limited, which was a harbinger of a swift return to dictatorship.

For reasons I cannot fathom, all dictatorial regimes—or at least the vast majority of them—engage in persecution and repression against those who produce and distribute pornographic material; and in this sense, the presence or absence of freedom regarding the production and/or distribution of pornographic material serves as a good indicator of whether a country is moving toward democracy and freedom or toward prohibitions, dictatorship, totalitarianism, or at the very least, conservatism. At the time, few people paid attention to this case, but today it clearly signals that the sexual aspect of a Russian citizen’s life is not exclusively a private matter—that is, that the Russian state considers it appropriate to decide which erotic (pornographic) material a citizen may consume and which is prohibited. In this sense, the persecution of the LGBT movement is a consequence of the fact that Russian citizens were never granted sexual freedom in the 1990s; that is, even in the 1990s, the Russian state considered it necessary and important to regulate, control, and censor the realm of eroticism and pornography.

[Fenriz Angelo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Queer in Russia is the scholarly work of Laurie Essig, a sociologist deeply interested in Russia's queer community from mid 80's to mid 90's.

During the years she was in Moscow, Essig managed to amass an impresive amount of research by discovering and getting involved in queer activism, obtaining any documents mentioning homosexuality in either fiction or non-fiction works, and interviewing or hanging out with key members of queer Russian's groups that formed during her time there. All this expertly condensed in less than 300 pages.

Although it doesn't cover the period of time I was interest in (and to be honest this is the furthest I'd find on the subject historically), reading about the transition from the criminalization of homosexuality to a mild acceptance and how russians acted on and defined queerness was truly fascinating. Specifically when it comes to the failed attempts to create a political queer group to publicly fight for queer rights. Even Essig was bewildered in the beginning of her research because as an American lesbian from New York, she couldn't understand queer Russians not wanting to be part of a liberation movement, however, taking in the context of their cultural background, russian's were burned out of political propaganda and also the majority saw taking querness in a political sense like stripping themselves of russianess to label themselves solely by what they do in private which wasn't appealing at all. Something she truly understood years later when american and German members of queer rights organizations from their hometown came to Moscow to meet with fellow queer groups and organice a stonewall event (americans) and a queer film festival (germans). Both events resulted in a backlash from the russians whom saw westerns like colonizers and didn't like their patronizing attitude, Essig herself had the same sentiments. On top of all, russians saw westerner's queer expression vulgar, with no sense of aesthetics.

There's also an extensive analysis of the ties russian queerness has with nationalism and examines 3 prominent figures of neonazi/nationalist organizations who are also homosexuals, two of them publicly out who also have cooperated in queer organizations before getting involved in politics. Essig does a great job reflecting the attraction to such contradictory ideology and doesn't judge where these subjects come from.

This book was very enlightening, i learned not only about queer russian's lifestyles but also made me ponder about the complexity of sexuality as a whole.
In the end it made me curious to know how the queer community evolved in the 2000's when there was more openess and internet became more accessible. Considering the current re-criminalization of queerness I feel this book serves as a lookout on how queer life is going to be in the near future for the people who cannot leave.

[Reuben Woolley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an incredibly impressive book. As a history, it documents murky and hard to trace moments of public queer activism when it briefly looked feasible for a strong Russian LGBTQ+ movement to develop, and links it to the absolute car crash that was 1990s russian politics — particularly insightful is the final chapter on leading gay activists (Slava Mogutin, Evgeniya Debrianskaya) and their links to the Russian neofascist movement. As a piece of queer theory, it takes heavily from Foucault and Butler, and deconstructs the idea of a queerness based on ‘identity’ as something innate to queer politics (particularly interesting looking back at it from an era where ‘identity politics’ has become a supposed wedge driven between ‘leftism’ and ‘queer politics’) and explores how Russia‘s incredibly bizarre historical development of queerness as a political object/subject led to a queer population that struggled to gel with Western European terminology and concepts surrounding queerness. Something intriguing to me is that the modern Russian queer scene seems much more open to/welcoming of those same western terms and concepts— I wonder if there’s anything written that charts why and how that came about.

There are things in the book which are more or less useful and more or less suitable after 20 years of putin and his particular engagement with homophobic policy, but as a document of 1990s russian queerness I found it engaging, insightful and aware of its own limits. The only genuine criticism I have is that the question of “western imperialism”, a term which the author uses but doesn’t really explore the implications or even really a definition of, could do with rethinking. It seems absurd to me that one could call it ‘imperialism’ when an American LGBT organisation offers comparably small amounts of money to anti-government gay organisations in Russia, to allow them to keep functioning (regardless of how misguided those organisations’ understanding of the russian conception of queerness is, or how much they tried to educate on ideas of LGBT identity that were more comprehensible to an American audience than a russian one).