Some New York gay activists are so fed up with Russia’s continued carelessness with queer rights, a trend exhibited most recently during Moscow’s bloody pride, they’re taking their battle to the streets. Or, East 91st, where Russia keeps an embassy. Good ol’ Joe from Joe.My.God fills us in on the details:
With Russian news cameras rolling, rainbow flag creator Gilbert Baker and gay activist Brendan Fay poured Stolichnaya vodka into the street in front of New York City’s Russian embassy in protest of the treatment of Russian gays by their government.
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Brendan Fay attempted to deliver a letter of complaint to the embassy staff, but they did not come to the door. I spoke briefly with the Russian news team, seemed sympathetic to the cause and promised that their story will run on Russian satellite news later today.
Russian gays will definitely appreciate the effort, but we’re not too sure the government’s going to give two shits (or one) over a bunch of queers quitting Stoli.
Shit, you kids should have quit Stoli a long, long time ago.
See more pics over at, yes, Joe.My.God…
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WWH
Maybe gay bars should simply stop carrying the nine zillion flavors of Stoli. Period.
Paul Raposo
Let’s hope this does help. Considering we have it pretty good here in Canada and there are LGBTQ’s worldwide who can only dream of the freedoms we have.
Writing letters and making phone calls is great, but you want to get over there and fight the good fight and you can’t. It makes one feel helpless.
Mr. B
Am I missing something? Are they boycotting Stolichnaya solely because of the injustices against queers in Russia, or because the company itself has displayed anti-LGBT sentiment? It seems to me that picking a Russian product, no matter how prolific (yeah, yeah, I know the gays love their Stoli) and boycotting it solely based on its national origin is kind of stupid. And weak. And not a way to get anyone in the Russian embassy on our side, either. (Why don’t pro-marriage queers in England boycott Lay’s potato chips because of the marriage issue? Yeah, that would really be effective. Might seem a little less ethnicist, though.)
Martini-boy
I was thinking the same thing B.
If you want to REALLY make a statement, leave Vodka out of it and attack the direct source: the politicians and the government supporting (or at least tolerating) such discriminatory behaviour.