A final fact about Vayno is that the letters of his last name can spell voyna, the Russian word for war. Is this the message that Putin is sendingJumping the shark?
The New Yorker
Masha Gessen
Who is Masha Gessen, you ask.
Maria Alexandrovna Gessen (Russian: Мари́я Алекса́ндровна Ге́ссен; IPA: [maˈrʲijə ɐlʲɪkˈsandrəvnəˈɡʲesʲɪn]; born 13 January 1967), better known as Masha Gessen, is a Russian and American journalist, author, and activist noted for her opposition to Russian President Vladimir Putin. Gessen identifies as a lesbian and has written extensively on LGBT rights and help founded the Pink Triangle Campaign. She has been described as "Russia's leading LGBT rights activist"[2] and has said herself that for many years she was "probably the only publicly out gay person in the whole country."[3]
Gessen writes primarily in English but also in her native Russian, and in addition to writing books on Putin and Russian feminist punk rock protest group Pussy Riot, she has been a prolific contributor to such publications as The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, The New Republic, New Statesman, Granta, Slate, Vanity Fair, Harper's Magazine, and U.S. News & World Report.And, yes, she gets paid to write this stuff.
What's the Orthodox view on homosexuality vs. the Protestant (Roman Catholic sub-sect) view?
ReplyDeletePutin presents himself as copacetic with the Orthodox Church over there so this L female will probably take issue with him...
She is probably looking at Putin like a left L female would look at a Ted Cruz type person over here...
The Orthodox view and the official RC view are essentially the same, which is simultaneously condemnation of the act but toleration of the sinner. Protestants that accept the OT as biblical law are more extreme in requiring legal or extra-legal punishment over the sinner, as do Muslims that interpret Sharia strictly.
ReplyDeleteIn Russia as in many other places including many areas of the US, the issue is the ultra-liberal lifestyle, which traditionalists regard as getting in their face and taunting them, daring them to do something about it and then crying victim. Certainly that was the case with Pussy Riot, who would have been arrested and prosecuted if they had done that in St. Pat's in Manhattan at minimum for disorderly conduct.
Could Femen be considered a counterpart to Pussy Riot?
ReplyDelete