The Life of an Openly Gay Person in Russia
Gotta be strong to live life in MultiColor
The life of an openly gay person in Russia is not full. Most times, it is dangerous and takes courage to live the way you are. Far from everyone can be that brave, so a lot of LGBT people make up their minds to leave the homeland for a better place, by any means, because they want to enjoy their lives in full.
Few of them give a thought about what made those places better. They hardly ever think about the price paid in bloodshed and deaths during times when life for LGBT people in the UK, US, Canada, Australia, and Europe has been hard. There is still a lot of work to do, as James Finn writes in his recent stories, but their lives are easier now because they have fought for it. Back to LGBT immigrants: are you ready to fight in case of need?
The other day I prepared a few creatives with six-color rainbows that will be used in photography and video supporting the promotion of my recent LGBT novel, and sent the files to the printing company I had used for the last few years. It was only next morning when it dawned on me that by sending those files, I exposed my attitude and relationship to LGBT culture, and I had taken a considerable risk of being rejected as a client.
Yesterday, upon entering their workshop, I asked for my order. “What was it?” asked the manager.
“It is multicolor,” I answered with a smile.
“Oh, I see,” he said, smiling back. “It is indeed multicolor.”
It wasn’t difficult to trace the look of understanding what was behind “multicolor” flash across the manager’s eyes — the eyes of a traditionally married man. And I felt relief to be accepted so casually. My recent novel aims for the same thing — to raise acceptance of LGBT people in a casual way.
To me, LGBT people are a big family scattered around the globe. Despite the distances between us, through communication, we share our experiences and make each other’s lives better. Getting around impossibilities and obstacles, I managed to self-publish my novel on Amazon, and now my story is ready not only to inspire others in almost every corner of the world, but also make them stronger.
Editor’s note: Jacob Green is the pen name of an artist and author who lives in Russia, where “promoting homosexuality” is a serious crime that artists like Pussy Riot have gone to prison for.
