The One Easy Way You Can Protest The Anti-Gay Bill In Russia

Are you completely outraged by Russia's anti-gay bill and feel totally helpless? Well, you're not alone. Gay activists have staged what they hope is a massive protest of one of the country's biggest exports: good old Russian vodka.

Six gay bars in Chicago have already took a vow to stop selling any Russian vodka products to boycott the "homosexual propaganda" bill that has outlaws "making public events that promote gay rights and public displays of affection by same-sex couples illegal." A growing number of people are joining and what started as a national protest, could become international.

Dan Savage, one of the leaders of this boycott became involved after Russia announced that they would arrest openly gay tourists if they were suspected of being "pro-gay." Four Dutch tourists have already been arrested and were jailed since the law was put in place.

"To show our solidarity with Russian queers and their allies and to help to draw international attention to the persecution of gay men, lesbians, bisexuals, trans people and straight allies in Vladimir Putin's increasingly fascistic Russia: dump Russian vodka," Savage says on his blog.

In the wake of horrendous kidnappings and brutal hate crimes against the LGBTQ community in Russia by neo-nazi groups, the boycott seems that much more urgent. Because homophobia is basically state-sanctioned since the implementation of the anti-gay law, the police isn't even arresting the perpetrators who have gone as so far as lure their victims with social media and put videos of their attacks on YouTube. 

So this weekend, when someone says vodka, make sure it's anything but the Russian stuff.

Join the movement and the discussion on Twitter by using the #DumpRussianVodka hashtag. Will you be supporting Russian LGBTQ people and allies? Let me know on Twitter and Facebook.