Have not decided on terms

What awaits Russian culture after adopting a bill on promoting LGBT - issues and assumptions

When the Russian Book Union published its sensational appeal to the State Duma with a request to verify classical literature for compliance with traditional values, it looked, in general, a logical continuation of the absurd in which we all have been living recently.

In healthy times, such a visit - both the content of the request and the list of works proposed to verify - could be calculated with a thin stem, but now it is perceived exclusively as a manifestation of the instinct of self -preservation. The fact is that the bill adopted in the first reading (October 20) on the prohibition of LGBT propaganda and non-traditional relations is extremely cautious in terminology: neither book publishers, nor authors, nor readers have still been able to find out what it was forbidden to them.

• Will there be a complete ban on literature, in any way mentioning LGBT?

• Will the already printed books with this topic be removed?

• And if the book was written by the author of non -traditional sexual orientation, but not a word about this in the book itself?

We will try to summarize all the main questions and few answers and finally understand the composition of future crimes and punishments.

Let's start with the banality. The bill itself clearly contradicts the Constitution of the Russian Federation. Moreover, we will be pedantic, at once by several articles of the Chapter two (“Rights and freedoms of man and citizen”). In addition to the now common place that

The Constitution prohibits censorship (29.5), it also prohibits any restrictions on the rights of citizens on the grounds of social or religious affiliation (19.2), and also allows to freely choose, have and spread religious and other beliefs and act in accordance with them (28).

Thus, an attempt to put Orthodox (called from imaginary tolerance by “family”) values ​​above any others is initially outlawed. However, who interests it. Interested in everyone else now: what do the deputies mean by the word "propaganda"?

For lack of the best, we turn to the explanatory dictionary:

"PROPAGANDA. Distribution in society and clarification of any. views, ideas, knowledge, teachings. Agitation and p. ". (Dictionary of Ozhegov and Shvedova).

So, according to the norms of the Russian language, the compilers of the bill had in mind that the forbidden books should be something like brochures on sexword, popularly explaining the charms of non-traditional sexual orientation and agitating masses to change the floor.

How many books exist in Russia? The answer depends on the interpretation and intelligence of the responsible. Are deputies going to follow in the search for these books by the norms of the Russian language? An even more philosophical question, because practice shows that with their native language their communication, to put it mildly, has not developed. In addition: what is the “traditional values” in general?

What, for example, has in mind Peter Tolstoy when he says: “We have entered the decisive stage of the battle for our traditional family, moral and religious values, the result of which can only be victory”?

We repeat: according to the Constitution, there should be no priority of religion in the Russian Federation. As we understand, personal life is also a matter and right of everyone. But still

• Where, according to the logic of legislators, the border between “traditional” and “non -traditional”?

• Is a divorce a traditional practice for Russia or not?

• Relations between partners with a big age difference? Relations between representatives of different faiths?

• Different citizenships?

• And the inhabitants of different cities?

With regard to the book market, all these issues are even more sick: in order to write a work, the author obviously will have to feel like a sapper in the minefield, and create an unmarried or divorced hero without at least two children, military rank and spiritual dignity. In this sense, the future law will apparently be similar to the law on the discrediting of the army: since no one knows what exactly is considered discrediting, everything undesirable can be adjusted to this concept.

The main and most obvious consequence is fear and self -censorship.

It is difficult to follow all the undesirable from the outside, and instead of the authorities the authors, book publishers, bookstore owners, afraid of many thousands of fines, will do this. The fear will be followed by refusals in publication or, at least, in PR, in the absence of PR - the absence of a reader.

Finally, the most important question: how to really be with the classic? With a suicidal monologue of Katerina from the “thunderstorm”?

With the pedophilia of Stavrogin from the "demons"? With drug addiction in Bulgakov’s morphine? With betrayal in “Quiet Don” and “Anna Karenina”? Is it necessary to remove all the collections of poems by Marina Tsvetaeva and Mikhail Kuzmina from everywhere? And Mayakovsky? Alexander Khinshtein, in a commentary to Kommersant, assured the interviewer that, say, Lolita, Nabokov could not be propaganda. " A novel that was accused of pornographic, starting with Akhmatova.