At last year's Cleveland International Film Festival a rousing documentary was shown called "Pride" in which the narrator travels to a handful of notoriously anti-gay countries and pro-gay countries to see how they celebrate Gay Pride. Most of the film centers around Russia, Moscow specifically, and a man named Nicholai Aleksev.
In the film the narrator tries to meet Aleksev who then brings together a group of supporters at an undisclosed location. They use covert phone calls with mysterious coded messages just in case they are being recorded or the phones are tapped. They issue a statement to the media they will be organizing a protest in one location, but instead go to another location so they won't get any reporters or secret police showing up. They launch a parade that consists of only a few people with a couple signs, but the parade is over in a minute because they don't want to attract too much attention. It's very cloak and dagger. Watching the film makes one shake their head in shame at how these poor gay rights activists must live in the shadows. The film lauds Aleksev tirelessly; you simply cannot help but sing his praises. And of course we have all read stories of how Moscow wouldn't allow gay marches, etc. so the film rings very true. By the end of the film nearly everyone who was present in the earlier meeting has been arrested for "seeding civil unrest".
I made friends with Aleksev on Facebook so I could show my international support for his cause. That's when things took a strange turn. Amid the fervent supporters I started noticing some detractors, and astonishingly, some of these detractors were Russian. Before he suddenly de-friended them and erased their posts, these detractors claimed they were meeting openly in Moscow and forming distinct political movements which were gaining some traction. They claimed Aleksev was making gay rights all about Aleksev and his cloak and dagger routine was simply an act to gain international support. Aleksev brushed off the complainers as people who didn't have vision, or as simply people who didn't like Aleksev.
Last year, on his Facebook page, Aleksev claimed he was thinking about coming to America. His American fans clamored to be the first ones to welcome him. Then he dramatically claimed he would never set foot in the country because he "hates" America with every 'cell in his body'. He made a number of such statements, but his fans reassured him they would still welcome him and reminded him that American politics don't necessarily reflect the attitudes and beliefs of the people. He finally gave in and decided he would plan a trip to the United States.
Finally, Nicolai Aleksev made his voyage to the U.S., paid for in part by the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) and some Californian gay rights groups. They set up a number of press interviews and a couple of speaking engagements, selling reasonably priced tickets to sell-out crowds. Nicolai "joked" that he was going to enter the country and while at customs he would create a commotion. His American sponsors/handlers asked him not to play around in such a manner, as he could get himself thrown out of the country. He entered quietly and safely.
As he made his way across the country, Aleksev gave interviews, most of which had been previously arranged by his handlers. Everyone counted on Aleksev being extremely outspoken in his views. What they didn't count on was that his views would also be extreme in unexpected ways. His HRC handlers began to terminate the interviews and cut the press junket short, hurriedly rushing him to California and avoiding the rest of America. Rumors began to spread that Aleksev was not only fervent in his support of gay rights, but also a racist, an anti-semite, an anti-Muslim, an anti-American, an anti-anti. He seemed to dislike everyone who was not a white Russian gay male.
When he got to California, Aleksev had grown tired of being told "not to speak". On the day of the big presentation and speech, Aleksev balked and refused to go. He found a few "friends" who took him out on the town to a myriad of gay bars and venues. Then he was asked, perhaps not politely, to pack his bags and go back to Russia. Tickets were refunded. His final parting words were delivered in a couple of interviews where he claimed his HRC handlers had badly managed him, had coerced him into delivering only prepared speeches, and refused to let him have the "freedom of speech" that American's tout so much.
Upon returning to his homeland Aleksev issued statement after statement condemning America and their support of the "evil Israel state". He then said he'd been arrested by secret police and held in a prison in rural Russia, but then the next day he was on a plane to Switzerland. He claimed to be poor, yet he vacationed in Switzerland for three weeks and then moved there at the beginning of 2011. His Facebook page documents at least three separate vacations since that time. It's good work when you can get it. His Facebook page also documents his extremely anti-semitic views, not just political views on the state of Israel, but how Jews ruin the world. He pulls no punches when it comes to his hatred of Americans, Muslims, and Arabs.
Aleksev may have helped the gay rights movement in Russia, or perhaps, as other gay groups in Russia claim, he has hindered them by focusing on getting arrested and making grand speeches which only help to buoy the anti-gay rhetoric of politicians. The New York Times recently called him the "face of gay rights in Russia". This is certainly so since his is the only gay face from Russia we've seen.
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