Bigotry in Eastern Europe
This Guardian (UK) article discusses the difficulties that Gay pride organizers are having in Eastern Europe. It’s not a surprise, because it’s been clear for a few years that the prevailing sentiment in the ex-Communist countries is very anti-gay, but it’s still disturbing.
I’m not sure I understand why that sentiment is so strong. It does appear to go along with racism and strong nationalistic feeling—as it does in the West also. There are definitely those who are anti-gay while not being prejudiced against other groups, but for the most part there seems to be a correlation with other forms of prejudice.
But why is it so strong in Eastern Europe? Is it due to the weaker economies, or the fact that the capitalist democracies there are very young, and still going through teething pains? (That last point seems a little patronizing, though, and I distrust it on that basis.)
The rise of nationalistic and intolerant religions, as well as the influx of American-style globalist Christian fundamentalism, certainly contribute. But for those things to take hold, some of the sentiment has to already exist, and I wonder if homophobia is contributing to the rise of those movements just as much as they are contributing to it.
In many ways, I think that the rise of these movements, especially the religious ones, demonstrate (if any more demonstration were necessary) the failure of the Soviet system, because I think that if it had really taught reason for seventy years then there wouldn’t be a foothold for them. But, of course, it didn’t get anywhere near teaching reason, instead enforcing its own anti-rational belief structure. And when that structure collapsed, the people looked for new ones, creating ideal circumstances for an upsurge of religiosity.
Religion meets (or appears to meet) various human needs. In my view, these needs can also be met outside of religion, but doing so outside of ready-made belief structures is harder on individuals. Social uncertainty makes these needs stronger, and so people turn to religion. But on a lower level, prejudice itself must satisfy some human needs also. Social uncertainty makes people uncertain about many things, including their own identities. This identity confusion is then harder to deal with given the lack of trustworthy social support.
Affirmative identity markers are often harder to really invest in—it seems harder to say “I am x“, since this may require some action (or history of action) for support. But saying “I am not x” seems easier, since all it appears to require is a lack of action. Once adopted, however, it requires action to distance oneself from the x group. It seems like a rather short step from there to bigotry.
That analysis, though, clearly misses a lot of things. Why not negative identity markers like “I’m not selfish”, demonstrated by performing good works? Possibly because selfishness and greed aren’t immediately evident, observable qualities. (Those particular examples would also run afoul of social power structures, but that’s another issue.) But people looking for identity support often want clear markers, markers that are easily visible, and it makes sense for them to designate anti-groups who can be identified in that way also.
Social Dominance Orientation is relevant here, although I’m not sure it answers questions about why certain characteristics are picked on rather than others. I suspect there’s some algorithm that would allow one to examine those issues a society is most frightened about and then predict the characteristics most likely to discriminated against in that society.