Putin and the politics of protest
The legal reality that Russian authorities can arrest anyone for something as minor as telling a gay teen “it gets better,” or for waving a rainbow flag in a public park, has been enough to motivate calls for the world to boycott to the Sochi Olympics. British actor Stephen Fry and American actor George Takei (both high-profile gay entertainers) have endorsed an anti-Sochi 2014 petition, which has garnered more than 165,000 signatures to date. The protesters would like to see Sochi stripped of its hosting privileges. Read my column about it here.
Emma Teitel is a National Magazine Award-winning columnist who writes frequently about women’s issues and popular culture. She gets a lot of hate mail, mostly from Burnaby, British Columbia.
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