Yesterday was the annual Pride parade in Budapest with an estimated couple of hundred thousand people participating. The local police had issued a ban on the event and Hungarian Prime Minister has made various threats against the community, including fines for attendees, with police allowed to use facial recognition technology to identify participants, as well as potential prison sentences for organisers.
I completely support that people marched on the streets in Budapest. This is what Pride should really be about – a peaceful demonstration of love, respect and tolerance from the participants in protest at intolerance, hate and unfair laws and discrimination.
In some countries, including Switzerland, we have so much freedom and so many rights, that we have almost forgotten what we were protesting about. There are other countries around the world where protests are still needed. We must concentrate on these real problems instead of inventing new tiny imaginary fake problems. There are people living in fear keeping their sexuality secret in countries where they face execution for same-sex relations. There are people who face hatred and discrimination every day, making their lives unpleasant or even miserable. We need to fight these things, not spend our time arguing about silly ideologies coming from the bigoted and hateful USA via our social media feeds. To hell with what the Americans think, it is a country with a history and present where prejudice and hatred are hard-wired into their culture. We need to focus on Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa and encourage and support those countries in developing modern moral systems, where everyone is treated fairly.
This is why I am happy to see the Budapest Pride take place. Their success is important and hopefully will last longer than their current leaders.