A Backlash in Georgia

TBILISI, Georgia — At the unofficial headquarters of the Tbilisi gay rights movement this week — a small, dimly lit second-story office redolent with cigarette smoke and populated by a litter of newborn kittens — the mood was both hopeful and grim.

“Never have these issues been as visible as they are right now,” Eka Aghdgomelashvili, director of Women’s Initiative Support Group, told me. “It’s a breakthrough.”

Irakli Vacharadze, executive director of Identoba, an umbrella organization for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues, nodded in agreement. “It’s very positive,” he said. “But I want you to write that it’s scary, too. This is the first time we have been threatened, physically threatened.”

Issues of concern to the gay community moved into the public sphere in Georgia with an anti-homophobia parade on May 17, among the first in the nation’s history, that was blocked by a group of Orthodox priests and their followers, leading to a minor but bloody street brawl.

http://latitude.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/14/progress-by-georgias-gays-spurs-a-backlash/