On April 25th the “Silent Flashmob” took place in St. Petersburg. More than 70 representatives of LGBT-community and friendly heterosexuals went into the Nevsky prospect to attract general population’s attention to the problem of silencing the cases of discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity and hate (homophobia) crimes.

The participants of the flashmob, their mouths taped shut, divided into two groups and walked through the Nevsky prospect and giving out leaflets to the passersby. Scotch tape symbolized the silence LGBT face in our society. About four thousands leaflets and “silent cards” have been given out for an hour and a half of action. The reaction of passersby was extremely positive: so many of them were surprised seeing our large groups, they took initiative to take the leaflets. On the way back the participants of the flashmob saw hardly a single leaflet thrown out, which is evidence of the fact that citizens read them and considered them interesting for themselves.

Today flashmob described set the record for the number of participants among mass street actions carried out by representatives of Petersburg LGBT-community. The fact that more than 70 people came out into the streets of Petersburg speaks volumes. Firstly, our community is becoming more united, secondly, many of us have already realized the necessity of active actions, thirdly, this demonstrated that LGBT community of Petersburg is interested not only in entertainment, but also in human rights events, fourthly, this is one more evidence that the year of work of organization “Coming Out” was not in vain: the organization is well respected and has full confidence of the city’s LGBT community.

Besides the activists of organization “Coming Out”, the representatives of the following LGBT-organizations participated in the flashmob: the Russian LGBT Network – Igor Petrov and LesbiParty – Elena Inozemtceva.

Some journalists persistently name the Day of Silence with title gay-pride. It is very strange, because the Day of Silence site doesn’t contain any words about gay-pride. Moreover, the forms, which the Day of Silence takes around the world, are very different from gay-pride form. Besides that, the objective of the Day of Silence holding is attracting attention to the issue of silencing the discrimination of lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgenders, and crimes against them on homophobia ground. And this objective is different from the objective of gay-prides, which is the celebration of the sexual and gender variety of the world. Having nothing against the objectives of gay-prides, we stress one more time that the Day of Silence has never been gay-pride, and it is a glaring mistake to name it like that.

This year the Day of Silence in Petersburg lengthened out for two days. Today, on April 25th – there will be a flashmob, tomorrow, on April 26th – there will be single rallies. LGBT-community representatives’ coming out to the street is not just the way to attract attention to the community problems. This is to some extent the demonstration, the declaration and strengthening of those that is called “Gay Power” in English. Unfortunately, there is no really adequate translation of this term in Russian. Anarchists have unique slogan: “Come out to the streets – retrieve the town”. These brave girls and boys have done just that today.

And what have you done to stop the silence?