ABSTRACT
In David Tuller’s (1996) exploration of homosexuality in post-Soviet Russia, one lesbian acquaintance, Lena, expresses unequivocal disdain for gay and lesbian activists:
I don’t want to fight for the rights of lesbians—they never repressed lesbians here because no one ever knew that they existed.… The problems for lesbians only start when they fight for their rights. Because now the Russian public knows the word. They know that lesbians exist. (p. 61)
Activism, for Lena, means visibility, and visibility means danger. The reticence of Russian gays and lesbians to engage in activism or to acknowledge any political value in the act of coming out has perplexed Western observers for whom “Silence = Death” and “the private is public” have become mantras. “Many gays and lesbians in Moscow agree that no movement exists,” writes Elizabeth Wolfe in The Moscow Times, and “opinions are divided over whether it should, or could” (Wolfe, 2001, p. 10).