In the Name of Hate: Homophobia as a Value

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2013 DOI 10.1163/18763332-03701001

Southeastern Europe 37 (2013) 1–16 brill.com/seeu

In the Name of Hate: Homophobia as a Value

Roman KuharAssociate Professor of Sociology at the University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Arts

Researcher at the Peace Institute, Ljubljana

“Četnik”, a derogatory term for a Serb. Used by Croats, Bosnians and Kosovo Albanians.“Ustaša”, a derogatory term for a Croat. Used by Serbs, Bosnians and Kosovo Albanians.“Balija”, a derogatory term for a Bosnian. Used by Croats, Serbs and Kosovo Albanians.“Šiptar”, a derogatory term for a Kosovo Albanian. Used by Bosnians, Croats and Serbs.“Peder”, a derogatory term for a homosexual person. Used by everybody.(Parada, a film by Srđan Dragojević)

One of the latest topics widely discussed in texts, informed by queer theory, is “homonationalism” (cf. Puar 2007). The term refers to islamophobic, xenophobic, racist and similar stands against immigrants, which have been occurring within the mainstream gay and lesbian movement since the early 1990s. It also refers to the instrumentalisation and consequent abuse of gay and lesbian human rights discourse for the disqualification, margin-alisation and social exclusion of other minorities, particularly (illegal) immigrants.

The notorious example of the Dutch right-wing and openly gay politi-cian Pim Fortuyn is a good illustration of homonationalistic discourse. During the Dutch national election campaign in 2002 his political pro-gramme was based on social exclusion of immigrants, particularly Muslims, who became a symbol of human rights infringements and as such a symbol of reactionary, traditionalist and intolerant culture. During one TV debate a Muslim imam mocked Pim Fortuyn due to his homosexuality. Fortuyn turned to the camera and said to the audience that this was “the Trojan horse of intolerance,” which would walk into the Netherlands in the name of multiculturalism. He believed that Muslims were a threat to the human rights of minorities, including gays and lesbians and women (Dreher 2002).

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In other words, the protection of the human rights of some minorities was used as a platform for the discrimination against and exclusion of other minorities.

Éric Fassin argues that gender equality and sexual liberation became “a litmus test for the selection and integration of immigrants” (Fassin 2007). Similarly, Judith Butler questions the new position into which gay European citizens are being placed: “Is this a liberal defense of my freedom[…] or is my freedom being used as an instrument of coercion, one that seeks to keep Europe white, pure, and ‘secular’ in ways that do not interrogate the violence that underwrites the very project?” (Butler 2008). Answering her own question, Butler rejected the Civil Courage Award from the Berlin Pride, a mainstream gay and lesbian organisation, claiming that she must distance herself from this “racist complicity.” She pointed out that the mainstream gay and lesbian movement often construes homophobia as the problem of immigrants.

Some evidence for such a construction can be found also in empirical studies. In the analysis of the factors that contribute to the level of a coun-try’s homonegativity, Štulhofer and Rimac (2009) found that persisting immigration flow may limit the effect of modernisation, which is under-stood to have a central role in increasing social acceptance of homosexual-ity. However, they pointed out that their study “does not only suggest that immigrant subcultures could be more sexually restrictive than the host cul-ture, but also that the existing national curricula in Europe may not be as efficient in promoting social tolerance as is commonly believed” (Štulhofer and Rimac 2009: 7-8).

Is homonationalism a pan-European project, or are there countries where homophobia remains a “family value” and gay and lesbian human rights cannot serve as a litmus test for the selection of immigrants? It seems that in Europe, where walls and borders are being notoriously erased, new walls are being built. These are the walls of homonationalism in the West and the walls of old-fashioned “heteronationalism” in the East. The violent reactions to the Gay Pride Parades in Belgrade, Split, Zagreb, Moscow, Budapest, Riga, Warsaw and elsewhere, the prohibition of such events in several Eastern European cities, and the public non-existence of the gay and lesbian minority in some other Eastern European countries represent heteronormative ideals that are central to the nation-state formation and national identity building – the two processes both heavily informed by heterosexual imagery. Unlike the situation in the West, where gay and les-bian rights are being abused for the exclusion of the Others, in the East gays

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and lesbians –and particularly the homosexual body– are “the Others,” the element whose rights cannot be situated in post-socialist societies, which (occasionally) pride themselves on homophobia.

Homophobia – the unifying experience of gays and lesbians

The term “homophobia” emerged in the late 1960s and early 1970s in the context of psychological research on the fears that some people manifested when confronted with homosexuals or the idea of homosexuality. The author of the term, an American clinical psychologist George Weinberg, discussed homophobia in his ground-breaking book Society and the Healthy Homosexual (1972), but – as Wickberg (2000) pointed out – failed to define the term in a precise way. He described homophobia both as a “disease” and a “standpoint,” as a pathology and a world-view at the same time. It includes condemnation, dislike, disapproval, violence, disdain and discrimination against gays and lesbians. Baird (2004) rightly notes that the meaning of homosexuality can be mutated in a variety of ways. Depending on the con-text, homosexuality can be described as a sickness or as something sinful, but also as unnatural or even unpatriotic, if there exist actual or just imag-ined threats to the nation.

The term literally means “the fear of sameness” (from Greek homo - same, equal- and phobos - fear). While we might agree with numerous crit-ics who believe that the term is awkward and imprecise, the literal meaning of the term nevertheless points towards an important part of the “fear of homosexuality.” Homophobia is not just a fear from those who identify as gays or lesbians. It is also a fear of being recognised as such (“a poof,” “a queer”) by society. The fear of not being in compliance with the cultural definitions, ideas, fantasies and desires of hegemonic masculinity (or femi-ninity) is an important source of homophobia. As hegemonic masculinity is not just an identity, but rather “the pattern of practice” (Connell and Messerschmidt 2005: 832), homophobia seems to be the practice of con-struction of hegemonic masculinity. In the words of Chodorow (1998): “The primary issue in homophobia is men not being men and women not being with men.”

There are three typical approaches to explain homophobia (Groneberg 2011). The inertia explanation builds on the idea that homophobia is some kind of a historical sediment of the religious, legal and moral norms of the past. It is believed that gradually, but surely, homophobia is being tucked

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away as the level of tolerance in society for homosexuality becomes pro-gressively higher.

The second, the new forms explanation, assumes that homophobia and homophobic attitudes are continuously created anew. In this kind of understanding, homophobia is seen as a modern phenomenon, which is maintained and renewed either for the conservation of the male domina-tion (gender roles, gender inequality, patriarchal culture), in order to dis-qualify political enemies (stigma, nationalism), or due to the aggression targeted at marginalised groups in society (violence). The new forms expla-nation is the most common way to address and understand homophobia.

The third approach, the basic configuration explanation, tries –like the first one– to find the explanation in the past. However, it is interested in deeper, structural causes, which can be revealed by the genealogical survey of contemporary subjectivity. This approach is interested in the ancient nozzles for homophobia, particularly in the construction of male subjectiv-ity. What it means to be a man is of course a socially constructed idea. It is precisely in the construction of this idea that the cultural determinants of homophobia might originate (Groneberg 2011).

In the classic functionalist analysis of homophobia, Gregory Herek (1984; 1991) distinguishes between three basic functions performed by homopho-bic feelings, reactions and behaviour. The empirical, symbolic and defen-sive functions of homophobia are connected to different psychological benefits that an individual (or a group) acquires when advocating homo-phobic attitudes. Consequently, homophobia can be best tackled and most effectively addressed if we take into consideration the primary psychologi-cal function that it serves.

The empirical function is related to making sense of past experiences with gays and lesbians and consequently regulating future behaviour. If past experiences have been negative, this reinforces stereotypes and nega-tive attitudes towards homosexuality.

Homophobia in terms of its symbolic function strengthens the individu-al’s self-image and his identity, either through the confirmation of the val-ues that are at the heart of his understanding of himself or through the social recognition and support that he gets from significant others for expressing homophobic views. In the first case a religious person might take a homophobic standpoint in order to be in sync with his religious teachings, beliefs, and values. In the second case a teenager might verbally attack a homosexual person in order to get support and recognition from his peers. It means that violence against homosexuals is not merely an

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expression of one’s intolerance. Myslik (1996) believes that it is rather the result of social intolerance and cultural heterosexism, which allows such actions and simultaneously mitigates their impact. We can illustrate this with the concept of hegemonic masculinity. According to Kaufman (1994), men are faced with a contradictory experience of power, which is caused by the distinction between attributes ascribed to male gender and the actual opportunities to meet these expectations. In an attempt to conform to the social definitions of masculinity, men suppress their emotions, as emo-tional needs are not in accordance with cultural definitions of hegemonic masculinity. In this process, ironically, men become even more emotionally dependent. They experience the so-called “men’s pain,” which is caused by the gap between the social power that men as a group have and the indi-vidual feelings of powerlessness. Kaufman points out that men’s pain cre-ates a tremendous fear, which can be expressed in society as homophobia. Men’s pain is channelled towards the Others, those whom they find even less powerful.

Herek relates the third function of homophobia –the defensive function– to the reduction of the unease and anxiety that can be triggered by homo-sexuality. Anxiety is often associated with one’s conflicting position regarding one’s own sexuality or sexual orientation. In other words, sup-pressed homosexual feelings might be expressed in homophobic attitudes. In such a way the homophobic person symbolically destroys his own (homoerotic) feelings and desires and transforms them into hatred and aversion (homophobia). The individual, however, does not recognise that what he hates and fears are his own homoerotic feelings. “It is not true,” explains Lešnik, “that people who aggressively reject homosexuality simply do not like this kind of sexuality, that it is not their ‘cup of tea.’ Just the opposite: they like it too much. ‘Homosexuality,’ which they reject, is com-pounded by their own passive impulses, which they find unacceptable” (Lešnik 2010: 302).

Although the psychological and psychoanalytical approach to the analy-sis of homophobia is important, some authors (cf. Kitzinger, 1996; Rothblum and Bond, 1996, Adam, 1998; Wickberg, 2000) fear that the reduction of homophobia to a psychological problem might de-politicise the problem of violence against homosexuals. Homophobia is not only an individual phe-nomena; it is also a question of structural, economic and institutionalised violence and repression against homosexuals. We will now turn our discus-sion to these broader factors, framing them in the social, cultural and politi-cal context of Eastern Europe.

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The two factors that are usually listed as those that have predominantly shaped the attitudes towards homosexuality in contemporary Eastern Europe societies are religion and the effects of the post-socialist transition. Religion is seen as a key factor preventing or slowing down the process of modernisation and taking an important social role and position in circum-stances of slow economic development and the lack of democratic culture. The legacy of communism, on the other hand, is closely related to the intensification of nationalism in the post-socialist period and in the con-text of demographic decline. This, in turn, gave rise to the process of re-traditionalisation, seen as a return to the nation’s true patriarchal culture, previously destroyed by the communist regime. The Balkan region was fur-ther characterised by the wars in the 1990s, which also had an important effect on how sexual minorities are seen and understood today in former Yugoslav republics.

Religion

Religion seems to be one of the strongest predictors of homophobic atti-tudes not only in Eastern Europe, but also elsewhere. In a meta-analysis of over 60 studies Whitley (2009) found that religion is significantly related to negative attitudes towards gays and lesbians. In the context of religious teachings, homosexuality is generally interpreted as a sin and immoral. In order to be in line with religious values and norms, one cannot accept homosexuality. The expression of non-acceptance, however, takes different shapes, including homophobic violence. Furthermore, the religious tradi-tion does not influence only those who are religious and consider them-selves members of the Church, but also the others who share the same cultural space in which the religious traditions are embedded.

Combining the social distance towards homosexuals and the disap-proval of homosexuality as the two indicators of homonegativity, Štulhofer and Rimac (2009) outlined religious traditions as one of the key factors in determining the country’s level of homonegativity, although the level of modernisation, measured by mass education, the economic development and the process of urbanisation turned out to explain even more variance. However, persisting religious tradition limits the effects of modernisation.

In accordance with previous research, which showed that Protestant countries are less sexually restricted than the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox countries, Štulhofer and Rimac (2009) found that the Western

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Protestant countries tend to be more tolerant towards homosexuality and have lower levels of homonegativity than Western Roman Catholic coun-tries. The latter are affected by the Vatican rigorous rejection of any kind of legal recognition of same-sex partnerships and families and their vocal condemnation of non-heterosexuality. However, the high economic devel-opment, the political stability, the functioning of democratic institutions and the effective legal system are all factors that contribute to lower levels of homonegativity in Western European countries. In contrast, the lack of these factors in Eastern European countries maintains the high level of homonegativity.

In Eastern European countries, however, a different level of homonega-tivity is recorded among those countries that are predominantly Eastern Orthodox and those that are predominantly Roman Catholic. One of the latest studies on this issue, based on the European Social Survey data from 2008/09, showed that among all Europeans the Eastern Orthodox Church’s followers express the lowest level of agreement (42%) with the statement that gays and lesbians should be free to live their own lives (Takács and Szalma 2011). Štulhofer and Rimac link this to the more troublesome, destructive and delayed political and socio-economic transitions in Eastern Orthodox countries. In such circumstances the role of the Church has been intensified and became “a tool for re-building personal and collective identity in a rapidly changing social environment” (Štulhofer and Rimac 2009: 7).

Despite the statistical differences in the level of homonegativity between the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox countries in Eastern Europe, the role of the Roman Catholic Church cannot be downplayed. In the context of social and political turmoil in the early 1990s, the Roman Catholic Church and its corresponding religious identity became an integrative element of the national/ethnic identity in some Eastern European countries, such as Croatia or Bosnia (cf. Jakelić 2010; Velikonja 2003; Ramet 2002; Mirescu 2003) and such nation-state building still resonates in political discourses nowadays. For example, it comes as no surprise that one of the key differ-ences found in the comparison of the parliamentary debates on the Same-Sex Partnership Act in Slovenia and Croatia (Kuhar 2011) is the fact that religious discourse was nearly non-existent in the Slovenian Parliament, while it emerged strongly during the reading of the bill in the Croatian Parliament. In Croatia Christian values, embedded in Croatian culture, were seen to be in direct opposition to the proposed bill, as clearly shown in a statement by MP Dr. Anto Kovačević:

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The effects of this law are fatal for the healthy national tissue of Croatia. […]. In our HSP HKDU club we cannot understand that the state that has 89 % Catholics whose healthy life was implanted into them by mother’s milk and baptism, for whom love is the basis and the content of life, for whom family is a shrine, the Croatian home is a shrine, a place of peace and happiness […]. We cannot allow that those who don’t like Croatia and don’t respect its traditional values continue to terrorize us with the new-world gay projects (quoted in Kuhar 2011: 64).

The human rights of gays and lesbians seem to be most endangered when conservative and nationalistic political forces are joined with religious forces. There have been several occasions across Eastern Europe where Church and state authorities jointly opposed the human rights of gays and lesbians, most notoriously in the incidents related to the prohibition of the Pride Parades. Some of them even called on the “normal majority” to act violently against the participants of the Pride Parade. An Orthodox priest from Bulgaria, for example, encouraged people to throw stones at the par-ticipants of the Pride Parade in Sofia in 2012 (Montgomery 2012). Similarly, members of the Orthodox Church in Russia gave their blessing to those who had beaten up participants of the officially banned Pride Parade in Moscow (Davis 2011).

Communism and the post-socialist transition

Another common interpretation, offered to explain the existing differences in attitudes towards homosexuality in Western and Eastern European countries, strive to see homophobia as a heritage of the communist regime in Eastern Europe. The consequent post-socialist transition is believed to have contributed to the non-acceptance of homosexuality, especially through the resurgence of nationalism in the late 1980s and early 1990s and the process of re-traditionalisation (closely connected with the rehabilita-tion of religion), which was seen as “coming home” to the true (patriarchal) values of the nation, previously erased by the communist regime (cf. Healey 2002; Waitt 2005; Mole 2011; Kon 1999; for an overview and critique of expla-nations of “post-socialist” homophobia, see Renkin 2009).

Although the communist regimes in Eastern Europe were generally not open towards homosexuality, and their attitudes ranged from apathy to persecution, it is also true that in some Eastern European countries homo-sexuality was decriminalised earlier than in the West. However, while homosexuality was decriminalised in (most of) Western Europe by the

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early 1980s (with France being the first one in 1791, and Ireland being an exception, as it decriminalised homosexuality only in 1993), there are sev-eral Eastern European countries that decriminalised homosexuality only after the fall of communism (with Bosnia and Herzegovina and Romania being the last ones to decriminalise homosexuality, in 1998 and 2000 respectively).

The effects of the communist regime on the legal situation of gays and lesbians have been diverse, and there were substantial differences in the treatment of homosexuality among Eastern European countries. Several reports and analysis, focusing primarily on the Soviet Union and Russia (Kon 1999; Healey 2001) show a high level of intolerance towards homo-sexuality, which could be understood as part of a larger process of “belated modernisation” of sexuality in Eastern Europe. Bernik (2010), however, claims that the modernisation processes of sexuality in Eastern Europe were not totally absent. These processes – primarily in terms of secularisa-tion, industrialisation and urbanisation, and the high rates of women’s employment and mass education – took place in the sixties and seventies, although several factors were preventing and inhibiting modernisation, among others the lack of democracy and cultural pluralism. Criticising the notion that Eastern European countries are experiencing a “belated mod-ernisation” in sexuality, Bernik (2010) argues that empirical studies on sexu-ality show that there are substantial differences in sexual behaviors across Europe, which prevent us from drawing an unified image of “Western” vs. “Eastern” sexuality: “The results of these studies are in line with the notion that the circumstances in the socialist societies, which we have described as a unique blend of modernisation and traditionalism, have not encour-aged changes in sexuality, but have also not discouraged them” (Bernik 2010: 20). It means that some communist countries in Eastern Europe were “modern enough” to experience modernisation in the organisation of sexuality.

There is, however, one important difference between Western and Eastern European countries in terms of their treatment of sexual minori-ties. What the communist countries lacked was a platform for political organisation and for the establishment of social movements. While in the West the gay and lesbian movement contributed to the decriminalisation and especially demedicalisation of homosexuality (the American Psychological Association removed homosexuality from the list of mental illnesses in 1973) –which was all made possible because of the politi-cal, social and cultural organisation of the gay and lesbian minority– the

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homosexuals in Eastern Europe had no such opportunity. The Slovenian gay and lesbian movement is an exception, as it was established already in 1984 as part of the larger social movement in Slovenia at the time (cf. Lešnik 2006), but the gay and lesbian movements in the remaining Eastern European countries emerged only in the early 1990s or even later. By that time, the Western gay and lesbian movement had existed for nearly 40 years.

The post-socialist transition brought important changes for sexual minorities in Eastern Europe, primarily in terms of political organising (cf. Graff 2006; Kuhar and Takács 2007; Kulpa and Mizielinska 2011; Gruszc-zynska 2012). Gay and lesbian organisations across Eastern Europe soon adopted the “Western agenda” and were faced with the need to quickly grow up. The “condensed puberty” of the Eastern European gay and lesbian movement was faced with harsh protests from the conservative groups in society. This is partly due to the fact that there were literally no public dis-cussions on homosexuality before the early 1990s. The demands for equal-ity, gay marriage and legal recognition of same-sex families were therefore built on fragile foundations. But even more importantly, the process of democratisation did not only enable gay and lesbian groups to organise politically and demand their human rights. It has also opened up political space for other voices, usually opposing radical homophobic voices, which found fertile ground for their ideas in the context of the economic and social uncertainty of the post-socialist transition. These voices and groups were further stimulated by what followed the collapse of state socialism: re-traditionalisation, rehabilitation of religion, resurgence of nationalism, and demographic decline in some Eastern European countries.

The process of re-traditionalisation can be clearly detected in the con-text of gender roles. The politics of gender equality was seen as a heritage of “socialist state feminism” and therefore something that should be replaced by traditional gender roles (cf. Jalušič 2002). Mole (2011) claims that such a replacement was seen as a return back to normality from communism, which was understood as a historical period of time lost – i.e. a period of abnormality. “However,” writes Mole, “what is seen as normal is often defined in strictly national, Christian and heterosexual terms, with homo-sexuality thereby confusing and threatening this traditional order” (Mole 2011: 546). In other words, the process of re-traditionalisation is an attempt to strengthen and revive the patriarchal culture with its gender order.

The post-socialist calls of the conservative groups to preserve the patri-archal culture –often in an explosive blend with nationalism– need to be

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understood also in the context of demographic decline. In the 1990s Europe was faced with a downward trend in population, and in Eastern Europe the birth rates dropped below 1.3, which Kohler, Ortega and Billardi (2002) called the “lowest-low fertility,” the rate at which the population can be cut in half in less than 50 years. With the countries getting their new demo-cratic identity and national independence these numbers rang several political alarm bells. They were ringing in tune with the process of re- traditionalisation and post-socialist nationalism. The Eastern European societies were not endangered only by low fertility rates, but also by the homosexual minority, constructed as a scapegoat, one that demanded equal rights, but cannot reproduce and therefore presents a threat to the nation and the binary system of gender roles. The latter was graphically illustrated in the recent public referendum in Slovenia on the Family Code, which put heterosexual and homosexual partnerships on an equal legal footing, including the right to adoption. The proposal stirred a public con-troversy and protests from the conservative political parties and the Catholic Church. Later the civil initiative for the family and the rights of children started to collect signatures for the public referendum in order to reject the Family Code. They decorated their stands and tables with Slovenian flags and traditional Slovenian carnation bouquets, and some people dressed in national costumes and sang the Slovenian national anthem. All this gave the impression that the equal rights of gays and lesbi-ans, inscribed in the Family Code, threaten the existence of the Slovenian nation and its essence.

As much as such a “threat” is only imaginary, it is very real in its effects and consequences: the demographic decline mixed with the nationalistic and popular rhetoric established a framework within which sexual minori-ties can be continuously overlooked and discriminated against. Furthermore, the lack of political democratic culture in Eastern Europe only strengthens the “demonisation” of sexual minorities. As Mole rightly observes in his analysis of the situation in Lithuania –and this observation can be to a certain degree extended to all post-socialist countries in Eastern Europe– the impact of the post-socialist transition on negative attitudes towards homosexuality is reflected in the misunderstanding of concepts such as democracy and human rights: “Democracy is often used simply to mean ‘rule of the majority,’ which frees politicians from the need to take account of the rights of minority groups […]” (Mole 2011: 547). The lat-ter is reflected also in those legal propositions discussed in Lithuania, Russia, Ukraine and Moldova (cf. Ursu and Hosa, 2012) that aim to prohibit

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discussions on homosexuality in schools and other public spaces in order to protect minors from what is intentionally named as “homosexual propaganda.”

In the Balkans the attitudes towards homosexuality have also been shaped by the experience of the Balkan wars. As traumatically shown by the use of rape as a weapon of war in Croatia and Bosnia, the acts, driven by nationalism, were tightly interwoven with heterosexuality. Feminist schol-arship has shown that nationalistic discourses symbolically create the nation in the form of a female body that needs protection (cf. Yuval-Davis 1997), but can be also “erotically desired, nourished […] fertilized and pen-etrated” (Kuntsman 2010: 145).

Similarly, the “homosexual body” is constructed as its opposition – the Other, which represents a threat to the nation (and as such to heterosexual men). Mosse (1985) has shown that the modern European nation-building process has been significantly heteronormative and substantiated on the construction of a homosexual as the internal Other.

The phantasmatic imagery of the homosexual as the Other is fed on the ideas that homosexuality is not natural and is characterised by an exces-sive, careless sexuality, which is not “burdened” by reproduction (of human beings as well as the nation). The latter is often depicted on banners, held by homophobic opponents of the Pride Parades, for example in the form of a crossed-out depiction of anal sex.

Psychoanalytically speaking, this represents some kind of a “heterosex-ual envy,” a construction of the Other as the one who is supposedly enjoy-ing what the subject believes he has lost himself or – on the collective level, what it is believed that the nation has been deprived of. The “persecutory Other” (the homosexual) needs to be persecuted in order to regain order (in terms of what is constructed as natural). Desiree Lewis, discussing the vio-lent reactions against homoerotic desires by some African political leaders, concludes that “homosexuality, whether as ‘fact’ or as ‘possibility’ drasti-cally confounds the ‘natural’ binaries, identities and relationships central to fictions of nation: to belong as citizens, we have legitimate and ‘natural’ sexual roles to play. When we step out of these roles, we become unnatural, ‘westernized’ and traitorous” (Lewis 2008: 107).

As homophobia seems to be so deeply embedded in the notions of nation, masculinity, gender binary, normality, naturalness […] where is the way out of it? The gay and lesbian movement across Europe increas-ingly places its bets on strategic litigation. Important legal victories have already been won at the European Court of Human Rights, and the gradual

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increase in the number of European countries that recognise equal part-nership and family rights for gays and lesbians keep hopes high. Furthermore, Takács and Szalma (2011) have shown that the institutional level of same-sex relationship positively affects the social acceptance of gays and lesbians. Those countries that have legally recognised same-sex partnerships have recorded lower levels of homophobia. However, consid-ering the complicated structural factors that encourage and justify homophobia, it is unlikely that the legal changes alone will bring about also the needed social changes. The latter can be achieved –at least to a certain extent– only by continuous work on education, public awareness and deconstruction of popular beliefs about homosexuality. The prerequisites for all these are effective court procedures and proper understanding of the concept of human rights protection. Both, however, seem to be far away from the reality in many Eastern European countries in the first decades of the twenty-first century.

This issue of Southeastern Europe on homophobia takes three post-socialist Balkan countries –Croatia, Serbia and Slovenia– as case studies to examine the role of homophobia in the (nationalistic) projects of state building after the dissolution of Yugoslavia.

Dean Vuletić, discussing the marginalisation of homosexuals in Croatian politics and society in the 1990s, focuses on the analysis of the homophobic politics of the Croatian Democratic Union Party, the largest and the most powerful party in Croatia, often associated with the Croatian nationalism of the past two decades. Vuletić claims that homophobia in Croatian soci-ety and politics became more salient during the disintegration of Yugoslavia and the wars in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina, when “imagined” homo-sexuals became scapegoats that could be blamed for political problems. Furthermore, during the war the Serbs were portrayed as homosexuals in order to create an image of Croats’ moral and physical superiority over their enemies.

In her discussion of homophobia in Serbia, Zorica Mršević tackles the issue through the analysis of structural factors maintaining homophobia in contemporary Serbian society high on the list of values, and through the reflection upon the empirical data on homophobia, obtained by Serbian LGBT groups. The author concludes that homophobia in Serbia is repro-duced by the nationalists, traditionalist and conformist political discourses, where the hatred of homosexuals is seen as a way to defend the national and territorial integrity of the state, and, by implication, of the true Serbian family.

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Roman Kuhar and Alenka Švab frame the discussion on homophobia in Slovenia in the context of the theory of recognition. The authors claim that tolerance towards gays and lesbians in Slovenia is conditioned by the pub-lic non-recognition of their identity. The gay and lesbian community in Slovenia is therefore pushed into a “transparent closet,” in which homosexu-ality is reduced to a private matter of a citizen. Despite the fact that Slovenia is often portrayed as the most tolerant society towards homosexuality in the context of former Yugoslav republics, the tolerance is a fictitious one, conditioned by keeping the heteronormative organisation of society intact.

Although the authors approach homophobia from different standpoints, and the role that homophobia has played in the politics and the history of the analysed countries differs, the conclusions are, however, congruent: homophobia remains the sole unifying experience of an otherwise hetero-geneous gay and lesbian community.

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In the Name of Hate: Homophobia as a Value

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