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Russian embassy says anti-gay attacks are no more severe than the UK’s ‘abuse’ of ginger people

Feb 12 2014
Written by Aaron Day

Russian diplomats have condemned a recent Channel 4 documentary about anti-gay attacks in the country, saying a similar film could have been made out of the UK’s “abuse” towards ginger people.

Last week, Channel 4 released the documentary ‘Hunted’ on Occupy Paedophilia’s vigilante methods of luring, humiliating, and torturing gay people.

According to The Telegraph, the Russian embassy spoke recently to condemn the film as “hate propaganda,” saying it was “full of distorted facts and unverifiable allegations.”

They said: “The documentary’s emotional appeal is misleading, since the film falls far short of the standards of professional journalistic investigation.

“One could have easily whipped up such ‘documentary’ about a hunting season on redheads in the UK saying that ‘ginger’ people face unmotivated verbal and physical abuse on a daily basis,” it said.

“If the authors of the documentary really had evidence of rampant gay hate crimes in Russia, they wouldn’t need to wait until an international sporting event takes place in Russia to raise the alarm. While violent attacks on homosexuals sometimes take place in Russia, just like in many other European countries, this does not mean that they are condoned, supported or, let alone, encouraged by the Government. Such attacks are few and far between and by no means reflect general sentiments of the Russian people.”

In the film, showing off for the camera, the group find a man looking for a hookup, and lure him back to the flat. He is caught and held down, as the group set about extracting a confession from him. “We will ruin his life, as usual”, one quips.

Another man, Dima, was left blinded in one eye after an attack by an anti-gay group. He says he can almost understand why the groups target gay men, as the country’s anti-gay propaganda law silences anyone who speaks positively or neutrally about gay rights: “First they stopped us responding, and then they called us paedophiles and rapists.”

The embassy said the leader of Occupy Paedophilia has since been arrested and charged with extremism, but also appeared to defend the group, saying: “As its name suggests, [it] targets only paedophiles both straight and gay”.

In July last year, Occupy Paedophilia took to social media to publicise images and videos of gay teenagers lured in on the promise of a date, before torturing them and forcing them to come out to friends and family on video.