This morning's workshop was about 'media and homophobia', led by Assia. Participants of the workshop were: Tijs, Ruud, Piotr, David, Mauro, Birute, Marco, Ania, Artur and Anna.
About half of the people in the group have experience with the media - through working for radio, newspapers or television.
Homophobia is what we call the fear of homosexuals in general, or the fear of being one yourself. There are a ot of things that stem from it, such as discrimination, violence, stignmatising etc. In all the countries discussed people still have problems. In some countries there's police violence against gays (for example Italy). In some, people get killed because of their sexual orientation. In a lot of countries, gay men can't give blood (to a blood bank).
In a lot of countries the media has a homophobic attitude. In Bulgaria, Poland, Ukraine a homophobic attitiude is seen quite regularly. In Croatia most of the news comes from the Church, and is very homophobic. In Lithuania and Germany it's more the exception than the rule, but, especially in Germany you see that homophobia will come out in small, hidden ways. The Netherlands are the only country without homophobic issues in the media. Several examples were given of how the media report about homosexuals, and often they seem to use diminishing terms, dishabilitating the homosexual's point of view/case/standpoint.
There are two types of media - the one that is openly homophobic, and the one that does the slandering in subtle undertones. Open offensiveness has been obviously lessening. Due to Europan legislation, among others, rude comments are being made less in the media today. However, subtle ways of discriminating gays and lesbians are still very much active. Hidden homophobic slander is hard to tackle, since people can easily wrap up their opinions in a cover of freedom of religion and from that point of view stating discriminating things. Another part of the problem is is that the way the media think is connected to the way the society thinks. So, to change the attitude of a journalist to LGBT issues, you need to change the society's view of said issues. And that is a long-term, difficult proces. We need to educate and inform people, and to get homosexuality into their daily lives as just another way of living, instead of an avebriation. Having celebrities (from sportsmen to politicians to actors) come out is also a very good way of normalising the way people look at LGBT people.