Global Anti-Gay Crusader Scott Lively Returns To Russia

Though facing trial for crimes against humanity for his role in Uganda's anti-LGBT movement, Scott Lively heads to Russia this week determined to appear integral to that country's crackdown on LGBT rights.

In a dispatch on his blog, global anti-gay activist Scott Lively details a week-long "mission to bolster the Russian pro-family movement."

The trip was prompted by a meeting of a planning committee for the World Congress of Families summit which will be held in Moscow next year. The organization, based in Rockford, Ill., convenes meetings of social conservatives from the U.S. and abroad to exchange ideas on topics such as combating LGBT rights and reproductive rights. One of their leaders also recently appeared in Serbia to celebrate the country's ban on a planned LGBT pride march.

Lively's description of the conference plan suggests just how symbolically important Russia's crackdown on LGBT rights has become for conservative activists worldwide. Lively reports that the conference will have its "grand opening" in the Kremlin and be held nearby at the Christ the Savior Cathedral.

Lively also appeared on a television show with Archpriest Dimitri Smirnov, head of the Orthodox patriarch's Commission on the Family. Lively adds that Smirnov has offered to help him find a publisher for this 1995 book, The Pink Swastika, which claims a cabal of gay men in the Nazi party was responsible for the holocaust.

Lively promises to "devote 50% of earnings from this book to promote the pro-family movement in Russia and the former Soviet countries."

Lively, who has previously likened Russia's battle against the "homosexualist movement" to the country's fight against Nazi Germany, asserted, "Given the Russian attitude about homosexuality, and the still-fresh memories of Nazism in the Russian population, this book has significant potential to further harden resolve against the homosexualization of Russia and the countries in its orbit."

Though facing charges for crimes against humanity for his role in Uganda's anti-gay crackdown, Lively shows no fear of being linked to Russia's current wave of anti-gay legislation. He once again took credit for the "homosexual propaganda" law, claiming, "I proposed just such a law during my 50-city tour of the former Soviet Union in 2006-2007."

He is promoting a strategy to prevent LGBT-rights supporters from "rainbow bomb[ing]" the Sochi Olympics by using the pride flag to protest the propaganda law. He is urging "pro-family leaders and advocates everywhere to start using the rainbow again ... [to remind] the world of its true meaning" as the a symbol of the biblical covenant between God and Noah in the Old Testament.

"The global homosexual movement, in cooperation with the leftist media, is making a final gambit to gain exclusive control of the rainbow symbol," he warns, proclaiming, "The Rainbow Belongs to God."

J. Lester Feder is a foreign correspondent for BuzzFeed and 2013 Alicia Patterson journalism fellow.

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