A Russian bakery has been fined for hanging a sign at its entrance banning LGBT+ customers.
The Ipakov Brothers bakery which is located in the Siberian city of Kemerovo reportedly hung a wooden sign outside the store which read “F*****s are not allowed.”
The Moscow Times reports that Kemerovo central district court ruled that the display was not only offensive but illegal and fined the bakery 10,000 rubles (€135).
The court said that the sign in the Russian bakery “humiliates homosexuals as … a group of people distinguished on the basis of sexual orientation” and negatively impacts others’ feelings toward LGBT+ people.
10,000 rubles is just under half a month’s wages for the average worker in Siberia.
Ipatov attempted to justify his homophobic rhetoric saying he hung the sign because of his “personal convictions”. He claimed that the presence of LGBT+ people would “affect his children” and that everything “unnatural is alien to him” as his store makes “natural” products.
This is not the first such ruling in Russia. In 2017, a shop owned by Orthodox activist German Sterligov in St. Petersburg came under fire from LGBT+ activists for hanging a similar sign in his organic farm shop to ban LGBT+ customers.
Ipatov told reported that online commentators have compared the Ipanoc bakery with Sterligov’s chain of food shops.
Earlier this month, a Russian couple were forced to flee Russia to avoid losing their adoptive sons.
Reports say authorities claimed they had broken the law by telling their children that they are married which they say violates the “gay propaganda law” and threatened to take them away.
A spokesperson from LGBT+ support organisation Vykhod, Maksim Olenichev has said that there has never been a situation like this before.
The organisation was helping the couple with their legal case and advised the gay couple to flee Russia. The situation is worrying as it could set a legal precedent for other same-sex couples in the country. Olenichev said, “We think we need to defend this family from the actions of the state. This is the next twist in that law.
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