Madonna Won't Return to Russia Because of Antigay Laws

'I don't want to perform in places where being homosexual is tantamount to a crime,' the singer says.

Trudy Ring

Trudy Ring is The Advocate’s senior politics editor and copy chief. She has been a reporter and editor for daily newspapers and LGBTQ+ weeklies/monthlies, trade magazines, and reference books. She is a political junkie who thinks even the wonkiest details are fascinating, and she always loves to see political candidates who are groundbreaking in some way. She enjoys writing about other topics as well, including religion (she’s interested in what people believe and why), literature, theater, and film. Trudy is a proud “old movie weirdo” and loves the Hollywood films of the 1930s and ’40s above all others. Other interests include classic rock music (Bruce Springsteen rules!) and history. Oh, and she was a Jeopardy! contestant back in 1998 and won two games. Not up there with Amy Schneider, but Trudy still takes pride in this achievement.

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Trudy Ring

August 15 2015 2:28 PM EST

November 05 2017 1:09 AM EST

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Madonna says she will never perform in Russia again because of the nation's antigay laws, for which she's predictably catching heat from some homophobic politicians.

"I won't appear in Moscow or St. Petersburg anymore, because I don't want to perform in places where being homosexual is tantamount to a crime," she told Entertainment Weekly in an interview for its August 14 issue. The full interview is not online, but several websites have summarized it, including i-D and Pink News.

She spoke up for LGBT rights while performing in St. Petersburg in 2012, leading to a lawsuit, eventually dismissed, accusing her of violating the city's law against "gay propaganda," which was the basis for a national law enacted in 2013. She has also defended the feminist punk-rock collective Pussy Riot against the Russian government's suppression, for which she said she received death threats, and she has denounced Russia's antigay policies in a variety of venues.

Vitaly Milanov, the St. Petersburg city official behind its antigay law, denounced Madonna as a "hypocritical old lady" in an interview with the Russian News Agency. He "accused her of prioritising gay rights over the lives of children suffering because of the conflict in eastern Ukraine," Pink News notes.