II. Social visibility and acceptance of LGBT people in Hungary

Social visibility and acceptance of LGBT people in Hungary will be examined in this chapter from three perspectives. First, I will present Hungarian as well as international opinion poll findings indicating the social acceptance level of homosexuality in Hungary, including important issues such as same-sex marriage and adoption of children by same-sex couples. In this section I won’t be able to present anything in relation to transgender or transsexual issues, simply because I have not found any such data relevant to Hungary. Naturally, the fact that there is no available data is informative in itself: it can show the lack of social awareness, visibility and acceptance of transgender issues – all at the same time. 1

Second, I will present the findings of a study on mainstream media visibility of homosexuality. Again, I have not found any Hungarian media analyses related to transgender issues.

Third, I will sketch the socio-cultural infrastructure available for LGBT people in Hungary. Here the officially functioning organisations representing the – political and various other – interests of LGBT people are introduced as well as the main events and places where their constituencies can meet, organise themselves and socialise with each other. This section is extended with a brief description of the main actors of LGBT media products, followed by a short analysis about the main features and the significance of creating and using “Own media”. It is important to note that this is the only part of this chapter where we can find traces of transgender existence in Hungary mainly in the form of an internet portal called TransSexual Online. 2

II.1. Opinion poll findings

Social acceptance of homosexuality can be measured by opinion poll questions in which people are asked what they think about issues related to homosexuality. According to the findings of an international research project in 1991 Hungary was rated higher than average in comparison with other Eastern European countries – and Western European ones, too – in accepting homosexuality. 3 According to another finding from 1993, 85 percent of the Hungarian respondents thought that homosexuality was “unforgivable”. 4 Data of a Hungarian survey of 1994 showed that 78,6 % of the respondents thought that it was always inappropriate if two same-sex grown-ups have sexual relationship with each other. 5 According to a Hungarian result from 1995 74,6% of the respondents found same-sex cohabitation acceptable. 6 According to the research findings of Hungarian sociologist László Tóth between 1991 and 1996 the social rejection of homosexuality radically decreased and the level of tolerance increased in Hungary. 7

According to the most recent research findings 8 in 2003 more than one third of Hungarian respondents viewed homosexuality as an illness, almost one third thought that homosexuality was a private matter of the individual, about every seventh respondent considered homosexuality to be a form of deviant behaviour, while only about one tenth of respondents thought that choosing a same-sex sexual partner was a basic right. (See: Table I.)

In 2003 almost one third the respondents stated that the life of homosexuals should be regulated by the state, by legal means, while almost two thirds rejected the possibility of state intervention. (See: Table II.)

Respondents were also able to express their views on homosexual organisations, gay marriage and adoption issues: in 2003 41,8% would approve if homosexuals established an organisation to represent their interests, 21% would approve gay marriage and 17,9% would approve child adoption by same-sex couples. (See: Tables III, IV, V.)

As we could see, the above presented opinion poll and research findings are rather controversial. Still, it can be assumed that the social acceptance level of homosexuality is relatively low in Hungary. Especially in the light of the results of 2003, it seems that the majority (about 60 percent) of Hungarians still express negative views on homosexuality by considering it to be a form of sin, crime, illness or deviant behaviour, while only about 10 percent acknowledge the right to choose a same-sex partner.

At the same time according to the data of the European Social Survey (ESS) in 2002 and 2005 almost half (48,7%; 47,5%) of the Hungarian respondents agreed or rather agreed with the statement that gays and lesbians should be free to live as they wish. 9 (See: Table VI.) Age, educational background and place of living seemed to be determining factors in supporting this issue, while the gender of the respondents did not seem to affect their views.

A relatively low level of social acceptance of homosexuality in Hungary was also reflected by the international comparison: among the 24 countries Hungary – with its mean value of 2,8 (where 1 = absolute agreement and 5 = absolute disagreement) – had the 20th place. The result of all the examined countries were the following: the Netherlands (1,7), Denmark (1,7), Iceland (1,7), Sweden (1,9), Belgium (1,9), Luxembourg (1,9), France (2), Norway (2), Switzerland (2,1), Ireland (2,1), United Kingdom (2,1), Austria (2,1), Germany (2,2), Spain (2,2), Finland (2,3), Portugal (2,4), Czech Republic (2,4), Slovenia (2,6), Greece (2,7), Hungary (2,8), Slovakia (2,8), Estonia (2,9), Poland (3), Ukraine (3,1). 10

In 2003 EOS Gallup Europe conducted a large scale (N=15,074) opinion poll concerning the authorisation of homosexual marriage and the adoption of children by homosexual couples in 30 European countries, including Hungary (N=500). 11 (See: TABLE VI–IX.) According to the findings, in the 15 old member states of the European Union 57% of respondents were in favour of authorising the marriage of homosexual couples, and 42% of respondents were in favour of authorising the adoption of children by homosexual couples throughout Europe. While in the ten new member states there was a much lower level of support: only 28,8% of respondents were in favour of same-sex marriage (64% opposed it), and 19,3% were in favour of adoption of children by same-sex couples (73,7% opposed it). In this light the Hungarian results of 37% of respondents supporting (55% opposing) same-sex marriage and 34% supporting (60% opposing) adoption of children by same-sex couples are not too discouraging.

From the findings, it turned out that gender, age, educational level, religious background and political orientation seemed to be determining factors in supporting these issues: women, younger people, people with higher educational level, non-religious background and left-wing political orientation tended to be more supportive than others. It was also noted that the level of support towards these issues varied in accordance with the current national legislation: countries having already adapted their laws, or in the stage of doing so, received firm support according to their respective public opinions. According to the findings of the Eurobarometer 66 12 (N=29.152), conducted in September and October of 2006, covering the population aged 15 years and over in the 25 EU member states as well as in Bulgaria and Romania, on average 44% of the respondents from the European Union agreed that homosexual marriages should be allowed throughout Europe (See: TABLE X–XI.). The Netherlands (82%), Sweden (71%), Denmark (69%) were characterised by the highest levels of acceptance, while responses from Cyprus (14%), Latvia (14%) and Romania (11%) indicated the lowest level of acceptance. In Hungary 18% of the respondents (N=1005) agreed with this statement. Concerning the question whether adoption of children should be authorised for homosexual couples throughout Europe, 32% of the respondents from the European Union agreed: the Netherlands (69%), Sweden (51%), Denmark (44) were characterised by the highest levels of acceptance, while responses from Romania (8%), Malta (7%) and Poland (7%) indicated the lowest level of acceptance. In Hungary 13% of the respondents expressed their agreement.

II.2. Mainstream media visibility

Mainstream media visibility can be another indicator of the social acceptance level of homosexuality in a society. Here I would like to refer to the findings of a Hungarian study analysing media representations of homosexuality to be found in HVG – a Hungarian economic, political news magazine with a circulation of around 115.000 issues per week – between 1993 and 2000. 13 HVG – modelled on The Economist – closely follows the developments within Hungarian society but at the same time it provides the Hungarian reader with a broad review of current international political, economic, social, cultural as well as scientific issues. If we accept that even though weekly papers cannot be considered primary sources of information, their content can nevertheless be assumed to be equal to that of such primary information sources as television and the daily papers (cf. Funkhauser, 1973), then it can be asserted that the

themes of the articles in HVG are most probably in accordance with the most important Hungarian and international developments and by their analysis we can have a picture of what were the most important events and news items in the world from a Hungarian perspective in a given period.

The scope of this examination covered 8 annual issues of HVG with a total of 40.332 articles, out of which there were 189 articles with references to homosexuality or homosexuals. Within the 189 articles, 33 were written specifically about homosexuals or homosexuality. By analysing these media representations the “news value” of homosexuality could be detected, i.e. how, when and why homosexuality became a topic worthwhile to write about not on the level of daily sensationalism but especially on the level of arousing and reflecting more durable, more serious public attention.

According to the findings the topic of homosexuality was continually present in HVG from the beginning of the examined period, though this continuity started in articles written about Hungary only from 1995–96. From 1996 – and especially from 1998 – the visibility of homosexuality in Hungary became stronger by the growing opportunity for homosexual self-expression. Practically it meant more direct voicing of individuals identifying themselves as gays and lesbians, which could also be interpreted as a sign of Hungarian homosexual activism becoming more effective. (See: TABLE XIII.)

Within the thematic group of homosexuality – i.e. those articles focusing on the subject of homosexuality – especially those initiatives had the chance to gain news value that targeted changes in the existing penal and civil codes (in relation to decriminalisation and the legal acceptance of same-sex relationships, for example by claiming non-

discriminatory age of consent and officially recognised forms of cohabitation for same-sex partners). From the beginning HVG described the “special homosexual issues” in a broader human rights context. Therefore there was increasing attention focusing on the claims that the social discrimination of homosexuals should be interpreted as a form of human rights violation to be dealt with by introducing antidiscriminatory legislation being an official expectation or already implemented practice in the European Union.

The strongest stereotype about homosexuals seemed to be their promiscuity. In maintaining this stereotypical view references to homosexuals being an “AIDS risk group” played an important role. Here the illusory correlation between homosexuality and the practice of frequent change of sexual partners could be detected. Probably it was not a coincidence that homosexuals were described in the most homogenised way in this context: being referred to as members of a unified, homogenous “risk group”; and in judging them group membership gained primary importance in relation to the reality of their sexual practices.

By examining the terminology used in HVG to describe homosexuals it turned out that besides the “traditional” use of words with negative or even obscene connotation – functioning mainly as signs to emphasise the social distance between the speaker and “the homosexuals” –, by the second half of the 1990s the word ‘meleg’ (which can be interpreted as the Hungarian version of “gay”, with the literary meaning “warm”) suggesting respect for the self-definition of homosexuals gradually became widely accepted and entered into everyday use.

The media representations of HVG on homosexuality between 1993 and 2000 can be interpreted as documents of growing social visibility of homosexuality in Hungary, the extension of which can show on the one hand the level of cultural and social integration of homosexuality in society, while on the other hand it can reflect the power relations of homosexual groups in society and their abilities or opportunities for self-expression.

II.3. The socio-cultural infrastructure of LGBT people in Hungary

The scope of the socio-cultural infrastructure for LGBT people in Hungary covers organisations representing their various kinds of interests, events and virtual as well as real places where they can meet, organise and socialise.

There are several officially functioning organisations representing the interests of LGBT people in Hungary at present. These are the Háttér Support Society for LGBT People, the Labrisz Lesbian Association, the Lambda Budapest Gay Association, the Habeas Corpus Working Group, the Five Loaves of Bread Community (“Öt kenyér” Christian Community for Homosexuals), the “DAMKÖR” Gay Association, the “Együtt Egymásért Kelet Magyarországon” (Together for Each Other in East-Hungary) Gay Association, the Szimpozion Association, the Atlasz LGBT Sport Association, and the Rainbow Mission Foundation. The Homeros-Lambda, the first officially recognized Hungarian homosexual organisation was established in 1988 – but it does not function any longer. Háttér Support Society for LGBT people was established in 1995 with the objectives “to further the self-organisation of Hungarian sexual minorities, to dissolve nonsensical, but widely spread stereotypes and prejudices about LGBT people, to facilitate a more open social dialogue, to stop the direct and indirect discrimination of LGBT people”. 15 From 1996 they have been operating information as well as personal and telephone counselling services. In 2000 they started their legal aid program. This organisation has the largest number of members and activities in Hungary.

The Labrisz Lesbian Association was founded officially in 1999 but the core of the organisation existed already from 1996. Their main goals include organising community building activities, increasing social visibility of lesbian and bisexual women, publishing relevant material to further a social dialogue and spread information in order to draw attention to discrimination of female sexual minorities and fight against prejudices and stereotypes. 16 With the support of the PHARE Democracy Micro-projects Programme of the European Union in 2000, Labrisz introduced a ground-breaking educational program for secondary school students and teachers with the main aims of creating a safe and unbiased environment in schools, helping students learn to respect other people, and increasing teachers’ awareness that their students might be gay or lesbian, and instructing them in ways to help lesbian and gay students.

The Lambda Budapest Gay Association, the oldest Hungarian gay organisation that is still functioning, was founded in 1991. Their main activity has been to publish the monthly gay magazine “Mások” – the first unofficial issue of which came out as early as 1989. 17

The Habeas Corpus Working Group, a human rights NGO was founded in 1996 and their legal aid service has been active since 1997. In the past few years they primarily focus on the equality of women and sexual minorities, and rights connected to sexual autonomy. 18

The Five Loaves of Bread Community (“Öt kenyér” Christian Community for Homosexuals) – started as a strictly Catholic, but now an ecumenical Christian group – was founded in 1996 with a main objective “to support those gay and lesbian people trying to live with their orientation as Christians, seeking solution for emerging problems”. 19

The “DAMKÖR” Southern Hungarian Gay Association is the first one of its kind functioning outside the capital of Hungary. It was established in 1999 in the city of Szeged, a major regional centre of South East Hungary. Their main activities are organising a gay and lesbian student club at Szeged University, another club for people over thirty, and other community building activities as well as maintaining a telephone help-line in order to further the social emancipation and integration of gays and lesbians. 20

The “Együtt Egymásért Kelet Magyarországon” (Together for Each Other in East-Hungary) Gay Association is the second officially registered group functioning outside Budapest. They are involved in community building and AIDS prevention activities. They also cooperate with the www.melegkelet.ini.hu (Gay East) internet portal.

The Szimpozion Cultural, Educational, and Leisure Association of Young GLBT People 21 was founded in 2002. They organise the biweekly meetings of the Pocok Club, a youth club with a cultural orientation. In 2006 they started the “Bújj elõ!” (Come out!) campaign by launching the www.melegvagyok.hu (‘meleg vagyok’ = I am gay) internet portal.

The Atlasz LGBT Sport Association was officially registered in 2004. It has ten sections: running, rock climbing, soccer, cycling, handball, basketball, dance, badminton, hiking, swimming. 22

The Rainbow Mission Foundation was established by the Háttér Support Society for LGBT People, the Labrisz Lesbian Association and the Lambda Budapest Gay Association in 2001 with the primary aim of organising the events of the yearly Gay and Lesbian Cultural Festival and the Gay Pride Day. 23

The annual Gay and Lesbian Cultural Festival is probably the most important cultural event for LGBT people in Hungary. The festival was organised for the ninth time in 2004 in Budapest, and besides the “traditional” gay pride march its program covered several workshops – on community building and coming out issues, HIV prevention, transgender issues, and legal issues such as same-sex partnership and equal treatment legislation etc. – book presentations, art exhibitions, parties and film screenings.

In Budapest mainly for the gay public there are several bars, cafés, clubs, hotels, restaurants and cruising areas available that can sometimes also serve the needs of other segments of the LGBT crowd. Exclusively lesbian places are hard to find but special “women only” events are regularly organised in Budapest. During the last few years the Hungarian countryside offers a growing number of parties and clubs, frequented mainly by gay men.

II.3.1. Own media: creating symbolic environments

Besides two newsletters of gay and lesbian organisations, which are not available publicly (and two issues of the Hom-Eros, published by the first Hungarian homosexual organisation in the early 1990s), there was only one gay magazine, Mások (founded in 1989, officially published from 1991, now also available online 24) between 1989 and 2006 in Hungary. Though Mások was – is – open to lesbians in theory, in practice it became an almost exclusively gay magazine, made almost entirely by gay men.

The choice of the name “Mások” (Others) reflected a certain message. According to the editors if they were to start a gay magazine today, they would choose a different name, but at the very end of the 1980s and the very beginning of the 1990s Mások seemed to be the right choice: “Nowadays people have a very different approach to this than then. It became a part of everyday life that gays exist in the world, too. But when we started, it was a completely different world. During the last ten years the situation changed so much that there is no reason to choose such a name now. If we would look for a new name for the magazine, I am sure that we would not call it ‘others’ because it has a completely different meaning now. At that time it meant that we had to assume our identity, but nowadays it rather suggests separation. So this is a very different world now.” 25

In April 2006 the first issue of the Boxer magazine was published: this glossy gay lifestyle magazine represents a new product targeting primarily middle class gay men with considerable consuming power. After appearing at first in two monthly issues and as a third bimonthly issue, the magazine ceased publication appearing again only at the end of the year.

There is also an advertisement leaflet-like monthly publication, called Na végre! 100% GAY (published from 2001 by the owner of a gay fitness centre). It is a free publication, based on a business venture, gaining income from advertisements. The fact that Na végre! exists now for more than four years can be interpreted as the sign of the strengthening pink economy in Hungary.

In 1997–98 four issues of the lesbian Labrisz zine were published. Though there is no Hungarian lesbian magazine, Hungarian lesbians are in fact quite active in publishing. At a certain point when they were granted a substantial amount of money by an American foundation (ASTRAEA), they decided to start publishing a book series instead of starting a “proper” magazine. There were attempts to establish a Hungarian lesbian magazine in 1997-98, but after four issues these stopped. Therefore nowadays Labrisz, the only independent Hungarian lesbian organisation regularly publishes a minimum budget, photocopied newsletter primarily to inform their members and a book series on lesbian themes.

At present there are only a few Hungarian LGBT radio programmes: the Önazonos (broadcast from 1994 on the national radio); the Szappanopera helyett (from 1996) and the Zártkörû lányok (from 2000 on a non-profit alternative radio, during 2001–2002 available only on the internet); and the Meleg helyzet (from 2005 on a commercial radio). In January 2007 the GayRadio.hu community radio started to broadcast on the internet. Previously there were the non-profit internet radio, the Pararádió (from 1997), and the Ki más?! programme (also from 1997 on a non-profit community radio) – but these do not exist any longer. It is important to note that producing radio programmes can be very costeffective compared with publishing, printing costs on the one hand and television programme producing costs on the other hand. The three main GLBT internet portals are the gay.hu, functioning from 1996, the pride.hu, the “first Hungarian gay portal”, an officially registered internet portal, established in 2001, and from 2001 the TranSexual Online, the “most significant transsexual related site in Hungary … and probably in East-Europe” which is about transsexuality for transpeople and those interested, providing advice, reference, communication forums, and support for the transsexual minority. 26 These internet portals are gaining growing importance as there is growing internet access in Hungary.

LGBT media content is typically produced by sexual minority groups: mainly gays and lesbians. These minority groups usually share a common “mainstream media fate” with other relatively powerless – for example, ethnic – minority groups, which can be characterised by low visibility and stereotypical representation. Therefore sexual minority media products can be seen as means of creating a symbolic environment where people belonging to these groups can feel at home (cf. Gross, 1991). It is also important to emphasise that the position of sexual minorities differs from that of “traditional” minorities in two aspects: they are usually not marked by their bodies – for example, by their skin colour –, thus they are not recognisable at first sight; and their existence challenges the “natural order of things”, thus their media appearances can become problematic. Still, their media products can be perceived to be documents of, as well as tools for promoting the successful social integration of relatively powerless social groups, and – in some cases – struggling against social intolerance.

LGBT media is usually made for and by members of sexual minorities but it does not have to be exclusively so. According to a leading Hungarian gay activist “of course, it helps if you are gay, but […] I don’t think that just because you are gay you are able to create good quality gay media”. 27 The peripheral of the target audience necessarily interfaces with mainstream society – through, for example, parents, friends and colleagues – and some sexual minority media producers take this into account.

As LGBT media productivity matures there appears to be a trend towards specialisation: mixed media – i.e. media produced by gays and lesbians working together, for an aggregate gay and lesbian public – tend to become more homogenous: either lesbian or gay only. Mások, the only Hungarian gay magazine targeted lesbians, too when it started, but it has now become – according to its editors – “98% gay”. Specialisation is an indicator of development. However, it does not necessarily imply that cooperative networks stop functioning: joint events, like pride and film festivals, will continue to be organised by a broad spectrum of LGBT activists working together – as this could be observed in he case of organising the Hungarian Gay and Lesbian Cultural festivals during the last nine years.

There can be cultural indicators for including erotic material, particularly in gay specialised magazines. Additionally there can be commercial reasons for doing so. On the other hand, there can be cultural indicators against the inclusion of naked images: besides the danger of over-sexualisation, or that of intimidating the public with picture-perfect bodies, the distinction between pornography and cultural eroticism is a hard one to make objectively.

Probably the most stable function of LGBT media is the information function. It is stable in the sense that the importance of this function seems to be independent from changing socio-cultural contexts. While the importance of other functions – such as community building, helping people in their coming out, or entertaining them – can change according to the changing social environments. Identity politics is a system-specific concept: it can hardly be interpreted in anti-democratic political systems characterised by the extensive erosion of private identities as well as the rigid and forced separation of public and private identities. The natural context of identity politics is civil society, the field of social self-organisation, being the framework as well as the guarantee of modern identity formations (cf. Erõs, 1994). In Hungary, where involvement in civil activities still counts as a relatively new and not at all wide-spread experience, LGBT identity building is still an important media function. However, the very strong connection between LGBT activism and sexual minority media production characteristic especially in the early 1990s seems to be diminishing gradually.

In places where mainstream media are unable to mediate the special needs and claims of sexual minorities, special media segments must be created by the concerned groups in order to provide their constituencies with positive reference points for identity formation. Inability to use mass media to project LGBT cultural elements into the mainstream can reflect the relatively high level of social discrimination of LGBT people in present day Hungary. Probably the ideal of Hungarian activists would be that sexual minority media would no longer be necessary as an autonomous entity, the mainstream media would encompass the various sexual minority media products, thus nullifying the distinction between sexual minorities and the majority in this respect.

Once LGBT media production outgrows the no-budget, selffinancing, small scale stage, further expansion is only possible either through commercial financing or through grants. This usually implies that a choice has to be made: commercial financing can lead to compromises in politics, while the grant option faces the problem that grants are hard to find. Activists dream of large grants with no strings attached, but market rules can force their hand too. So, whereas in some cases only the philanthropic finance option is possible, in other cases a commercial approach may be the only option for survival.

Ultimately these types of media must be of a transient nature as they are in a way working towards making themselves irrelevant politically, but on the other hand, they advance themselves culturally doing so. Own media have a cultural impact. LGBT media can provide a cultural contraweight against societal oppression. It seems that in the long run culture is at least as an effective emancipatory agent as legislation.