Sexologists will soon work in Russian clinics to help patients “overcome” homosexuality and various sexual “mental disorders”, according to the Health Ministry’s decree. Reuters news agency.
The decree, which will take effect on July 1, comes amid a crackdown on gay rights that President Vladimir Putin has sought to frame as evidence of the moral decline of Western countries from which Russia must be protected.
The help of such professionals is needed when a person wants to recover from frigidity, impotence, or violations of sexual behavior such as fetishism, masochism, and sadism.
– wrote the Official Gazette of the Russian Parliament.
According to the decree signed by Putin, the specialists also help patients treat “unusual preferences, such as fetishism, homosexuality and bestiality,” the newspaper writes.
In 1987, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, removed homosexuality from its list of mental disorders. Russia did this in 1999.
But last December, Putin signed a law expanding restrictions on promoting so-called “gay propaganda,” which effectively bans any public expression of LGBT behavior or lifestyle in Russia.
Authorities have used this and older laws to shut down gay marches and detain gay rights activists.
