Members of the LGBTQ+ community gathered in Hungary’s capital Budapest to mock the right-wing government’s recently passed law banning LGBTQ+ Pride marches.
For weeks, protesters have staged demonstrations in Budapest against the legislation, with thousands of queer folks and allies flooding the streets with signs and flags.
Hungary’s ruling Fidesz party, which was recently praised by Donald Trump, submitted a bill to parliament in March that effectively bans Pride marches from taking place, with supporters of the legislation claiming such events could be considered “harmful to children”.
It was quickly passed into law by prime minister Viktor Orbán and set fines of up to 200,000 forints (£420/$550) for organisers of Budapest Pride and anyone attending. The law also allows police to use facial recognition to target and fine anyone at Pride marches.
In previous years, more than 30,000 LGBTQ+ people and allies have marched in Budapest Pride.
On Saturday (12 April), protesters took a different tack: rather than protesting with rainbow Pride colours, they went grey for a tongue-in-cheek jibe at the anti-queer law.
At the rally – organised by the parody political party the Two-tailed Dog Party – demonstrators waved flags that were monochrome and held ironic signs with satirical slogans such as “sameness is trendy”.
“Look at all these people here now, dressed in grey – a perfect display of what sameness looks like,” demonstrator Kata Bicskei, 53, told AFP.
“That’s the twist, of course. We don’t want everyone to be the same.”
Another protester noted that “humour exposes the absurd”.
When the bill was passed, Budapest Pride issued a statement condemning the bigoted law as “not child protection, this is fascism”.
“The Hungarian government is trying to restrict peaceful protests with a critical voice by targeting a minority. Therefore, as a movement, we will fight for the freedom of all Hungarians to protest!,” the statement issued by the group read.
“Hungarians are a freedom-loving nation. We know that if the government tries to ban protests with critical voices, they will face resistance from the whole of society.
“That is why we need a scapegoat, a distraction, another wave of hatred… they lie to their voters about a child protection measure, but there is no child protection in this bill.
