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Russia Moves to File Criminal Charges Over YouTube Videos Showing Kids Talking to Gays

Parents of the kids have reportedly been threatened with loss of parental rights for violating a controversial law banning “homosexual propaganda.”

Russian prosecutors have opened a criminal investigation into a YouTube channel that posted videos showing children asking members of the LGBTQ+ community questions, a move that Russian authorities believe violates a law outlawing “homosexual propaganda.” According to Valentina Dekhtyarenko of the Pravozashchity Otkrytki of the human rights group, some of the people involved with the YouTube show, including the parents of the children, have already been called in for police questioning. “The mothers of at least two kids said that the police threatened to take away their parental rights, and that child protective services came to their houses,” Dekhtyarenko wrote on Telegram.

In one of the YouTube channel’s videos shown by state media, a young girl can be heard asking a gay man what would appear to most people to be a harmless question: “How can it happen that a boy grows up and cannot love a girl?” Russian state media reported in September that State Duma deputy speaker Pyotr Tolstoi had asked law enforcement officials to look into the videos, which he called “amoral” and “ethically impermissible.” Radio Free Europe reports that the producer of the video was given an administrative citation last month for violating Russia’s controversial law against “propagandizing” nontraditional sexuality to minors, and that police were considering bringing criminal charges.