For the Russian authorities, journalist Vadim Vaganov is a “foreign agent” and a “participant in the international LGBT civil society movement”. A few months ago, the queer media outlet he works for was declared an “extremist organisation”. Being a queer journalist makes Vaganov part of not only one but two vulnerable groups in Russia. In 2024, he was forced into exile. In an interview with ECPMF, he spoke about what it is like when your work and your identity merge into a single, huge area of risk.

By Leonie Hauck

“Being queer in Russia means constantly feeling like you somehow don’t quite fit into the world around you. From a very young age, you absorb the homophobia that exists in society, along with this idea that it’s better not to stand out, not to draw attention to yourself.”

Vadim Vaganov is a Russian journalist. He grew up in a country where the only kind of love portrayed around him was heterosexual love. “Queer people on talk shows were either mocked or portrayed as these ridiculous caricatures. And over time, it turned into people openly pouring buckets of hate on the queer community.” When he realised he was gay, his first thought was: “Okay, I just need to pass as straight, and then everything will be fine.” However, Vaganov notes that constantly hiding who you are can take a serious emotional toll.

Being queer in Russia

Even if the Russian government tries to keep LGBTQ+ people isolated from each other and as invisible as possible, that does not go according to plan, Vaganov states. “There are actually an incredible number of remarkably brave people in Russia. No matter how hard the authorities try to push everyone underground, queer initiatives still keep emerging and communities keep forming — and not just in Moscow and St. Petersburg.”

Nevertheless, being a queer person in Russia puts you at a huge risk. In 2022, the government passed a law prohibiting so-called “LGBT propaganda”. “Today, even the simple fact that you’re openly gay and write about it on your blog can put you at risk of administrative prosecution.” The journalist explains that even a neutral statement about LGBTQ+ people can be labelled as propaganda nowadays. According to the Guardian, individuals can be fined up to 400,000 roubles (~4,176 euros) for “propagandising nontraditional sexual relations”. Organisations risk fines of up to 5 million roubles (~52,200 euros).

Despite the odds, 2022 was also the year Vaganov came out as queer publicly. He says he already had been pretty open before that. “Everyone around me knew I was gay.” But after the law was passed, he could no longer accept what was happening. He wanted to show, by his own example, that they were not going to succeed in silencing them all. “You want to make the LGBTQ+ community invisible? Fine, then I’m going to make myself visible on purpose. I wanted other queer people to see that and hopefully feel a little less alone.”

Unfortunately, the situation for queer people continued to get worse after that. In 2023, the Russian Supreme Court classified the “international LGBT movement” as “extremist”, prohibiting any form of activism in that regard. Under the new law, media outlets hesitated even more to report on LGBTQ+ issues, Vaganov explains. “Queer content was censored more aggressively, and people themselves started self-censoring even more.”

Vadim Vaganov standing outside the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg, holding a sign that said, “The best constitutional amendment is Putin’s resignation”. Photo from Vadim Vaganov’s personal archive.

Being a queer journalist in Russia

As a queer journalist, Vaganov is not only part of one but two vulnerable groups in Russia. “My professional work and my identity have basically merged into one big area of risk.” He says that even before he began working as a journalist, he had been deeply involved in civic and political life. “I was part of the leadership of the St. Petersburg branch of the Yabloko party, worked on election campaigns, and later worked for an urban advocacy organisation called City Projects.” He also started his own blog where he wrote a lot about LGBTQ+ issues. In 2021, he began working as a journalist for the queer Russian media outlet Parni+.

But practising independent journalism in the country has become incredibly difficult. “There’s no guarantee that law enforcement won’t show up at your door one day for one reason or another. And if you’ve already attracted the authorities’ attention, the risks only get higher.” Vaganov also states that the space for LGBTQ+ journalism in Russia has been steadily shrinking. “Over the years, almost every LGBTQ+ media outlet or initiative doing similar work has either been blocked or shut down because the risks became too high. At some point, the information space just started emptying out.”

Writing about LGBTQ+ issues, human rights, freedom or repression can get your articles or the entire outlet blocked by Russia’s state censorship authority Roskomnadzor, he says. “So part of a journalist’s job ends up becoming a constant struggle just to make sure people inside Russia can still access what you publish.” The journalist adds that independent outlets in the country have found ways to circumvent many of these restrictions and keep their reporting accessible to the Russian audience — but it is a constant fight.

The state censors everything, from websites and articles to social media, images and books. “And it’s never just, ‘you’re not allowed to read this’. There’s always a second message: ‘this is the correct way to live’. The correct family, the correct life, the correct kind of love, the correct heroes.”

Photo from Vadim Vaganov’s personal archive

Forced to silence yourself

Vaganov shares that some people, even within the queer community, say that repression only affects the most active and visible people. “That if you just live quietly and don’t ‘broadcast’ who you are, nothing will happen. But that line is completely arbitrary. Cases involving so-called ‘LGBT extremism’ are already affecting people whose activities have nothing to do with activism — for things like messages in dating groups or organising private parties.”

And for journalists? Self-censorship has become pretty common. “When I was still living in Russia, I sometimes had to soften the wording or rewrite parts of an article just to avoid accidentally getting hit with something like ‘discrediting the armed forces’ or some other charge.”

But nonetheless Vaganov has been on the radar of Russian authorities for a long time. “Six administrative cases have already been opened against me for ‘LGBT propaganda’. The case files literally say that I’m engaged in prohibited activity because I talk about the social equality of ‘traditional’ and same-sex relationships.” Also, his posts about LGBTQ+ people were described as a “sociocultural threat to the national security of the Russian Federation” as they were said to contain signs of “ideological and psychological influence on citizens through the promotion of a destructive ideology”.

“It would be funny if it weren´t so sad. One pretty telling example: even a post of mine quoting RuPaul was classified as ‘LGBT propaganda’: ‘If you can’t love yourself, how in the hell are you gonna love somebody else?’”

Forced into exile

Vaganov exiled Russia in early 2024. Later that same year, he was designated a “foreign agent” and in 2025, the Russian Ministry of Justice identified him as a “participant in the international LGBT civil society movement”, ua.news reported. “Personally, I’ve always treated the ‘foreign agent’ label more like a sign that you must be doing something right. But of course, there’s nothing good about the fact that this system exists in the first place.” His uncle, for example, was denied jobs because of “foreign agents” in his family. Also, a friend of his was aggressively questioned at the border, and officers searched his belongings and chats after finding Vaganov’s contact on his phone.

In April 2026, Parni+, the outlet he still works for, was declared an “extremist organisation” according to the independent Russian outlet meduza. Parni+ was founded in 2008. Aside from articles it has been publishing guides, holding webinars, consultations and support groups for the queer community, Vaganov explains. “There was never anything extremist about that work.” But the Russian state takes a different view. “If LGBTQ+ people talk about themselves, that means they’re ‘promoting visibility’. If they talk about discrimination, that means they’re ‘positioning themselves against the state’. If they use inclusive language, that means they’re ‘undermining traditional values’.” The classification as “extremist” has made the work of Parni+ as well as the interaction with audiences inside Russia much more difficult, the journalist says. At this point, any form of support for the outlet carries serious risks.

In May 2026, Russian law enforcement authorities placed Vaganov on the federal wanted list. After that, law enforcement officers started visiting his relatives to gather information about him, telling them that Vaganov had nothing to worry about when it came to his criminal prosecution. “All I have to do is come back home, confess my guilt, and explain in court that I simply didn’t know I was supposed to comply with discriminatory legislation. And then maybe I won’t even get a prison sentence! I’m joking — who knows, maybe they’ll even buy me ice cream?”

A look into the future

Now in exile, Vaganov can finally feel safer while working. “That constant background anxiety is gone.” But looking back at the country he can no longer set foot in fills him with concern. “My biggest fear is that fewer and fewer people will keep doing queer journalism. Censorship, pressure, newsrooms disappearing, professional networks falling apart, the lack of safe places to publish — all of that has already become part of our reality.”

Independent outlets in the country are facing a serious funding crisis. On top of that, “the Russian state is very generous when it comes to handing out toxic legal labels to independent media and organisations. And once you have one of those labels, even simply interacting with you — let alone financially supporting you — can become unsafe for people inside Russia.” He emphasises the importance of programmes that help independent media and human rights organisations under the current conditions.

It is important for Vaganov that people do not think that the Russian LGBTQ+ community no longer exists. Because it does, even if under much more dangerous conditions. “And I think one of our responsibilities as journalists is not to let the state achieve what it ultimately wants: to make these people invisible and convince everyone else that they somehow don’t exist.”