Before the dawn of the computer age brought Alan Turing’s work its rightful recognition, before the honors that were to come, we recognized his legacy and his tragic life in November of 1988. There are memorials and movies now, but then his World War II code-breaking triumph and his contributions to the development of of artificial intelligence was all but unknown (produced by Hugh Young and presented by Barry Empson).
And in NewsWrap: Liechtenstein rings in 2025 with its first legal gay and lesbian marriages, Lithuania’s Constitutional Court strikes down its “no promo homo” law, the government of China jails three writers of the online “danmei” genre of gay male romance and sex stories, travel agent arrested in raids on Moscow gay nightspots found dead in prison, veterans booted from the U.S. military under anti-queer policies win a class action lawsuit against the Defense Department to get their discharges upgraded, , and more international LGBTQ+ news reported this week by Michael LeBeau and Ava Davis (produced by Brian DeShazor).
All this on the January 13, 2025 edition of This Way Out!
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Complete Program Summary
for the week of January 13, 2025
The Enigmatic Life of Alan Turing
NewsWrap (full transcript below): Marriage equality bells ring in the new year in the tiny European Alpine nation of Liechtenstein … Lithuania’s Constitutional Court strikes down the Eastern European country’s version of a “gay propaganda” law that had banned the “promotion” of queer relationships to children … China continues its crackdown on all things queer by arresting dozens of writers of online-posted gay erotic fiction … 48-year-old Andrei Kotov, one of the people netted in recent Russian security force raids on Moscow “extremist” queer nightspots who was additionally charged with being a travel agent who organized trips for gay men, is found dead in his cell in what authorities have called a suicide … the U.S. Defense Department settles a class action lawsuit affecting some 35,000 former service members who were kicked out of the military for being gay or lesbian, allowing them to positively-update their records and, for those who were dishonorably discharged, the chance to have that action reviewed (written by GREG GORDON and LUCIA CHAPPELLE, produced by BRIAN DeSHAZOR with technical assistance by DANIEL HUECIAS, reported this week by MICHAEL LeBEAU and AVA DAVIS).
Feature: British mathematician Alan Turing was still somewhat of an enigma in the early days of This Way Out. The 1983 best-selling biography had not yet made his tragic story legendary. A highly acclaimed play starring Derek Jacobi closed on Broadway just a week after This Way Out’s 1988 debut, but the name “Turing” was still not a household word. Before the dawn of the computer age brought Alan Turing’s work its rightful recognition, before the honors that were to come, on our November 23, 1988 program, it made perfect sense to lead into this feature written and produced by HUGH YOUNG and presented by BARRY EMPSON with the question, “Alan who?”(with music by THE PET SHOP BOYS and ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA).
NewsWrap
A summary of some of the news in or affecting
global LGBTQ communities
for the three weeks ending January 11, 2025
Written by Greg Gordon and Lucia Chappelle,
reported this week by Michael LeBeau and Ava Davis,
produced by Brian DeShazor
Liechtenstein rang in 2025 with its first legal gay and lesbian marriages. Parliament voted nearly unanimously to open civil marriage to same-gender couples last May, and the measure took effect on January 1st.
Liechtenstein is home to about 40,000 people. It’s bound to become a new wedding and honeymoon destination for lesbian and gay couples drawn to its picturesque Alpine location between Austria and Switzerland.
Queer couples can already marry in those countries and in Germany. Liechtenstein is the last German-speaking country to enact marriage equality. The fourth-smallest European country is the 22nd on the continent to do so.
Civil unions that do not confer the same rights as marriage have been available to same-gender couples since 2011. If a couple so desires, those unions can be converted to full marriage. Liechtenstein is a socially conservative country and only hosted its first LGBTQ Pride celebration in 2022.
Lithuania’s version of a “no promo homo” law was struck down by the Constitutional Court in late December. It was called the Law on the Protection of Minors Against the Detrimental Effect of Public Information, and it was enacted in 2009. Like its forebears, it banned what it called the “promotion” of same-gender relationships to minors. It included a ban on any positive depiction of LGBTQ people in children’s books and restricted the representation of LGBTQ people on public television.
The small Eastern European nation’s top court declared the measure unconstitutional on several grounds. The justices decided that exposing minors to information about diverse families is not automatically inappropriate. In fact, they found that the law hinders minors’ development into mature, well-rounded individuals.
The court said that the state has a constitutional duty to ensure harmonious and comprehensive child development, and that the restrictions are incompatible with that goal.
The “no promo homo” law had also been found to be incompatible with the European Convention on Human Rights. Activists had mounted challenges against it at the European Court of Human Rights. Still, the Lithuanian Gay League says that the law “created a significant chilling effect, leading to self-censorship among LGBTIQ+ individuals, organisations, and media outlets.”
LGL’s victory statement declares, “The decision upholds the constitutional understanding that family, as a protected institution, can be formed on bases other than marriage, and emphasizes the importance of providing youth with information that reflects real social relationships and promotes respect for human rights and dignity.”
Same-gender sex has been legal in Lithuania since 1993, and openly gay and lesbian people can serve in the military. However, marriage equality is banned, and same gender couples have no legal rights. A 2023 poll by the global think-tank GLOBSEC ranked Lithuania last in support for marriage equality among European Union nations.
Online gay erotic fiction is being targeted by the government of China, labeling such material a “social evil.” More than 50 people have been arrested since June of 2024 according to local news outlets and social media posts.
Haitang Literature is a popular Taiwan-based website for adult fiction that allows writers to earn money from tips and subscriptions. One top writer on the site with the pen-name Yuan Shang Bai Yun Jian was sentenced to four-and-a-half years in prison, according to Radio Free Asia. Writer Ci Xi is serving five-and-a-half years behind bars, and Yi Xie was sentenced to a year and five months in prison. Details about the prosecutions of other detained writers have not yet been made public.
So-called “obscene material” has been against the law in China since 1997. The law bans “disseminating obscene electronic messages” in “publications, films, video and audio recordings, and images containing depictions of sexual acts.”
Despite these restrictions, the “danmei” genre of gay male romance and sex stories has been gaining in popularity. Those clicks are significant, since 50,000 views or a profit of 50,000 yuan can mean 10 years in jail. Writers whose work earns more than 250,000 yuan can go to prison for life if they fail to pay back what amounts to about 34,000 U.S. dollars.
Operators of “pornographic” websites can be jailed for up to 12 years. Some reports claim that individuals enjoying pornography in their own homes have also been prosecuted.
One of the men caught up in recent raids on Moscow gay nightspots has died in police custody. Authorities are calling Andrei Kotov’s December 29th death a suicide, noting that he was discovered covered in blood and that “cuts were found” on his body. In reports of the raids Kotov was singled out as the person behind Men Travel. Kotov had testified in court that he had been beaten and tortured with electric shocks to force a confession.
Vladimir Putin’s legislative and judicial sycophants have been prosecuting alleged proponents of their imagined “international LGBT movement” as “extremists.” The 48-year-old travel agent was charged with creating “an extremist community in which propaganda of the ideology of an association recognized as an extremist organization and banned by the court in the territory of the Russian Federation was carried out.”
The charges against Kotov went on to say, “The defendant and active participants, who supported the views and activities of the extremist through trips, public events and the publication of images on the internet, formed a false impression among citizens about the institution of marriage enshrined in the constitution of the Russian Federation, and carried out actions aimed at undermining traditional family values.”
It is not unusual for those considered subversive to be found dead supposedly by suicide in Russian prisons. Putin’s crackdown on all things queer in recent years has also included bans on gender-affirming healthcare, marriage equality and adoption.
Finally, veterans booted from the U.S. military under anti-queer policies have won a class action lawsuit against the Defense Department. More than 35,000 former servicemembers will get to update their discharges removing references to their sexual orientation. Those with dishonorable discharges will be able to apply for an immediate review. Approval by a federal judge is pending.
The lawsuit was originally filed by a group of LGBTQ veterans in 2023. It dramatically improves efforts by the Biden administration to streamline the process for unfairly discharged queer servicemembers seeking redress, especially those booted under “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” The onus will now be on the Pentagon to initiate the upgrades.
Biden issued pardons to thousands of servicemembers convicted under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. What was once Article 125 of the Code criminalized consensual sodomy. It was updated in 2013 to punish only forcible acts.
Monetary damages were not sought. The settlement asks the court to approve a $350,000 payment by the Pentagon to cover the plaintiffs’ legal costs.
Elizabeth Kristen is a senior staff attorney with Legal Aid at Work, a group that helped file the suit. She called the settlement “long-overdue justice to LGBTQ+ veterans who served our country with honor but were stripped of the dignity and recognition they rightfully earned due to discriminatory discharge policies.” In her words, “It marks a crucial step in addressing this deep-seated injustice and ensuring these veterans receive the acknowledgment and respect they have long been denied."
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