By LifeSiteNews (Politics) | Created at 2026-07-24 15:11:08 | Updated at 2026-08-05 01:34:39
1 week ago
Fri Jul 24, 2026 - 11:08 am EDT
(LifeSiteNews) — A decade ago, while walking the streets of Belgrade, the local tour guide showing me around the city asked me a question. Serbia had been an official candidate country for the European Union since 2012, and it came with strings attached: pressure to facilitate LGBT “pride” events. The guide was disgusted. “Why do they want us to have this?” he asked.
Clashes between local, socially conservative cultures and the EU-backed LGBT movement have become common. Eastern and central European countries still, for the most part, reject the LGBT agenda; many have passed laws banning LGBT propaganda in order to respond to the massive push by LGBT activists to normalize and mainstream LGBT ideology, including transgender ideology, in their countries.
Where LGBT activists cannot change the law, they seek to break the law and topple the system through civil disobedience. In Hungary, the ban on “pride” events triggered a massive LGBT event in Budapest; major European figures flew in to join the crowds in breaking the law, including Spain’s deputy prime minister and minister of culture, the EU commissioner for equality, and around 70 Members of European Parliament. The message was clear: Your laws and your culture mean nothing to us.
A similar, smaller-scale situation is playing out in Romania, where LGBT activists have declared that they will host a “pride” march despite not getting permission (for the fourth consecutive year). According to the Guardian: “Since 2023, campaigners in the western city of Oradea, which has a population of about 180,000, have sought permission to hold Pride events. However, each year they have faced opposition, making Oradea the only major city in the EU where local authorities have repeatedly blocked Pride marches.”
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Romania is a very socially conservative country; according to Eurobarometer, only 25 percent support the redefinition of marriage, second only to Bulgaria in opposing same-sex “marriage.” The European Court of Human Rights has consistently targeted Romania over its opposition to the LGBT agenda, ruling in 2023 that Romania had an obligation to introduce a legal framework for same-sex unions (successive governments have rejected the demand) and ordering the country to permit gender reassignment without the precondition of sex-change surgeries.
The current situation—with local authorities facing off with LGBT activists over “pride”—is a microcosm. The major of Oradea declined to speak with the Guardian about the issue, and LGBT activists insist—probably correctly—that they are being denied because authorities do not want to endorse their agenda. “It feels like the message that they are trying to send our way is that we’re not welcome here,” the organizer said. “They have never said out loud that they are banning Pride for LGBT reasons. They’re always hiding behind technical reasons.”
Of course, the international LGBT movement immediately kicked into action. “The dispute has attracted growing international attention,” the Guardian reported. “More than 152 organisations from 30 countries have signed a statement calling on officials to allow the march to take place ‘in complete safety; and in line with EU law.” Their statement read: “When an authority consistently prevents a community from assembling peacefully, a principle that concerns all citizens is undermined.”
The statement also complained that other conservative jurisdictions have exhibited similar reluctance to host LGBT events: “In recent years, the restriction of Pride marches has become, in several European states, an indicator of democratic backsliding and the weakening of the rule of law.” The organizer stated that the march will proceed with or without permission. Last year several attendees were fined; this year, “representatives from several diplomatic missions have said they will take part.”
The message, once again, is clear. Eastern European countries who do not wish to implement, celebrate, and submit to the LGBT agenda in law and practice will be targeted by international forces. The goal, as then-Prime Minister Mark Rutte of Holland said when Hungary passed their anti-LGBT propaganda law, is to “bring them to their knees.”
Jonathon’s writings have been translated into more than six languages and in addition to LifeSiteNews, has been published in the National Post, National Review, First Things, The Federalist, The American Conservative, The Stream, the Jewish Independent, the Hamilton Spectator, Reformed Perspective Magazine, and LifeNews, among others. He is a contributing editor to The European Conservative.
His insights have been featured on CTV, Global News, and the CBC, as well as over twenty radio stations. He regularly speaks on a variety of social issues at universities, high schools, churches, and other functions in Canada, the United States, and Europe.
He is the author of The Culture War, Seeing is Believing: Why Our Culture Must Face the Victims of Abortion, Patriots: The Untold Story of Ireland’s Pro-Life Movement, Prairie Lion: The Life and Times of Ted Byfield, and co-author of A Guide to Discussing Assisted Suicide with Blaise Alleyne.
Jonathon serves as the communications director for the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform.
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