Evgenia Evgenievna Debryanskaya (Russian: Евгения Евгеньевна Дебрянская; born 10 June 1953) or Yevgenia Debryanskaya is a Russian dissident and LGBT rights activist.

She was also the co-founder of the Osvobozhdenie (Freedom), a radical group that emerged out of the first homosexual movement in Russia and the Democratic Union. ^[1] Former leader of the Libertarian Party of the RSFSR. ^[2]

Debryanskaya advocated for the withdrawal of the Soviet army from Eastern Europe, opening of the Russian borders, and the legalization of same-sex marriage. ^[3] She was also the first wife of Aleksandr Dugin, ^[4] the Russian political activist, who has been referred to as Vladimir Putin's " Rasputin" by the Milken Institute, as well as "Putin's philosopher", and "Putin's brain". ^{[5] [6]} Debryanskaya was called the first "open" lesbian in Russia in a 2008 interview in Ogoniok. ^[7]

Debryanskaya is also a writer and has directed auteur films.

Biography

Debryanskaya was born on 10 June 1953 in Sverdlovsk Oblast, Soviet Union. ^[8] She has been described as provincial and uneducated, since she did not finish college. ^[9] She was, however, wealthy and enjoyed political connections. Her money was attributed to her skill in gambling while she owed her connections to her being the illegitimate daughter of a Moscow Party boss. ^[9] Prior to living as a lesbian, Debryanskaya was in a heterosexual relationship with Aleksandr Dugin, a Russian philosopher and political agitator. ^[10] She met him when she was 30 years old. Both were said to have hated the Soviet regime. ^[9] They married and, in 1985, had a son called Artur Dugin, named in honor of Arthur Rimbaud. ^[4] Debryanskaya said that she and Dugin were members of the "black order of the SS", a circle of people led by Yevgeny Golovin [ ru] who studied esoteric fascism and occultism. ^[11]

Activism

In 1987, Debryanskaya, Valeriya Novodvorskaya and Sergei Grigoryants co-founded the first official political opposition party in the Soviet Union Democratic Union. However, she was later expelled from the party for "amoral behavior". ^{[12] [13]} She was also a member of the Establishment of Trust between East and West. ^[14]

Debryanskaya helped establish the gay and lesbian rights movement in Russia in the early 1990s. ^[15] This was possible due to Mikhail Gorbachev's glasnost policy, which lifted some restrictions on the freedom of the press and freedom of expression. ^[16] With Roman Kalinin and eight others, she founded the Moscow Organization of Sexual Minorities. This organization, later renamed Moscow Gay and Lesbian Union, published Tema, a newspaper that helped advance its goals such as the repeal of Article 21, the law that criminalised consensual homosexual activity. ^[16] She headed a campaign for the RSFSR Libertarian Party ^[2] nomination of the one-legged openly-gay Roman Kalinin for the President of Russia. The campaign failed because Kalinin was younger than the minimum age allowed by the Constitution of Russia. ^[13]

With Masha Gessen, she founded "Triangle" the organization supporting Russian lesbians. It was named after Pink triangle, a Nazi concentration camp badge identifying prisoners as gay. ^{[7] [17]}

One of her notable initiatives was the organization of a controversial pride parade in Moscow, which drew international attention to sexual minorities in the city. ^[15] This was announced with Nikolay Alexeyev on 27 July 2005. ^[15] The first-ever pride parade occurred a year later on 27 May 2006, ending in violence. ^[18] About 200 activists were arrested, including Debryanskaya and Alexeyev. ^[18] She was also involved with movie screenings, press conferences and discussions. ^[19]

Debryanskaya wrote and directed auteur films. Several of her initiatives were supported by international funding and, when these sources dwindled, nightclub owners. ^[20]

Later in life, Debryanskaya became an entrepreneur. ^[21] She owned a lesbian bar called Dietrich, which was stolen by Maksim Kozlouvskiy, her landlord. ^[22] In December 2015, Kozlouvskiy warned everyone to leave the club to avoid an imminent police raid. ^[22] Debryanskaya gave the keys to Kozlouvskiy and fled, but no police came. The landlord took over the establishment, saying it would be converted into a "natural nightclub". ^[22]

References