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Russia Takes Down Steve Jobs Memorial After Apple's Tim Cook Comes Out

Posted by samzenpus on from the honestly-not-the-onion dept.

An anonymous reader writes Citing the need to abide by a law combating "gay propaganda," a memorial dedicated to the late Apple founder Steve Jobs has been torn down. This comes on the heels of new CEO Tim Cook coming out as gay. "In Russia, gay propaganda and other sexual perversions among minors are prohibited by law," ZEFS (a Russian group of companies that originally erected the statue) said, noting that the memorial had been "in an area of direct access for young students and scholars". "After Apple CEO Tim Cook publicly called for sodomy, the monument was taken down to abide to the Russian federal law protecting children from information promoting denial of traditional family values."

44 of 430 comments (clear)

  1. Terrible by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    After Apple CEO Tim Cook publicly called for sodomy

    I know this is terrible and all, but as someone completely unaffected by this (not an apple fanboy, russian or gay) I find some kind of weird surreal humour in the whole thing.

    Mr Putin says there is no discrimination against gay people in Russia and the law was needed only to protect young people

    Like, how do you even reach this point of reasoning.

    1. Re:Terrible by MozeeToby · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I know I turned gay when I heard Tim Cook came out! Wait... that's not how human sexuality works.

    2. Re:Terrible by Payden+K.+Pringle · · Score: 5, Funny

      Then how does it work? Please cite sources.

    3. Re:Terrible by MightyMartian · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Because you're the autocratic ruler of a backward nation where a healthy percentage of the population still believes the Protocols of the Elders of Zion is a historical document.

      Since the time of Peter the Great, Russia has been an odd mix of backwards regressive state with a shiny veneer of modern technocratic government.

      --
      The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
    4. Re:Terrible by houstonbofh · · Score: 4, Funny

      Aperently it starts with a pizza delivery, according to may documentaries on the subject... Bom chicka bow wow... :)

    5. Re:Terrible by operagost · · Score: 5, Funny

      If the guy decides to show me his Little Caesar, he's getting no tip.

      --

      Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
    6. Re:Terrible by Gliscameria · · Score: 5, Funny

      I for one do do whatever statues tell me to do.

      --
      X
    7. Re:Terrible by MightyMartian · · Score: 4, Interesting

      "Homosexual relationships are by definition sodomy"

      This simply isn't true. Two famous homosexuals; Oscar Wilde and Noel Coward, apparently found the idea of penetration appalling.

      --
      The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
    8. Re:Terrible by UnknowingFool · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I don't know. Ask members of the GOP. It is the same logic that says allowing gay marriage will mean fewer traditional marriages.

      --
      Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
    9. Re:Terrible by MightyMartian · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Putin and the Russian Orthodox Church do a lot of favors for each other. The payback for the Church's pretty much unwavering support for anything coming out of the Kremlin is that the Kremlin make sure the ROC's nearly medieval social views be propagated into law.

      --
      The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
    10. Re:Terrible by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      YOU will get the tip. ;)

    11. Re:Terrible by Rei · · Score: 4, Funny

      "If the pizzaman truly loves this babysitter, why does he keep slapping her rear?" (beat) "Perhaps she's done something wrong..."

      --
      Are there any deer in the theater tonight? Get 'em up against the wall.
    12. Re:Terrible by AK+Marc · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The humor is that by that reckoning, they'd need to tear down the Lincoln memorial if Obama came out gay. The idea that a future holder of the same job should have any relation to the past (and dead) holders of the same position. They might as well make Apple illegal in Russia, as the CEO is gay, so all Apple products call for sodomy.

      --
      Learn to love Alaska
    13. Re:Terrible by Crashmarik · · Score: 3, Funny

      YOU will get the tip. ;)

      no no feeex thaaat for yuuu

      in Putin's Russia you get the teeep

    14. Re:Terrible by Crashmarik · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I for one do do whatever statues tell me to do.

      Just don't blink when talking to them.

    15. Re:Terrible by Delarth799 · · Score: 5, Funny

      You are first attacked by a flock of gays and if one of them bites you there is a 45% chance of being infected. With no known antidote upwards of 90% of all those infected turn into The Gay and attempt to turn others.

    16. Re:Terrible by Rinikusu · · Score: 4, Funny

      I'm not gay, but my boyfriend sure as shit is.

      --
      If you were me, you'd be good lookin'. - six string samurai
    17. Re:Terrible by Prien715 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      allowing gay marriage will mean fewer "traditional" marriages.

      To play devil's advocate, if bisexuality exists, then yes, it very well may.

      Not that it's a reason against it. To me, a traditional marriage is where the partners stay together until death parts them -- gay/straight/otherwise.

      --
      -- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.
    18. Re:Terrible by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Sodomy itself is not prohibited, but it is illegal to advocate it.

      I experience huge cognitive dissonance when Putin tells me that the law in question was only designed "to protect children from gay propaganda" when in reality, a statue of Jobs, who is a completely different person from Cook, gets torn down because Cook admitted that he's attracted to men. Not only does it mean that merely saying "I'm gay" could get you prosecuted because that alone is "gay propaganda", even if you said no more than that, but just like in the ole' good Soviet times, your family and associates would apparently be punished as well. Take that, all you idiotic Russophiles out there!

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    19. Re:Terrible by meglon · · Score: 4, Funny

      Here's traditional marriage:

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

      --
      Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
    20. Re:Terrible by AthanasiusKircher · · Score: 5, Informative

      Sodomy does not mean anal sex. Sodomy refers what went down in Sodom.

      ...only to 2000 year old myth writers. Sodomy, defined both in common usage and legal usage means exactly that.

      Umm, no. In modern sodomy statutes, it is typical to define any sex acts involving anal or ORAL sex as "sodomy," sometimes restricting it only to homosexual anal or oral sex. (But many states had laws on the books also including heterosexual "deviant sex," which could under certain interpretations include anything other than "missionary position" heterosexual sex of married couples.) Old laws also sometimes tended to include bestiality in the definition. We tend to forget the whole oral sex = sodomy in statutes ever since it became an acceptable part of public discourse back in the Clinton era, but that's the way many statutes are written and that's what the word clearly meant at least until 20 years ago or so.

      Then again, if you actually read the story in the old testament, the angels get pissed when he offers up his virgin daughters to the crowd (female virginity being a HUGE thing back then) so they won't take the angels.

      Umm, not really right here either. If you actually read the story, the "sodomy" as a term comes out of what the mob wants to do to the angels (who apparently appeared MALE), and then after Lot offers his daughters, the mob gets even more incensed and threatens to "do worse" to Lot (i.e., go beyond what he offered for them to do to his daughters, but in a [homosexual] way to Lot).

    21. Re:Terrible by cayenne8 · · Score: 4, Informative

      You are first attacked by a flock of gays and if one of them bites you there is a 45% chance of being infected. With no known antidote upwards of 90% of all those infected turn into The Gay and attempt to turn others.

      I don't think the bite thing is how it works, that's zombies.

      I think it works by if you "suck one dick" and then, well, you're gay from then on.

      :)

      --
      Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
    22. Re:Terrible by jbolden · · Score: 3, Interesting

      What hostility to Russia? The American media is mostly indifferent to Russia. When they aren't indifferent they either tend to be rather laudatory about the culture: ice skating, gymnastics, art... or hostile towards Russia being uncooperative with the USA.

      Now the Russian media is genuinely hostile and paranoid.

    23. Re:Terrible by Payden+K.+Pringle · · Score: 3, Funny

      +5 Funny? I was actually serious.

      "However, to date there are no replicated scientific studies supporting any specific biological etiology for homosexuality."

      Saying that's not how it works implies you know how it works. Please cite sources.

      I love how hilarity comes out of misinterpreted comments on the interwebs. It's lovely. I now see the humor in my comment. Still, Please cite sources.

    24. Re:Terrible by Beeftopia · · Score: 4, Interesting

      "However, to date there are no replicated scientific studies supporting any specific biological etiology for homosexuality."

      A simple thought experiment to see if homosexuality is a choice: If it really is a choice, try being gay for a week. Try engaging in gay physical intimacy with another man.

      Q.E.D.

      Caveat: For a bisexual, this won't be a problem. For a heterosexual, it will be extremely difficult if not impossible. I suspect those who believe homosexuality is a choice are probably bisexuals.

    25. Re:Terrible by Payden+K.+Pringle · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Your thought experiment is fruitless because there is no discernible way to tell if people could choose because they are bisexual or because sexuality is a choice. Or that if they can't "choose", if it's because it's not a choice, or if it's because of their psychology regarding the issue regarding any of the possible factors that make humans choose what they choose growing up.

      In other words, the thought experiment is pointless without the very information that quote says we don't have.

      Humans psychology is vastly complex. Solving for whether something is truly a choice or not, when that thing is deeply embedded in something we don't understand very well (our desires) is nigh impossible without a lot more information.

      I'm not arguing that it's a choice. I'm arguing that the claims that it isn't a choice are baseless.

    26. Re:Terrible by Noah+Haders · · Score: 4, Informative

      lool fox news report on how afghans are gay. you're an excellent troll.

    27. Re:Terrible by antifoidulus · · Score: 5, Interesting

      You are looking at this through your own cultural lens. Take a step back and look at in the context of the broader culture and conditions in which these men live. Polygamy and much shorter lifespans for women has created a shortage of marriageable women in Afghanistan. This coupled with severe cultural taboos on pre-marital sex(in the case of Afghanistan, it's not just a taboo, it's illegal) means that for many men, especially those on the lower rungs of the economic ladder, other men are essentially the only way they can have sex.

      This is not much different from any other situation where women are rare to non-existant(prison, the front lines of a war etc). In these situations men often engage in what is referred to as "trade", but of course none of them wants to label themselves homosexual because:
      a) homosexuality is taboo and/or illegal where they come from and/or
      b) they aren't actually gay, they are only engaging in homosexual behavior because that's all they have available to them.

      It doesn't surprise me at all that men in Afghanistan are having sex with each other but not declaring themselves to be gay.....

      --
      Monstar L
    28. Re:Terrible by Pfhorrest · · Score: 4, Funny

      No I thought it was like vampires where first they have to drain your dick and then you have to drink from theirs to be converted to a gay.

      That's why I'm only bisexual. I sucked his dick but he didn't suck mine, and I've since only sucked the dicks of guys who hadn't sucked mine, or had my dick sucked by guys who I hadn't sucked, so I remain perpetually on the verge between the straight world and the gay. I'm like Gay Blade.

      --
      -Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
      "I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."
    29. Re:Terrible by Mr.+Shotgun · · Score: 4, Funny

      It's true, one time I accidentally wandered into an Apple store, and before I knew it, there was a dick in my mouth.

      Yeah, you really gotta pay attention to those EULA's before clicking agree.

      --
      Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the (supposed) good of its victims may be the most oppressive
    30. Re:Terrible by Stephan+Schulz · · Score: 5, Informative

      Saying that's not how it works implies you know how it works.

      Not true. There are many things of which I know how they don't work without knowing how they work. Before the detection of nuclear fusion, we didn't know how the sun was heated. But we did know that it was not a chemical reaction (not enough fuel for the time it had been burning). I don't know how Google indexes keywords. But I do know they are not looking them up via sequential search (too fast for that). I don't know what the annoying traffic light on my way to work is triggered by, but I know its not telepathy - or I wouldn't be standing there forever each day. And so on. Indeed, that's how science works - you formulate hypotheses and then refute them one-by-one. If you can't refute a reasonable one, that's your tentative model of reality.

      --

      Stephan

    31. Re:Terrible by tehcyder · · Score: 3, Funny

      90% of the free rape porn on xvideos features Russians.

      But is good, healthy heterosexual rape!

      --
      To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
    32. Re:Terrible by jeremyp · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You're overthinking it.

      I'm heterosexual. I cannot choose to be sexually attracted to other men, I'm just not attracted to them. Whether this is caused by psychological reasons, the chemical environment in my mother's womb, or genetic factors is irrelevant. I cannot choose.

      It should be pointed out that the choice thing is really a red herring. If homosexuality were a choice, that would still be no reason to persecute gay people.

      --
      All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
  2. Because by MouseR · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Putin on a horse half naked is not gay.

    1. Re:Because by MightyMartian · · Score: 3, Funny

      Despite my confident heterosexuality, I'm terribly conflicted, as I truly want to see a half-naked gay horse.

      --
      The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
  3. In Putin's Russia... by Noah+Haders · · Score: 3, Funny

    ... the government sodomizes you!

    1. Re:In Putin's Russia... by houstonbofh · · Score: 4, Funny

      ... the government sodomizes you!

      Have you seen the US govenrment lately?

  4. PR hoax by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Removal of Steve Jobs memorial due to 'gay propaganda' law turns out to be PR hoax
    http://rt.com/news/201855-steve-jobs-memorial-gay/

    1. Re:PR hoax by psergiu · · Score: 3, Informative

      It's a link to the Russia Today's website posted by an AC.
      Rusia Today is not the most reliable news source when it comes to things happening inside or near Russia.

      --
      1% APY, No fees, Online Bank https://captl1.co/2uIErYq Don't let your $$$ sit in a no-interest acct.
    2. Re:PR hoax by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      What most of the media also left out is the other stated reason for not putting the monument back up: Apple's complicity with the NSA as revealed by Snowden. Plus the monument wasn't being taken down by governmental sources, but by the business group that put it up in the first place.

  5. ah, I understand by rubycodez · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I didn't know a person could become gay-tainted after they die if their successor is gay. Hope the next person to have my job after I die isn't gay, otherwise my tombstone might set off someone's gaydar. that would be embarrassing.

    1. Re:ah, I understand by wisnoskij · · Score: 5, Funny

      I didn't know a person could become gay-tainted after they die if their successor is gay. Hope the next person to have my job after I die isn't gay, otherwise my tombstone might set off someone's gaydar. that would be embarrassing.

      Particularly if they were also a necrophiliac.

      --
      Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
  6. Re:Never mind that Steve Jobs was not gay by hey! · · Score: 5, Funny

    Evidently gay is highly contagious. Scientists say it's not airborne, but some of them have got it, so there's obviously a lot they don't know about how gay is spread. It stands to reason we should do everything we an think of to reduce the public exposure to gay.

    --
    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  7. Re:Never mind that Steve Jobs was not gay by SuricouRaven · · Score: 5, Interesting

    If you're accusing a country of holding anti-gay views to the point of retroactively removing people from historical displays because they associated with a homosexual, then this might be one of the few situations where you're actually allowed to make a Nazi comparison.