The right to express sexual orientation

Abstract

Freedom of people to exercise their rights depends on good cultural understanding of frameworks they are often limited by. Are individuals or groups of people seeking protection of the right to express their sexual autonomy in Serbia “traitors of their own culture” because they approve Western values or are they just ordinary people seeking protection of their right within their own culture? The European Court of Human Rights is not the final distributor of justice over violations of the rights guaranteed by the European Convention on Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, but undoubtedly, by setting legal standards, it ensures respect of human rights in European countries. Views of the Court when it comes to recognizing the rights of hohomosexually oriented population will be analyzed. While Pride parades in the world are commercialized, festival and carnival events, in Serbia public exposure in a form of a “parade” of people of different sexual orientation is an issue expressed in a sense of moral fear and rejection. The author will try to explain the relation towards sexually marked social minority with value turbulences and divisions in society. Can we first of all change ourselves, and then cherish the culture of dialogue and tolerance? Starting from an opinion that “human rights concern what is right, not what is good”, the author discusses the issue of influence of the Serbian Orthodox Church on resolution of important issues we consider to be challenges of the contemporary world. The Church’s attitude is that individual rights cannot be opposed to family values and inter ests. Does respect of human life require the idea of the God and theological foundation of a view of the world or is it someone’s own experience of pain and ability to imagine pain of the others sufficient?