Sociologist Aigars Freimanis: They don't say one thing ‒ there are too many of you

The Chairperson of the Constitutional Court Sanita Osipova has spoken from her gilded Lady Justice heights. How we – the fighting dogs – will be in the future. Gender is canceled. Woman, man ‒ all the same. But not everyone agrees. Neatkarīgā talks to sociologist Aigars Freimanis.

The Constitutional Court has ruled that a mother's sexual partner is entitled to use paternity benefit. The reaction to this decision gives the impression that Pandora's box has been opened.

Its consequences in a light dictation-like manner were expressed by Mrs. Osipova herself immediately after the decision was taken. The Saeima was presented with a series of tasks on how to change the legislation in order for the judgment of the Constitutional Court to be executed. I encountered for the first time that the Constitutional Court says very clearly what needs to be done. It usually says what not to do.

Identifies the problem and says - solve it.

Yes, yes. But here they release almost a work order calendar. It sounded so dictatorial that I don't even know how the Saeima is reacting to it. There are different views and different groups of opinions in the Saeima and also in society as a whole. It is clear that no one takes this seriously yet, and the people who are calling for a referendum against this kind of decision do not think that their authority is high enough to lift large masses of the public to go and vote for or against it. For the simple reason that it is not on the agenda. It is not even in the top ten.

Because of covid?

Because of covid, because there are problems in the economy, there are survival problems for entire industries. And now to start thinking about some decision of the Constitutional Court, to express disliking or quite the opposite ‒ liking it, in my opinion, it is completely irrelevant. And if someone collects signatures now and imposes a referendum, I am afraid that nothing will happen there. That would be a victory for Mrs. Osipova and her advocates.

What would be the subject of a referendum?

To recognize same-sex couples living together as some kind of family analog. What the Constitutional Court did, it referred to the fact that there are such groups in society. In the LSM article, I remember perfectly well, at the bottom there was a post scriptum that there are currently several thousand same-sex couples living in Latvia who are raising children and who are waiting for their verdict. Naturally, no source from where those thousands originated was shown. Maybe it's not so important, but if this kind of statistically unsubstantiated argumentation is used, something is wrong here. In fact, this law might have to be changed, even if the victim were at least one such couple. If they were in a humiliating situation where their human rights were not respected.

But let's get back to the definable. Actual cohabitation is a much broader concept than family or same-sex couples, or so-called cohabiting couples, including normal male and female couples, formerly known as civil marriage.

Or concubinage.

Well, there were different variations, but they are able to have children. In Soviet times, this topic was very relevant in connection with receiving alimony, and the main argument was the common household. But here (in the court decision) this argument was actual cohabitation, as well as mutual respect and understanding ‒ this was the reason that led the court to call it a family. And this, in my opinion, is already a political decision ‒ to sneak into the concept of the family as a social institution, to supplement it.

Then there is the question in which house these matters have to be decided at all ‒ in court or in the Saeima.

I think that, of course, in the Saeima. And there is the moment when the Saeima is told that now you have to do this, this, and this, because that is what we decided, and also the public comments that were there in a huge amount. We are a society that has been trained to be intolerant for years... like fighting dogs... and at this point, I have experienced a revelation and now I have decided to change the whole society... to tell it, looking directly in its eyes...

Just like an oracle.

She sure assumed the role of St. Paul a little bit. Moreover, she did so with such pronounced arrogance. Probably the crowning moment of everything was that the people must observe the Constitution. Even the preamble written by Levits says “The people of Latvia won their State in the War of Liberation. They consolidated the system of government and adopted the Constitution in a freely elected Constitutional Assembly.”

And now that the Constitution has been decided, Mrs. Osipova appears and says, dear friends, let's put down the Constitution, you have no business with it.

In sociology what are parents and what is a family? In what measurements is this important in your work?

This has been the subject of considerable debate in sociology since the early 1990s. And back then, the word "family" was used very often, but slowly, slowly, it became the word "household." And so the household, first of all, solved the situation that several generations live together in one dwelling. Which is an extremely typical situation in Latvia. The well-known grandmother who is raising a grandchild because her daughter is working in the meantime. That is one household. There are people living together who may have descendants, and they also live in the same household, but they were not called families. Household is a much broader, smoother concept, under which much can be classified. For example, the actual cohabitation might be two students who rent one apartment, or for three students who rent one apartment in Riga on shares, paying for their shares with the rent of that apartment and jointly purchasing or bringing products from the real home. It is also a form of cohabitation where joint management takes place. And the goal is already clear because it is more convenient, more rational. Undoubtedly, there must also be those two mentioned words ‒ mutual respect and understanding. Otherwise, life in such an apartment can turn into hell. But will anyone risk calling this model a family? I think not. So that's the concept of the household. Surveys always even ask a very specific question, which clearly falls under the family sphere. For example, the explanatory question is how many people live together in your household, and then next, whether there are children under the age of 15 in your household. So it's really about a family that is being called a household.

LGBT advocates often emphasize that they fight not for sex but for human rights. At the same time, it is important who sleeps with whom, because the result is children.

Yes, of course! If there is a marriage, it is a formal agreement recorded by the state. These people, therefore, each assume a certain responsibility, which takes effect when children appear, when there is a desire to divorce, when one dies or falls ill. There, the state immediately acts as an intermediary and records them as a family.

But in the second case, it is a cohabitation union. By the way, if we remember even before this decision of the Constitutional Court, some politicians campaigned for the law of cohabitation. Well, first of all, Development/For! (Attīstībai/Par!). The Progressives (Progresīvie) campaigned in perhaps a more radical form, but the first, if I am not mistaken, was Pūce. The now-former minister. And he had such a very openly rational argument, some would even say cynically rational. If we assume that Latvian society is inhabited by a certain group of these people, for whom it would be important and interesting, and it is defined as about 8-10 percent. If we get them, then we get, so to speak, one base for our electorate. Then we take those who have no objection to this, so that there is another base. And together we gather, what was the plan at the time, from 15 to 20, but the complete optimists said that maybe even 30 percent of the public. And Pūce also used the words ‒ cohabitation union, cohabitation law. The word "family" was not used because the family derives from marriage. But this issue is very complex. There are both semantic nuances and an interpretation of the word "family". Then there is the family stereotype. The traditional-minded section of society, which is the majority, is unlikely to be able to include same-sex relationships in the name of "family". Two women or two men.

Throughout this story, the interests of children have completely disappeared. Is it in the child's best interest to have such an unconventional family?

That is a good question. In a same-sex family, they can get a child somehow. From a man, an orphanage, artificial insemination. A man can artificially inseminate a surrogate mother. I think in Latvia it is forbidden by law, but in Russia and Ukraine it is allowed. Let us remember when the pandemic started, it was revealed that there are whole baby factories in Ukraine, where surrogate mothers had birthed their children for export, but the new parents could not get inside the country for their order because of covid. So there are many options for getting a baby. The only misfortune is that the child does not know whether he is the winner or the loser. And it will never be possible to measure.

I recently had an argument with a warring lesbian. She had received money from the Culture Capital Foundation to advertise LGBT at a drag performance festival. Should the state support such unconventional directions?

As a conservative person, I say no. Mrs. Osipova and those other judges sitting in the Constitutional Court, an expensive and decorative institution, they say that this is a real social phenomenon. But all this LGBT ideology and its external manifestations often take very aggressive forms. And it is also a social phenomenon. Maybe it is not so noticeable in Latvia. There are few of them here. Maybe about 30 people show up at the monument and it's hard to say whether they all really belong. It might just as well be a manifestation ‒ I'm a liberal and I want to show it to everyone. But should the state participate in the promotion of these organizations or give them money? I am not so sure about that. They can get their money from private sponsors, like a large number of NGOs.

The Cultural Capital Foundation is the money of all taxpayers.

Well, yes, but that is an argument that can also be made by LGBT people: we also pay taxes. I remember Mr. Streips once said in his program ‒ also with an arrogant tone ‒ we, the homosexual community, are very beneficial. Why? We have no children! Well, in most cases. But we have a lot of money from building a career. As a result, we can afford much more than those who have children. Respectively, we are profitable for manufacturers who produce luxury goods. This, in turn, led to the inevitable conclusion that people who have children in a traditional family are not beneficial to the state. They expect more from the country than they are willing to buy and pay taxes and the like.

And even more, God forbid, if it is a large family, those people must have mental disorders or something like that. There was something so unpleasant about this Streips' pride manifesto.

It hit me very hard emotionally. Although he is right from a logical point of view, that's how it is.

But in the future, a large family will produce many taxpayers. Streips will not produce anything.

Well, yes, but that's in some distant future. In my opinion, the basis of Latvia's statehood is such short-term thinking. The first stage was 20 years, which is the time of one generation. After that, there was licking of wounds and a tragic period when Latvia was under occupation. Then came the period of praising Latvia. But long-term thinking has still not occurred. It should take two, maybe three generations for Latvia to exist.

But those mistakes are produced very quickly.

That is true.

And the question of whether this will not be one dramatic mistake. At the moment, there is a complex attack on traditional values ​​‒ welcomer campaigns, LGBT campaigns, now also the campaign of violence propaganda, which is actually directed against men. Why is this confrontation happening?

No, I still perceive the violence campaign as OK. Strong against the weak ‒ there the majority will always be on the side of the weak. But I keep thinking about whether violence is allowed here now. Could it be that a man is beating a woman while living with her, and that is allowed? Of course not! But I do not feel a particular resistance to this campaign.

In turn, with those welcomers, it was immediately clear what the consequences would be. One must be extremely pro-liberal and brought up in a modern atmosphere of political correctness, so that suddenly they would just shrug and open their heart. Some lady from the United Nations also appeared here on television with speeches about engineers, programmers, pianists, doctors moving into Europe. But mostly they are young men, many of them without education and without any work experience. Especially those from sub-Saharan Africa. They have not worked an hour in their lives, and they have no skills to do so. They move in, and it's clear what they're moving toward. They have smartphones in their hands and they are traveling to the world of their dreams, Angela Merkel gives everyone homes, cars and huge benefits, and they may not work for the rest of their lives.

Let us remember that in the middle of the year there were long stories in the Western media about the recruitment of hundreds of thousands of agricultural workers from Romania, because they are needed in France, Spain, Italy, Germany to harvest. But, excuse me, there are already four million people welcomed. So where are they? Everyone is working in their positions? Programming, engineering, and playing the piano in every possible corner? A person endowed with common sense understands these terrible exaggerations perfectly.

Is it not the case now that a minority is beginning to dictate the views of the majority by imposing its liberal ideas? The welcomers are not the majority. And advocates of gay marriage are also not the majority.

Advocates of cohabitation. The Constitution forbids their marriage, then the Constitution must be changed. Marriage, thanks to Šlesers, is written in the Constitution. Curse him as much as you wish, this is his legacy. But there really is something that is being imposed. Or rather, the majority do not offer their own model, so to speak. When the idea of ​​a cohabitation union emerged, there were voices from many conservative politicians that the existing legislation of Latvia and the current Civil Law allow enough to register their unions. But it was never discussed to the end: how, where, what needs to be done. Some absurd ideas appeared there ‒ register a SIA! Representing the constructive majority, I understand perfectly well that if same-sex couples are told to register a SIA, it is pure mockery. The law of cohabitation union or cohabitation could be a normal thing that settles relations with the state. In all necessary cases ‒ with regard to the right of inheritance, in case of death of one partner, for decision-making in the hospital, if one of the partners is in a coma. So that you can take a loan together at the bank. I know from the experience of my acquaintances ‒ in order to get to a larger apartment, they each bought their own apartment on the same floor and then knocked a hole in the common wall.

There are many intimate nuances that the majority should not talk much about. Let them feel equal in their partnership model, but without touching the family. Because not all of them long for children. In any case, there is a lack of dialogue between the public. Not just among some non-governmental organizations, where those minority organizations are better trained to speak up for their rights. And the other half is not ready.

Where should that conversation take place, in the Saeima?

I do not know. It should definitely take place in the Saeima, but unfortunately, the intellectual capacity of the existing Saeima is as it is. And I don't think there can be a very serious conversation there. Who will represent the traditionalists there?

Some nationalists have applied.

There is the question ‒ how argumentatively can they speak? And the bad news is that, as in the case of covid, we have an infinite number of experts who often express very different views. Some say the child will grow up free, liberated, more liberal, more innovative, and something more. And there are others who say no, it is a form of oppression. If a child suddenly finds out that the majority has a mother and a father, but he only had two guys or vice versa ‒ two mothers, the questions about the father are always out of place. Because the child can't say that my dad is a pilot, a sailor, or a famous motorist. There just isn't one. Can this cause a childhood trauma or not? We have always said that in a single-parent family, children live in traumatic conditions. So in a two-parent same-sex family, do the children live or not live in traumatic conditions? Can anyone answer that? Even if a person lives with some kind of stable belief system, but relies on experts, which is normal in today's society, he still finds himself in such a situation of uncertainty.

In conclusion, I would like to ask about the relationship between the minority and the majority ‒ from the point of view of laws and ethical norms, is it now even politically correct to be proud of the fact that I am heterosexual, that I have a traditional family, that I am Latvian and white.

No, clearly and unequivocally, it is politically incorrect at the moment.

Why?

Being a white heterosexual with a family right now is politically incorrect. I'll tell you what the unspoken phrase is ‒ hey, there are too many of your kind anyway! Sit down for a while, we'll talk here now. There are too many of you. When you can't be found in any nook or cranny, just like the first Christians, then maybe we will let you guys out, but not now. For now, there are too many of you. You better keep quiet because we are satisfied with the position of your silent majority.

The majority maintains tolerance for the time being, but also maintains the majority. And that balances that. For the time being.