‘We are (home).’
This is the slogan of this year’s Budapest Pride Festival, the largest LGBTQ+ annual event in Hungary, set to take place on 28 June.
Defiant, colourful, and always proud, LGBTQ+ Hungarians and their allies have taken to the streets of the country’s capital city every year since 1997.
This year’s will be no different, even after a law proposed by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s ruling party banned the Pride march altogether.
Fidesz put forward an amended law on public assembly on Monday, passed at a breakneck speed and signed by President Tamás Sulyok two days later.
The law, which claims LGBTQ+ Pride is harmful to children, also grants the police the power to use facial recognition cameras to identify Pride-goers and fine them 200,000 Hungarian forints (about £420).
‘We won’t let woke ideology endanger our kids,’ Orbán said of the law.
However, the Pride ban is not something all Hungarians support. Opposition lawmakers lit flares during the voting session on Tuesday, while demonstrators blocked Margaret Bridge in Budapest.
Yet a leading Hungarian LGBTQ+ group told Metro that the law, as much as it is a chilling symptom of authoritarianism, will not put a stop to Pride anytime soon.
‘The outrage we have witnessed in society in response to the ban on Pride has been outstanding: in crises like this, it is solidarity that carries us forward,’ said Luca Dudits, an executive board member of the Háttér Society, which provides legal aid to queer Hungarians.
‘Many have expressed that they will march with us on 28 June, for our freedom and equality.’
And this includes Budapest Pride itself. ‘They have tried countless times to ban our march – and failed,’ organisers said in a statement, referring to repeated calls in recent years by the far-right Mi Hazánk to prohibit Pride.
‘They will not succeed now either.’
Hungary’s Anti-LGBTQ+ Policies and Orbán’s Ideology
Since clawing his way back to power in 2010, Orbán has portrayed Hungary as the black sheep of a progressive, liberal Europe, positioning himself as a defender of Christian and traditional family values.
This approach has won him admiration from many European conservatives, as well as former US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
‘Our community has had to endure numerous laws restricting their rights, as well as persistent anti-LGBTQ+ government propaganda,’ said Dudits.
‘Many have moved abroad to live their lives in peace, free from the hate-mongering that Orbán relies on.’
In 2021, Hungary’s parliament passed a law that many campaigners have likened to Russia’s so-called ‘gay propaganda ban’.
The policy equates being gay with paedophilia, campaigners argue, by banning the ‘promotion’ of LGBTQ+ identities to minors in the media or sex education programmes.
Dudits said that this week’s ban, along with previous Fidesz policies, comes as no surprise.
‘Fidesz has a history of mistreating and attacking minority groups,’ she said.
‘In recent years, migrants and asylum seekers have been scapegoated, portrayed as the enemy of the public through billboard campaigns and television adverts.
‘Homeless people and Roma communities have also been targeted by government campaigns: homelessness has been criminalised.’
More Read
LGBTQ+ as the New Public Enemy
However, Fidesz, which secured a supermajority in 2022, has increasingly positioned LGBTQ+ people as public enemy number one, Dudits added—despite opinion polls indicating that Hungarians generally support LGBTQ+ rights.
‘They launch these crusades against social minorities to divert attention from real issues, such as skyrocketing inflation, corruption scandals, or the pandemic,’ she explained.
Hungary currently has the highest inflation rate in Europe. Food prices are 80% higher than five years ago, according to calculations by ING Bank.
Meanwhile, Hungary ranks among the most corrupt countries in the EU, according to Transparency International, an anti-corruption watchdog.
Facial Recognition and Government Crackdowns
Given this, it is unsurprising that Orbán’s supporters have turned to facial recognition technology (FRT) to suppress LGBTQ+ communities, campaign groups warn.
Facial recognition—software that maps, analyses, and verifies the identity of a person from a photograph or video—is limited by the EU Artificial Intelligence Act.
However, its potential use by the Hungarian authorities in targeting Pride-goers raises fresh concerns about privacy, surveillance, and the wider erosion of human rights in Hungary.
