Budapest
Police Chief Gábor Tóth, evidently aware that the 2008 Gay Dignity Procession was likely to elicit even greater protest than that in 2007, on 11 June informed the event's organizer, the Rainbow Mission Foundation [Szivárvány Misszió Alapítvány], that the BRFK had prohibited its request to hold the 2008 parade along Andrássy Avenue on July 5 on the grounds that it would "impede the circulation of
mass transit and vehicle traffic". Fifteen Hungarian
gay organizations, including the Rainbow Mission Foundation, sent a letter to the BRFK the following day protesting the decision, urging the Budapest police "not to try to prevent expected right-wing extremist attacks on the parade by forbidding it, but to do its duty to defend the marchers from expected aggression." Additionally,
liberal Budapest Mayor
Gábor Demszky refuted Chief Tóth's claim that the parade would unduly obstruct traffic in the vicinity of Andrássy Avenue, while the
Hungarian Civil Liberties Union (known in its Hungarian-language
acronymic form as TASZ) and the Hungarian Helsinki Committee [Magyar Helsinki Bizottság]
human rights organization also denounced the BRFK's prohibition of the parade. (TASZ announced that it would provide Hungarian gay organizations with legal services in the event that they chose to file a lawsuit against the BRFK for banning the parade, noting that the Budapest police routinely closes Andrássy Avenue to vehicle traffic for weekend events, most recently for the National Gallop
equestrian show held on the weekend of 31 May – 1 June 2008.) The most influential right-wing extremist groups and websites immediately went on the offensive following the announcement that the Budapest gay parade would be held as usual in 2008. On 18 June, Budaházy and his close associate, the leader of the radical-nationalist
64 Counties Youth Movement [64 Vármegye Ifjúsági Mozgalom]
László Toroczkai, issued a joint communiqué regarding the parade: We will not permit aberrant foreigners of this or that color to force their alien and sick world on Hungary. We hereby publicly declare that we, ourselves, will defend the Hungarian capital. Every Hungarian patriot is needed! Stand among the defenders, or form defensive forces from among your groups and organizations, and come to the
Oktogon in Budapest at 4 o'clock in the afternoon of July 5.! It is our moral duty to act.... The Rainbow Rampage, the aggressive
pederast caravan of degenerate foreigners that is traversing Europe, will arrive to its final stop in Budapest on July 4, Freemasonry's biggest holiday and the anniversary of the signing of America's
Declaration of Independence, in order to celebrate queerdom in our capital for several days on end. Beginning at 4 p.m. on July 5, this
exhibitionist queer rabble will hold a public procession and street ball, trampling under foot all fundamental traditional moral values and proclaiming Hungary's occupation by aberrants and foreigners. HOWEVER. During these days, we Hungarian patriots will recall the
Battle of Pressburg in which the forces of our founding father,
Prince Árpád, inflicted a crushing defeat upon the western armies.... The army of Hunnia will defend the capital of the Hungarians on July 5, 2008!. All the major right-wing radical websites in Hungary published this announcement, whose authors arguably command the greatest capacity in the country to mobilize right-wing extremists for engagement in violent street action. Also on 18 June, the Hungarian Self-Defense Movement (known in its Hungarian-language acronymic form as MÖM), which had been involved in organizing protests against the previous two gay parades, published an appeal on the organization's website under the heading "On July 5 we will attack out of self-defense!": We summon all Hungarians, responsibly minded families, fathers and mothers, to all come and expel the pederast horde once and for all! We cannot simply watch passively as such genetic trash shows a bad example for our children! ... We call upon all Hungarian self-defenders to resist on Saturday afternoon on July 5, we will meet at the designated place! We will unite our forces at the Oktogon! On 28 June, an anonymous self-described founding member of a
fan club for the Budapest
soccer team Ferencváros, whose supporters have a highly publicized history of hooliganism and participation in right-wing extremist street aggression, published a letter on MÖM 's website stating that "we are answering the Hungarian Self-Defense Movement's appeal": The annual "gay pride" day is coming as usual. The queers spend millions on their exhibitionism so that a few hundred people can put their perversions on display for the world. Are there enough healthy, heterosexual people out there, who marching opposite them, not shouting, not throwing things (we don't need a parade to do this), perhaps holding hands with their partners, to show that the love of the opposite sex is worth more? On 26 June, Hungary's primary right-wing extremist website, Kuruc.info, published a list of
gay bars, cafés, saunas, guest houses and hotels in Budapest. This was an ominous development, since beginning in December 2007 a group called the Arrows of the Hungarians National Liberation Army (Magyarok Nyilai Nemzeti Felszabadító Hadsereg) had
firebombed several residences and other locations implicitly identified as targets on the website. Early the following morning, a
Molotov cocktail was thrown into the entry of the gay-frequented Action Bar in Budapest, while on the morning of July 2, four Molotov cocktails were tossed into one of the city's sauna
gay bathhouse in Budapest, slightly injuring one of the establishment's employees. On July 3, Kuruc.info reported on the latter firebombing under the title "Cleansing Fire Licks Another Mini
Sodom" in which the website noted that "Incidentally, we drew the attention of our readers to the sauna, just in case they wanted a little hot air." Though the Arrows of the Hungarians did not claim responsibility for the firebombings as the organization had done in previous cases, usually publishing video recordings of the attacks, Kuruc.info asked the largely
rhetorical question following the assault on the Action Bar "has the Arrows of the Hungarians National Liberation Army struck again?" Kuruc.info further prepared its readers for the gay parade with the publication of detailed instructions, including pictures, two days before the event, on how to fill eggs with dye for throwing at the marchers in the procession. Tomcat, meanwhile, began the process of organizing his heterosexual counter-procession, though he was first compelled to explain how it was that he had actually marched in the 2004 Gay Dignity Procession: ... I participated carrying a "NOT ME" sign, though I did not want to eliminate or throw things at anybody. In fact, I found the events that took place there to be absolutely acceptable.... Yes, I observed the 2004 queer parade from the inside. I also took photos and chatted with the queers. I met among them some old buddies as well. And I still maintain that there was no problem with that parade. But I also maintain that now, in 2008, go ahead and bombard them with all sorts of stuff and eradicate their organizers. . . In 2004, and earlier I think, there were neither fags running around half naked, nor pink-Bible-licking obscenities, nor rump rummagers jumping all over each other in public.... However, one year later the Pride had totally changed and was not simply a party for queers. Politics had got hold of it by that time, the lackey media did the job of vilifying the "
homophobes," and the whole thing degenerated into an unprincipled advertisement for wild-liberal values.... The standard has been sinking ever since. It is no accident that fewer and fewer normal homos support the parade.... With regard to my allegedly boundless homophobia, it is enough to note that Bomb Factory has a gay editor as well. He doesn't make any particular secret out of it. And I have several gay friends and acquaintances besides him as well. None of them will be there [at the gay parade] on Saturday. Surely they are "far-right extremists" too. On July 1, Tomcat summoned his so-called "factory dwellers" to prepare for the Bomb Factory counter-procession: There are only a couple of days left until the Saturday street battles, so it is time that we began getting ready. Of course, we would not for the world harm those dear homosexual people, who want to truck down the entire length of Andrássy Avenue, but let's at least show them that we are here on this world as well.... We welcome all our healthy, heterosexual friends and also those homos who condemn those lunatics dressed in their disgusting garb and kindly decline to have these people represent them. Our procession will travel along the same route as that of the queers, and we will proceed down Andrássy Avenue opposite them. We won't yell, we won't throw things, we won't murder—the Kuruc people will do that in our place. And finally, on the night before the parade, Tomcat issued a last reminder: You haven't forgotten have you? ... We welcome everybody, and bring your partners with you. Those who would like to beat up queers can join Budaházy's group, though I don't see a very good opportunity to do this with so many cops around.... Our demonstration will not be violent, we aren't going to throw things or fight. Of course, it is still possible to thwart the queer parade. A kind Bomb Factory dweller is organizing an egg-throwing team. Those interested should contact.... The far-right Movement for a Better Hungary (
Jobbik), which had led efforts to organize demonstrations against previous Budapest Gay Dignity Processions, remained inactive with regard to the 2008 parade until the morning of the event, when the party published the following communiqué on its website: Ban the Queer Procession from Budapest! The instigators motivated in the force field of the extreme-liberal
SZDSZ are marching on the streets to demonstrate in favor of their deviant views this year as well.... We inform the misguided people preparing to take to the streets: you can still turn back before you collide the walls of awakening and organizing social resistance! There is currently a government-inspired show-like trial taking place against the
Hungarian Guard [Magyar Gárda], while liberals and left-wingers within several
local councils have initiated the prohibition of this charitable organization from their territory, including Budapest. At the same time, the police, in conformity with [Budapest Mayor]
Gábor Demszky's expectations, chose to review their original decision and permitted the initially banned homosexual event.... We request that the self-defined Christian-conservative
MDF and
Fidesz-KDNP not distance themselves from Jobbik and the Hungarian Guard, but from the true extremists. We urge them to read
the Old Testament,
Leviticus 20:13: "If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads." The BRFK had good reason to suspect, as the political daily
Népszabadság reported on 25 June, that "marchers would be exposed to more and increasingly brutal attacks than last year." All of Hungary's main right-wing extremist leaders, organizations and media—Budaházy, Torockai, Tomcat, the Hungarian Self-Defense Movement, the Hungarian National Committee Jobbik, ostensibly the Arrows of the Hungarians Liberation Army, Kuruc.info, Bombagyár, Holy Crown Radio (Szent Korona Rádió), Barikád.hu—had rallied with an exceptional degree of unity and purpose behind the cause of "defending the capital" against the "pederast horde." (Already in June, the main pages of the Kuruc.info and the Hungarian Self-Defense Movement websites had displayed countdown clocks showing the number of days, hours, minutes and seconds until the start of the 2008 Budapest gay parade.) Far-right attacks on gay parades held the previous weekend in
Brno Czech Republic and
Sofia, Bulgaria, both of which resulted in a considerable number of arrests, were also a powerful portent of what was likely to take place at the 13th Budapest Gay Dignity Procession. At the parade, as police helicopters hovered overhead, protesters broke down the tall metal fences surrounding the parade's endpoint at Heroes' Square. They threw eggs, bottles, rocks, and
firecrackers at the marchers, and
cobblestones and
gasoline bombs at police. At least 10 people were injured, including two policemen, and three media trucks were damaged; they hit, among others, liberal
MP Gabor Horn, and broke the window of the police car in which
Hungarian Socialist Party MEP Katalin Levai was riding with
Gábor Szetey, the first
out gay member of Hungary's government. Riot police dispersed the protesters using
tear gas and
water cannons. A total of 45 to 49 people were arrested. The police protection of the parade had an estimated cost of 500 000 dollars (100 million HUF). ==2009==