The Frontline | TikTok and the Political Earthquake in Romania

Description

Just under two weeks ago Romania was thrown into political turmoil that may have far reaching effects for Europe and the world, and for LGBTI people and other minorities in the country. In the first round of the country's Presidential election, nobody saw the victory of far-right, Russia-leaning Calin Georgescu, who was barely on the radar of the polls. Then, last Sunday, in Romania’s parliamentary elections saw mainstream parties gaining enough seats in parliament to form a government, although the far right has gained substantial ground in the legislature.

Meanwhile potential breaches in campaign finance laws and unfair practices exploiting the use of TikTok’s algorithms were credited to have boosted Georgescu, giving him enormous exposure despite the fact that he was relatively unknown. The European Commission have said they will be investigating whether there was unlawful TikTok interference.

So, as Romania gets ready for the nail-biting second round of its presidential election, what does all this mean for LGBTI people in the country? How are activists reading the conflicting results of the presidential and parliamentary elections, amid viral anti-LGBTI TikTok videos and the bombshell rise of Calin Georgescu who has previously said he wants to ‘ban homosexuality’? And what does this mean in terms of elections everywhere?

To discuss the questions and implications, we’re joined on The Frontline by Vlad Viski, President of Romania’s community-based LGBT organisation MozaiQ and Stefi Ionescu, board member of ACCEPT Association, which advocates for the human rights of LGBTI people in Romania.

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Transcription

Speaker #0
Over the last two weeks, there's been political turmoil in Romania. In the first round of the presidential election, nobody saw the far-right candidate, Russian-leaning Kalin Ceausescu, coming. He seemed to come out of nowhere on the back of a massively successful TikTok campaign. Some candidates challenged the results, and Romania's constitutional court ordered a recount, but without providing any clear justifications for this decision. Earlier this week, then, the court validated the results of the first round, leaving only a few days to campaign for the second round of the elections this Sunday. Meanwhile, potential preachers in campaign finance laws and unfair practices exploiting the use of TikTok's algorithms were credited to a boost at Georgescu, giving him enormous exposure, despite the fact that he was relatively unknown. The European Commission announced they will investigate whether there was unlawful TikTok interference. TikTok was also questioned in the Internal Market Committee of the European Parliament earlier this week. In the meantime, Romanians went to the polls a second time to elect a parliament last Sunday. The results suggest that the PSD, member of the Party of European Socialists, but also a party that has long been involved in corruption scandals and has so far rejected to advance legislation regarding civil partnerships, will likely have enough seats in the parliament to form a government. although the far right has gained substantial ground also in the parliamentary elections and came in second place. So now, only two days away from the second round of the presidential elections, we want to take a closer look at what all this means for LGBTI people in Romania. How are activists reading the results of the presidential and parliamentary elections and the rise of Karline Georgescu? Welcome to The Frontline, a podcast from Ilga Europe in Brussels. bringing you to the front lines of LGBTI activism across Europe and Central Asia. My name is Katrin Hugendubel and with me to discuss how the current political developments will play into the lives of LGBTI people and the protection of their rights in Romania are Vlad Vizki, president of Romania's community-based LGBT organization Mosaic, and Steffi Ionescu, board member of ACCEPT. Association, which advocates for the human rights of LGBTI people in Romania. So hello both, and thanks for taking the time to join us on the Frontline today. On Monday morning, the Politico playbook, which is an email that most people in Brussels receive, reported that the EU is breathing a sigh of relief after Romanians put the Social Democrats in the lead in Sunday's parliamentary elections. Are you breathing a sigh of relief as well?
Speaker #1
Yes and no. things can always be worse but it's difficult to breathe a sigh of relief uh after the past week and a half um at the time we're recording because i think whatever happens from now on most of the damage which i think will be felt uh in the romanian society in general and in particular for the lgbt community has already been done and we can discuss about the extent of this damage but it's difficult to say that just because the far right parties only have around 30% of the votes in parliament is sufficient for us to actually breathe a good, healthy sigh of relief. Most likely, it just shows the extent of all the work that is still to be done.
Speaker #2
Yes, I would add to this that indeed in Romania, where we are witnessing a political earthquake, and... and all sides involved are affected. We are talking about political parties, we are talking about state institutions, about civil society actors, about mass media. We were all in shock to see that a neo-Nazi candidate, Kalin Georgescu, entered the second route of the presidential elections. And political parties are in disarray, and they're not sure. what future brings, and we are not sure as civil society actors and LGBTI activists, what future brings for us. And one question besides the fact that, of course, it's a good news that pro-European parties have over 65% in the next Romanian parliament. Nevertheless, the fragmentation within the political system will continue to exist, and competition between even mainstream parties will continue to exist. And questions arose about how will the next government look. Of course, we're also waiting for the second round of the presidential elections, and we're hoping that the pro-Europe candidate will win. But nevertheless, the question is, how will mainstream political parties act after this earthquake? Because, of course, there is a strong and real possibility that they will also turn towards anti-LGBT rhetoric, towards hatred, towards minorities, in order to gain the votes that they have lost to the extreme right wing. So while we are happy that there is a pro-democracy majority within the parliament, and it helps a little bit stabilize the things right now, we are questioning. what future will bring for us.
Speaker #0
Yeah, and I think even more so as I mean, even the party that came out first now in the parliamentary election, so the socialists, I mean, I know from work that we've been doing together also with the party of European socialists, they themselves have not been supported on LGBTI rights and have not supported, for example, a simple call for recognized partnership in Romania. So I can see where that is not a very comforting win. But you've already mentioned the parliamentary elections and we're talking just days before the second round of the parliamentary election. So when Georgescu goes up against Elena Lasconi of the Save Romania Union, what's your lookout towards Sunday and the second round?
Speaker #1
It's difficult to have a very optimistic outlook. I think most people argue that if you look, you know, the math that shows that the far right parties have... only about 30% in parliament, doesn't necessarily apply to presidential elections, where people vote more on account of charisma and on account of various information that they've received, including through social media and so on. So I think this is going to be, in a large extent, a referendum on the interest that the Romanian society has to... continue to be firmly anchored in the European Union and in NATO. But I think this is, you know, it's easy to look at the choice between the two candidates and see, well, one of them is more close to Russia, more illiberal, more closer to the kind of policies that you would expect from far-right parties, and the other one is this pro-European. this person aligned with European values and so on. But I think there are a lot of voters who are not making this calculation, who don't necessarily see Kalinjarjescu as a representative of Putin in Romania, who maintain that they vote for him more because of economic issues. They vote for him more because he represents more of a change to the status quo than the other candidate who is a member of... party that has been in government for a short period of time in the past four years. And I don't think that people have in mind necessarily the extent of the damage that would be done to the country if they vote for a candidate oriented more towards the East and the West. So I don't think the Romanians view this as a referendum on East versus West as much as they would view this as an opportunity to... make a substantial change from the status quo. So I think it's going to be touch and go. I think anything can happen, but I don't think we would be very surprised if the far-right candidate actually pulls through. I don't know how Vlad sees this.
Speaker #2
So I think everyone is really waiting to see and no one has the right answer of what will happen. Even pollsters have stopped doing polling given the fact that their own polling before was completely off the charts and did not represent reality. So, of course, not even seasoned political scientists can actually say what's going to happen. Nevertheless, I think it's important to underline that in Romania, support for the European Union and NATO stands around 55 to 60 percent. So this is important. And also, I would like to underline the fact that The disinformation campaigns that have been going on on TikTok specifically, but also on other social media environments, really does not allow us to see the actual perspective and the actual damage that has been done in terms of influencing voters to vote one way or another. And in this regards, many of the people that have voted for Kalin Georgescu or are planning to vote for him do not know who he is, do not know. his past statements, do not know his positions. All they know is 30 seconds videos that they heard online about God, about patriotism, about the nation and so on. So this is, this really shows the extent to which you can manipulate an elections. And when voters without having access to all of the information about the candidates, can actually make decisions that are not necessarily informed decisions. Nevertheless, the political intelligentsia, let's call, and the intellectuals in Romania, and most of the political parties, not the socialists yet, have endorsed the pro-European candidate. And we are expecting to see now if this sort of endorsement, coming from celebrities as well, pop stars, singers, and of course civil society actors and so on, if they will lead to actually a result in terms of pro-Europe. A win by Kalin Georgescu would be catastrophic for Romania. Already the markets are down, the cost of borrowing for Romanians has gone up, the markets do not trust us anymore, and there's many tools that the president of Romania has. For example, the president of Romania represents the country... within the European Council, and it can block funding for Ukraine, for example, something that he has said he will. After that, he can start the referenda about all sorts of issues, even though they're not binding. Nevertheless, this referenda can refer to LGBT people. Also, in the past, he said he wants to ban homosexuality. So we're not talking just about... banning so-called homosexual propaganda as it has happened in Russia or in Hungary. Nevertheless, it's banning altogether and going back to a time where LGBTI people were hunted by the police and so on. So there's many tools that the president can force their own government and so on, can refuse prime ministers. So this is a decision about the future of Romania and the European future of Romania. And this is what we at Mosaic and, of course, other civil society actors such as our colleagues from Akchip, we are fighting for our democracy right now in these days.
Speaker #0
Before we turn back to the TikTok and I think distortion and online hate, Steffi, I want to go back to you. What would you say LGBTI people and rainbow families need to know before going to the elections, the second round on Sunday? about the candidates?
Speaker #1
I think I would like to address two types of LGBT families and communities in Romania, because I know that there are people in the LGBT community who vote for Mr. Kalin Giorgiestu. I've had the chance to discuss with some of them, and their explanations are quite compelling from their perspective in the sense that they say, I'm not voting with my LGBTI hat on, I'm voting for a change in the economic prospects of this country. I'm voting because I earn 500 euros a month and I cannot survive and I cannot sustain my family and I don't care. Or I don't want to listen to what might happen to me as an LGBT person. Rather, I want a change in the economic outlook of this country. And to these people, I would say the far right candidate does not have a solution to the economic problems of this country. They will... just like Mr. Orban doesn't have in his own country, just like Mr. Putin doesn't have in his country, and so on. These people will not be able to improve your economic situation. And they do not have solutions to problems like the inflation that has affected the Romanian society and so on. What they can do, however, is create... tokenistic measures against LGBT people, because this is a campaign promise which they can deliver on as opposed to the economic promises. So it's much more easy for them to do that. They are going to get easy political wins with the electorate that is interested in this. And this is why if you believe that you should not vote with your LGBT hat on, unfortunately, I think that part of your identity will be much more affected than... the economic output, which will not be improved by this choice. To other people in the LGBT community who fear and who have been feeling very anxious in the past two weeks about these results, I am one of those people. It's been a very tough week and a half from sort of, you know, I think, you know, you could argue, you talk about mental health of each of us thinking that, you know, are we still welcome in our own country? Can we continue to pursue the goals that we've been pursuing? Is all the progress that has been made going to be raised overnight? And, you know, I would like to tell them what I try to tell myself, which is... If Mr. Georgescu wins, the Romanian people will be the same. You know, the society in which we live in will be the same. The people who love you and support you are going to be the same. This just shows that there is so much more work to be done and that we need to maybe see how the nature of this work changes in the coming years. But it doesn't mean that overnight society is going to turn against us. It's going to mean it's going to be a much... much harder. But I think we should take, you know, I think the sort of optimistic outlook is I think the arc of justice bends in the right direction. And hopefully, we will be able to get through this.
Speaker #0
Thanks so much, because I think both these points are so important to hear. Like, I mean, we've seen those tokenistic, political and legislative actions against the LGBTI community as easy wins, as you said, in so many countries. across our region of Europe and Central Asia over the last two years. But also thank you for reminding us of the resilience and the love that's shared, no matter of the outcome of the elections and the standing together. The Commission has pledged to investigate the alleged interference on TikTok in the presidential elections. And actually only this week, also the Internal Market Commission of the European Parliament invited TikTok. for a hearing. Valérie Heia, who's the chair of the Renew Groups of the Liberals in the European Parliament, said Romania is a warning bell. Radicalization and disinformation can happen all over Europe with harmful consequences. And I know that you've been not only feeling those harmful consequences, as you just shared, but also monitoring and documenting some of that. So maybe Vlad, could you talk a little bit about what Mosaic has found looking closer on TikTok, on the content that was shared there. And then maybe both of you could talk a little bit on how are LGBTI people feeling actually, and how is it affecting organizations and people, what is happening right now?
Speaker #2
Yes. So thank you. Our monitoring of TikTok activity shows that there is a continuous disinformation campaign against LGBTI people with... with hundreds, if not thousands of videos that are being shared on all sorts of channels by regular people, by troll farms, by all sorts of bots and so on, all targeting the support that Mrs. Lascone, who is the liberal candidate, has given in the past for LGBTI rights. And basically the message they are sending is that if you vote for Lascone and not for Georgescu, then you are supporting LGBTI rights. And this comes at our expense. We're talking about homophobic songs that are being written and being shared, about all sorts of instances of making viral specific trends and videos. And all our database that we collected shows hundreds of thousands of shares. and millions of views for these videos. So we're not talking about just something singular. We're talking about a strong polarization within society, but also the usage of these social media channels and apps in order to scapegoat LGBTI people. And here it became one of the main topics of the campaign, the topic of LGBTI rights, in which LGBTI people are pictured as... are not national, not Romanian, foreign, perverts, unnatural, and so on. And all of these we have seen in the past. in the referendum of 2018 that would have banned same-sex marriages, which took place and we fought against and we were able to defeat. But the same networks are being used right now and enhanced. And we're talking also about church networks, about conservative voices that still are there and they're doing their work and they're trying to multiply this type of messaging. Of course, one question which is... Extremely important is who is funding this, because Mr. Georgescu has submitted a file to the Electoral Commission saying that his campaign costed zero euros. So he's claiming that his campaign was done with zero money. This is impossible for any political pundit and for anyone. And the question is, who's funding this? What what types of messaging are they using? How are they multiplying and using influencers and so on? And of course, this affects our community in many ways. Our organization has been threatened. Our address has been posted online. We've had to file complaints with the prosecutor's office because of this. Yesterday, someone was taking pictures of our office and we're still trying to figure out what happened. We're trying to increase security. So our organizations are affected. And then the community itself, which sees... All this hatred online, people are disillusioned, people don't know which direction it will take. Many people are talking about leaving Romania and emigrating. And our role, we see our role besides increasing our security in terms of our movement and increasing solidarity amongst different factions of the movement. And our role is also to send the signal that regardless of what happens on Sunday. We are here. We're determined to continue the fight that we have been doing for so many years. And people in the community need to know that there is hope and getting out the vote and going and vote right now on Sunday. It's extremely important that it's essential for the future of our movement and the European trajectory of Romania.
Speaker #0
Yeah, and I think that work on mobilizing people to come out is so important. But also to say like all the... documenting you're doing now will obviously feed into our work with the European Commission and the European Parliament to hold social media platforms accountable for online hate. But Steffi, do you want to add to how are people feeling? How has the climate changed over the last one week and a half?
Speaker #1
I think the morning after the first round of elections, I think everyone was feeling very uncomfortable. You feel anxiousness going on the streets and wondering where we're going. Who are the people around you? Who are your neighbors? How do they feel? And so on. And I think this is exactly the kind of atmosphere that usually becomes even worse when society is polarized in the way in which it has been polarized all throughout Europe and all throughout the Western world. I think a key takeaway is that foreign governments like Russia don't need tanks in order to... penetrate the soul of a society and of a country. They can do that using savvy technical capabilities, using TikTok propaganda, and so on. I think it is for sure what happened in these elections has to be documented, has to be studied by democracies all around the world, because the kind of vulnerability that was illustrated in these elections is a vulnerability which probably exists all around the world, wherever. these social networks exist. That being said, because just to remind everyone, the result of that first round of election has been a surprise to the entire establishment, the entire press. Everyone was shocked, even to the pollsters from the exit polls. So in the night of the election, we were shown one order between the candidates and next morning, it was something completely different. So somehow this evaded, you know, everything and everyone's anticipation. But I think the second point... about the way this propaganda has penetrated our society and the way LGBT rights have been weaponized in order to affect political change, but also the way in which there is a campaign to disinform people about what LGBT rights means. I think our, you know, the entire world of activists has to study this and understand this a bit better. maybe see what we can change in the way we communicate, in the channels through which we communicate, and in the technical resources which we use. Because I think, you know, when all is said and done, yes, the propaganda campaigns are obviously unfair. They are obviously immoral. They are obviously against human rights. They are obviously undemocratic and they, you know, they are against human rights in general. But they have been effective, which means that we have in a way failed to promote our message effectively. This campaign is in. illustrating that something has to change in the way in which LGBT activists operate, because it's clear that something in our message is not cutting through. I don't know if it's because of, I don't know, maybe taking for granted that people should simply accept LGBT rights as human rights. Maybe we have to go back to the drawing board to explain once again why allowing LGBT rights... is a sign that the country is interested in providing human rights to people in general. I think we have to make people be more aware of the fact that the state's treatment of minorities actually illustrates also how the state is going to treat people who don't have economic or don't have or underprivileged people all throughout the country. If people don't care about, if politicians don't care about minorities, then why would they care about people who are suffering for other reasons? Why would they care about people who are economically disenfranchised? Why would they care about people who don't have power? So I think we need to somehow retake control of the message and explain that the fight of LGBT people is actually the same fight that all the people in society has to continue to make in order to continue to live in a society that... protects their human rights.
Speaker #0
I want to thank you both really wholeheartedly to have taken the time in this very busy, very chaotic and very disruptive time in Romania. Thanks a lot for all the work you're doing. We'll all be looking together at the elections on Sunday and see what are next steps, how we at Ilga Europe can support the Romanian community, but also your work. and what needs to be done no matter what the outcomes of the elections will be. Thanks so much for joining us today. You've been listening to The Frontline, ILGA Europe's LGBTI activism podcast. To find out more about our guests, visit the links in our episode description. And please subscribe, like, comment or share wherever you listen to your podcasts. Tune in next time. when we'll be traveling further on the front lines of LGBTI activism in Europe and Central Asia. Bye for now.

Description

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Transcription

Speaker #0
Over the last two weeks, there's been political turmoil in Romania. In the first round of the presidential election, nobody saw the far-right candidate, Russian-leaning Kalin Ceausescu, coming. He seemed to come out of nowhere on the back of a massively successful TikTok campaign. Some candidates challenged the results, and Romania's constitutional court ordered a recount, but without providing any clear justifications for this decision. Earlier this week, then, the court validated the results of the first round, leaving only a few days to campaign for the second round of the elections this Sunday. Meanwhile, potential preachers in campaign finance laws and unfair practices exploiting the use of TikTok's algorithms were credited to a boost at Georgescu, giving him enormous exposure, despite the fact that he was relatively unknown. The European Commission announced they will investigate whether there was unlawful TikTok interference. TikTok was also questioned in the Internal Market Committee of the European Parliament earlier this week. In the meantime, Romanians went to the polls a second time to elect a parliament last Sunday. The results suggest that the PSD, member of the Party of European Socialists, but also a party that has long been involved in corruption scandals and has so far rejected to advance legislation regarding civil partnerships, will likely have enough seats in the parliament to form a government. although the far right has gained substantial ground also in the parliamentary elections and came in second place. So now, only two days away from the second round of the presidential elections, we want to take a closer look at what all this means for LGBTI people in Romania. How are activists reading the results of the presidential and parliamentary elections and the rise of Karline Georgescu? Welcome to The Frontline, a podcast from Ilga Europe in Brussels. bringing you to the front lines of LGBTI activism across Europe and Central Asia. My name is Katrin Hugendubel and with me to discuss how the current political developments will play into the lives of LGBTI people and the protection of their rights in Romania are Vlad Vizki, president of Romania's community-based LGBT organization Mosaic, and Steffi Ionescu, board member of ACCEPT. Association, which advocates for the human rights of LGBTI people in Romania. So hello both, and thanks for taking the time to join us on the Frontline today. On Monday morning, the Politico playbook, which is an email that most people in Brussels receive, reported that the EU is breathing a sigh of relief after Romanians put the Social Democrats in the lead in Sunday's parliamentary elections. Are you breathing a sigh of relief as well?
Speaker #1
Yes and no. things can always be worse but it's difficult to breathe a sigh of relief uh after the past week and a half um at the time we're recording because i think whatever happens from now on most of the damage which i think will be felt uh in the romanian society in general and in particular for the lgbt community has already been done and we can discuss about the extent of this damage but it's difficult to say that just because the far right parties only have around 30% of the votes in parliament is sufficient for us to actually breathe a good, healthy sigh of relief. Most likely, it just shows the extent of all the work that is still to be done.
Speaker #2
Yes, I would add to this that indeed in Romania, where we are witnessing a political earthquake, and... and all sides involved are affected. We are talking about political parties, we are talking about state institutions, about civil society actors, about mass media. We were all in shock to see that a neo-Nazi candidate, Kalin Georgescu, entered the second route of the presidential elections. And political parties are in disarray, and they're not sure. what future brings, and we are not sure as civil society actors and LGBTI activists, what future brings for us. And one question besides the fact that, of course, it's a good news that pro-European parties have over 65% in the next Romanian parliament. Nevertheless, the fragmentation within the political system will continue to exist, and competition between even mainstream parties will continue to exist. And questions arose about how will the next government look. Of course, we're also waiting for the second round of the presidential elections, and we're hoping that the pro-Europe candidate will win. But nevertheless, the question is, how will mainstream political parties act after this earthquake? Because, of course, there is a strong and real possibility that they will also turn towards anti-LGBT rhetoric, towards hatred, towards minorities, in order to gain the votes that they have lost to the extreme right wing. So while we are happy that there is a pro-democracy majority within the parliament, and it helps a little bit stabilize the things right now, we are questioning. what future will bring for us.
Speaker #0
Yeah, and I think even more so as I mean, even the party that came out first now in the parliamentary election, so the socialists, I mean, I know from work that we've been doing together also with the party of European socialists, they themselves have not been supported on LGBTI rights and have not supported, for example, a simple call for recognized partnership in Romania. So I can see where that is not a very comforting win. But you've already mentioned the parliamentary elections and we're talking just days before the second round of the parliamentary election. So when Georgescu goes up against Elena Lasconi of the Save Romania Union, what's your lookout towards Sunday and the second round?
Speaker #1
It's difficult to have a very optimistic outlook. I think most people argue that if you look, you know, the math that shows that the far right parties have... only about 30% in parliament, doesn't necessarily apply to presidential elections, where people vote more on account of charisma and on account of various information that they've received, including through social media and so on. So I think this is going to be, in a large extent, a referendum on the interest that the Romanian society has to... continue to be firmly anchored in the European Union and in NATO. But I think this is, you know, it's easy to look at the choice between the two candidates and see, well, one of them is more close to Russia, more illiberal, more closer to the kind of policies that you would expect from far-right parties, and the other one is this pro-European. this person aligned with European values and so on. But I think there are a lot of voters who are not making this calculation, who don't necessarily see Kalinjarjescu as a representative of Putin in Romania, who maintain that they vote for him more because of economic issues. They vote for him more because he represents more of a change to the status quo than the other candidate who is a member of... party that has been in government for a short period of time in the past four years. And I don't think that people have in mind necessarily the extent of the damage that would be done to the country if they vote for a candidate oriented more towards the East and the West. So I don't think the Romanians view this as a referendum on East versus West as much as they would view this as an opportunity to... make a substantial change from the status quo. So I think it's going to be touch and go. I think anything can happen, but I don't think we would be very surprised if the far-right candidate actually pulls through. I don't know how Vlad sees this.
Speaker #2
So I think everyone is really waiting to see and no one has the right answer of what will happen. Even pollsters have stopped doing polling given the fact that their own polling before was completely off the charts and did not represent reality. So, of course, not even seasoned political scientists can actually say what's going to happen. Nevertheless, I think it's important to underline that in Romania, support for the European Union and NATO stands around 55 to 60 percent. So this is important. And also, I would like to underline the fact that The disinformation campaigns that have been going on on TikTok specifically, but also on other social media environments, really does not allow us to see the actual perspective and the actual damage that has been done in terms of influencing voters to vote one way or another. And in this regards, many of the people that have voted for Kalin Georgescu or are planning to vote for him do not know who he is, do not know. his past statements, do not know his positions. All they know is 30 seconds videos that they heard online about God, about patriotism, about the nation and so on. So this is, this really shows the extent to which you can manipulate an elections. And when voters without having access to all of the information about the candidates, can actually make decisions that are not necessarily informed decisions. Nevertheless, the political intelligentsia, let's call, and the intellectuals in Romania, and most of the political parties, not the socialists yet, have endorsed the pro-European candidate. And we are expecting to see now if this sort of endorsement, coming from celebrities as well, pop stars, singers, and of course civil society actors and so on, if they will lead to actually a result in terms of pro-Europe. A win by Kalin Georgescu would be catastrophic for Romania. Already the markets are down, the cost of borrowing for Romanians has gone up, the markets do not trust us anymore, and there's many tools that the president of Romania has. For example, the president of Romania represents the country... within the European Council, and it can block funding for Ukraine, for example, something that he has said he will. After that, he can start the referenda about all sorts of issues, even though they're not binding. Nevertheless, this referenda can refer to LGBT people. Also, in the past, he said he wants to ban homosexuality. So we're not talking just about... banning so-called homosexual propaganda as it has happened in Russia or in Hungary. Nevertheless, it's banning altogether and going back to a time where LGBTI people were hunted by the police and so on. So there's many tools that the president can force their own government and so on, can refuse prime ministers. So this is a decision about the future of Romania and the European future of Romania. And this is what we at Mosaic and, of course, other civil society actors such as our colleagues from Akchip, we are fighting for our democracy right now in these days.
Speaker #0
Before we turn back to the TikTok and I think distortion and online hate, Steffi, I want to go back to you. What would you say LGBTI people and rainbow families need to know before going to the elections, the second round on Sunday? about the candidates?
Speaker #1
I think I would like to address two types of LGBT families and communities in Romania, because I know that there are people in the LGBT community who vote for Mr. Kalin Giorgiestu. I've had the chance to discuss with some of them, and their explanations are quite compelling from their perspective in the sense that they say, I'm not voting with my LGBTI hat on, I'm voting for a change in the economic prospects of this country. I'm voting because I earn 500 euros a month and I cannot survive and I cannot sustain my family and I don't care. Or I don't want to listen to what might happen to me as an LGBT person. Rather, I want a change in the economic outlook of this country. And to these people, I would say the far right candidate does not have a solution to the economic problems of this country. They will... just like Mr. Orban doesn't have in his own country, just like Mr. Putin doesn't have in his country, and so on. These people will not be able to improve your economic situation. And they do not have solutions to problems like the inflation that has affected the Romanian society and so on. What they can do, however, is create... tokenistic measures against LGBT people, because this is a campaign promise which they can deliver on as opposed to the economic promises. So it's much more easy for them to do that. They are going to get easy political wins with the electorate that is interested in this. And this is why if you believe that you should not vote with your LGBT hat on, unfortunately, I think that part of your identity will be much more affected than... the economic output, which will not be improved by this choice. To other people in the LGBT community who fear and who have been feeling very anxious in the past two weeks about these results, I am one of those people. It's been a very tough week and a half from sort of, you know, I think, you know, you could argue, you talk about mental health of each of us thinking that, you know, are we still welcome in our own country? Can we continue to pursue the goals that we've been pursuing? Is all the progress that has been made going to be raised overnight? And, you know, I would like to tell them what I try to tell myself, which is... If Mr. Georgescu wins, the Romanian people will be the same. You know, the society in which we live in will be the same. The people who love you and support you are going to be the same. This just shows that there is so much more work to be done and that we need to maybe see how the nature of this work changes in the coming years. But it doesn't mean that overnight society is going to turn against us. It's going to mean it's going to be a much... much harder. But I think we should take, you know, I think the sort of optimistic outlook is I think the arc of justice bends in the right direction. And hopefully, we will be able to get through this.
Speaker #0
Thanks so much, because I think both these points are so important to hear. Like, I mean, we've seen those tokenistic, political and legislative actions against the LGBTI community as easy wins, as you said, in so many countries. across our region of Europe and Central Asia over the last two years. But also thank you for reminding us of the resilience and the love that's shared, no matter of the outcome of the elections and the standing together. The Commission has pledged to investigate the alleged interference on TikTok in the presidential elections. And actually only this week, also the Internal Market Commission of the European Parliament invited TikTok. for a hearing. Valérie Heia, who's the chair of the Renew Groups of the Liberals in the European Parliament, said Romania is a warning bell. Radicalization and disinformation can happen all over Europe with harmful consequences. And I know that you've been not only feeling those harmful consequences, as you just shared, but also monitoring and documenting some of that. So maybe Vlad, could you talk a little bit about what Mosaic has found looking closer on TikTok, on the content that was shared there. And then maybe both of you could talk a little bit on how are LGBTI people feeling actually, and how is it affecting organizations and people, what is happening right now?
Speaker #2
Yes. So thank you. Our monitoring of TikTok activity shows that there is a continuous disinformation campaign against LGBTI people with... with hundreds, if not thousands of videos that are being shared on all sorts of channels by regular people, by troll farms, by all sorts of bots and so on, all targeting the support that Mrs. Lascone, who is the liberal candidate, has given in the past for LGBTI rights. And basically the message they are sending is that if you vote for Lascone and not for Georgescu, then you are supporting LGBTI rights. And this comes at our expense. We're talking about homophobic songs that are being written and being shared, about all sorts of instances of making viral specific trends and videos. And all our database that we collected shows hundreds of thousands of shares. and millions of views for these videos. So we're not talking about just something singular. We're talking about a strong polarization within society, but also the usage of these social media channels and apps in order to scapegoat LGBTI people. And here it became one of the main topics of the campaign, the topic of LGBTI rights, in which LGBTI people are pictured as... are not national, not Romanian, foreign, perverts, unnatural, and so on. And all of these we have seen in the past. in the referendum of 2018 that would have banned same-sex marriages, which took place and we fought against and we were able to defeat. But the same networks are being used right now and enhanced. And we're talking also about church networks, about conservative voices that still are there and they're doing their work and they're trying to multiply this type of messaging. Of course, one question which is... Extremely important is who is funding this, because Mr. Georgescu has submitted a file to the Electoral Commission saying that his campaign costed zero euros. So he's claiming that his campaign was done with zero money. This is impossible for any political pundit and for anyone. And the question is, who's funding this? What what types of messaging are they using? How are they multiplying and using influencers and so on? And of course, this affects our community in many ways. Our organization has been threatened. Our address has been posted online. We've had to file complaints with the prosecutor's office because of this. Yesterday, someone was taking pictures of our office and we're still trying to figure out what happened. We're trying to increase security. So our organizations are affected. And then the community itself, which sees... All this hatred online, people are disillusioned, people don't know which direction it will take. Many people are talking about leaving Romania and emigrating. And our role, we see our role besides increasing our security in terms of our movement and increasing solidarity amongst different factions of the movement. And our role is also to send the signal that regardless of what happens on Sunday. We are here. We're determined to continue the fight that we have been doing for so many years. And people in the community need to know that there is hope and getting out the vote and going and vote right now on Sunday. It's extremely important that it's essential for the future of our movement and the European trajectory of Romania.
Speaker #0
Yeah, and I think that work on mobilizing people to come out is so important. But also to say like all the... documenting you're doing now will obviously feed into our work with the European Commission and the European Parliament to hold social media platforms accountable for online hate. But Steffi, do you want to add to how are people feeling? How has the climate changed over the last one week and a half?
Speaker #1
I think the morning after the first round of elections, I think everyone was feeling very uncomfortable. You feel anxiousness going on the streets and wondering where we're going. Who are the people around you? Who are your neighbors? How do they feel? And so on. And I think this is exactly the kind of atmosphere that usually becomes even worse when society is polarized in the way in which it has been polarized all throughout Europe and all throughout the Western world. I think a key takeaway is that foreign governments like Russia don't need tanks in order to... penetrate the soul of a society and of a country. They can do that using savvy technical capabilities, using TikTok propaganda, and so on. I think it is for sure what happened in these elections has to be documented, has to be studied by democracies all around the world, because the kind of vulnerability that was illustrated in these elections is a vulnerability which probably exists all around the world, wherever. these social networks exist. That being said, because just to remind everyone, the result of that first round of election has been a surprise to the entire establishment, the entire press. Everyone was shocked, even to the pollsters from the exit polls. So in the night of the election, we were shown one order between the candidates and next morning, it was something completely different. So somehow this evaded, you know, everything and everyone's anticipation. But I think the second point... about the way this propaganda has penetrated our society and the way LGBT rights have been weaponized in order to affect political change, but also the way in which there is a campaign to disinform people about what LGBT rights means. I think our, you know, the entire world of activists has to study this and understand this a bit better. maybe see what we can change in the way we communicate, in the channels through which we communicate, and in the technical resources which we use. Because I think, you know, when all is said and done, yes, the propaganda campaigns are obviously unfair. They are obviously immoral. They are obviously against human rights. They are obviously undemocratic and they, you know, they are against human rights in general. But they have been effective, which means that we have in a way failed to promote our message effectively. This campaign is in. illustrating that something has to change in the way in which LGBT activists operate, because it's clear that something in our message is not cutting through. I don't know if it's because of, I don't know, maybe taking for granted that people should simply accept LGBT rights as human rights. Maybe we have to go back to the drawing board to explain once again why allowing LGBT rights... is a sign that the country is interested in providing human rights to people in general. I think we have to make people be more aware of the fact that the state's treatment of minorities actually illustrates also how the state is going to treat people who don't have economic or don't have or underprivileged people all throughout the country. If people don't care about, if politicians don't care about minorities, then why would they care about people who are suffering for other reasons? Why would they care about people who are economically disenfranchised? Why would they care about people who don't have power? So I think we need to somehow retake control of the message and explain that the fight of LGBT people is actually the same fight that all the people in society has to continue to make in order to continue to live in a society that... protects their human rights.
Speaker #0
I want to thank you both really wholeheartedly to have taken the time in this very busy, very chaotic and very disruptive time in Romania. Thanks a lot for all the work you're doing. We'll all be looking together at the elections on Sunday and see what are next steps, how we at Ilga Europe can support the Romanian community, but also your work. and what needs to be done no matter what the outcomes of the elections will be. Thanks so much for joining us today. You've been listening to The Frontline, ILGA Europe's LGBTI activism podcast. To find out more about our guests, visit the links in our episode description. And please subscribe, like, comment or share wherever you listen to your podcasts. Tune in next time. when we'll be traveling further on the front lines of LGBTI activism in Europe and Central Asia. Bye for now.

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