“I don’t want this in ten years, I want it now…”,-Paata Sabelashvili about civil partnership

I am Paata Sabelashvili, a human rights activist.

I started LGBT rights movement in Georgia. I am attracted to people of my own gender and since I started adult life, I’ve been fighting against injustice. When you grow up this society and learn that you like boys, at first it feels like you’re betraying your homeland, doing an awful thing, but on the inside you know, that the feeling, the drive that you have cannot be filthy, it can’t be as bad as they say and it’s a big struggle within your mind. When your country restricts you to something that is given to other citizens, it makes you feel dissatisfied, you don’t feel like you’re a part of that family and it’s bitter because you do want to be a part of the family the way you are but this family wants you to be something else. It doesn’t work like that. This is why we have to choose between living the only life that was given to us somewhere else or try to use our potential for our country.

Just like how this society overcame seeing social ranks, races and other differences as barriers against relationships between two people, Georgian society must develop higher and overcome this current barrier as well.

I remember one time when I got an offer. I had been in a monogamous relationship with a guy for five years and I was offered to move to one of the EU countries and same-sex partnerships are not recognized there either. I had to say no, I stayed with that person for two more years but the dilemma that the country puts me in, is unfair. I have to either give up an opportunity for personal development to be with a person, or I have to give up that person. The reason why the current situation is discriminatory is that if two people, based on mutual consent, have the right to start some sort of relationship that is recognized by the country, then two other mature people, who can give informed consent, should also be able to do the same. Otherwise this practice is discriminatory, heterosexual registered couples should give up the privileges that they are granted after marriage because otherwise I won’t feel that I am from this country, otherwise I won’t have the motivation to work for this country, to create, to build for this country, because I will know that anything that my partner and I create together, won’t be recognized, won’t be appreciated or accepted.

I don’t want this in 10 years, I want it now. It’s possible.