Allies talk: Hovhannes Madoyan, doctor, lawyer

I would like to be introduced in the following way – Hovhannes, just a happy person. One of the conditions of my happiness is that I am not homophobic.

Recently, I have developed an approach for myself. That is the concept of happiness – that everyone; all of the people want to be happy. My happiness sometimes fades with the fact that I see the ones beside me are not happy.

We have people in our society, no matter how small the percentage is, who we do not allow to be happy. We say, let them have their orientation, but let my eyes not see it. But why shall we not see? If a heterosexual couple can meet, go to a café, give flowers, kiss each other, grab hands, that is, show affection, then why can’t the gay couple show the same? That is also one of the components for a couple to be happy.

I have three children: until then they told me, are you gay, too? After the first child was born, that question vanished. Our society has several “royal” questions. The first question is what if your child sees a gay couple kissing, how are you going to explain that?

I try to explain everything regarding sexual life to my kids from the perspective of love. That is, people love each other; love is independent of people’s choices. People love each other, they kiss.

And the second question – would you want your son to be gay? It is meaningless to explain to these people that sexual orientation is not dependent on what one wants. It is pointless because it the meaning behind their question is to assess your attitude. That’s why I say that it doesn’t matter to me. I wouldn’t want, because in this society my child would be persecuted if his/her sexual orientation differs, but that is the only reason.

This material was made possible through the support from the “Allies in Action” program by COC Netherlands and ILGA-Europe.