Turkey

Turkey is still a comparatively safe place for gay men to live and visit with its very own gay scene. But it has become more conservative in recent years, banning the annual Pride march and regressing into an environment where we have to be cautious in 2026. While same-sex intimacy is legal, police harassment is on the rise, and a state-led divisive narrative - dictated from the top - follows a 'nationalist' and populist agenda. This incrementally separates gay people from what is purported to be a 'traditional' culture. The government's stance has seen an increase in hate crimes from both the authorities and local thugs.

So, how did Turkey become such a mixed bag?

2nd Century: The Imperial Cult of Bolu

Roman Emperor Hadrian marches his imperial entourage through Claudiopolis, a mountain city located in the modern-day Bolu province of Turkey. It is here he encounters Antinous, a stunning young man whose presence captivates the tough military ruler. Hadrian forms a loving relationship with the local youth, elevating him to the rank of permanent imperial companion and traveling alongside him across every province of Asia Minor.

Throughout this imperial tour, Hadrian openly snubs his wife, Empress Sabina, leaving her in the dust while Antinous receives full royal treatment. The Emperor even writes erotic poetry about his male favorites, proudly sharing the verses to the face of his court to flaunt his affection. The romance turns to tragedy in October 130 AD when Antinous drowns under suspicious circumstances in the Nile River - Was a jealous Empress responsible?

Devastated by grief, Hadrian orders the biggest public mourning of antiquity, using his absolute power to declare his Antinous a living god. The Emperor creates a grand religious cult spanning Anatolia, and turns the youth's Turkish birthplace into a sacred center of worship of this new gay god into eternity.

The proud Anatolian population loves the new divinity, rebranding athletic games and minting high-value imperial coins stamped with the face of the emperor's dead lover. This mass-cultural movement leaves behind a pristine trail of classical sculptures and architectural ruins across modern Turkey, cementing Antinous as the most celebrated protagonist of historical same-sex romance that is a deserved source of national celebration.
Historia Augusta Lives of Hadrian

6th Century: The Byzantine Castration Terror

Byzantine Emperor Justinian the first governs Constantinople with an authoritarian grip to enforce religious tyranny across his territories. His extremist religious purge consolidates political power and kills off wealthy rivals, turning conditional but acceptable same-sex intimacy into a death sentence.

To mask a collapsing economy and widespread misery, Justinian deploys an absurd legal scapegoat, explicitly decreeing that same-sex intimacy provokes the wrath of God to cause literal famines, plagues, and earthquakes. His imperial security forces round up wealthy senators, high-ranking nobles, and prominent bishops, including Isaiah, the influential Bishop of Rhodes, and Alexander, the Bishop of Diospolis.

These prominent figures have their assets seized, and are publicly castrated before being paraded in total agony through the city center. The regime weaponizes gay hate and uses public mutilation to both terrify and satiate the blood-lust of the populace and reinforce the crown's absolute domination.

The campaign of terror drives the once fluid sexual dynamics underground across Anatolia. The success of this divide and rule tactic establishes a centuries-long precedent of state-sponsored moral panic to show how ruling regimes paint the canvas of state power with the blood of gay men.
Chronicle of John Malalas

15th Century: The Sultan and the Prince

Sultan Mehmed II, the fierce conqueror of Constantinople, dominates his newly established Ottoman court. Following his military expansion along the Danube, Mehmed encounters Prince Radu of Wallachia, the younger brother of Vlad the Impaler. Captivated by Radu's legendary charm and elegant composure, the Sultan forms an aggressive, sexual obsession with the aristocratic captive.

The palace dynamic reaches a sensational, near-fatal climax inside the royal court chambers when Mehmed demands complete sexual submission. Radu, a fiercely independent and proud young man, refuses to act as a passive captive, draws a hidden dagger, slashing the Sultan's thigh before fleeing into the palace gardens. Instead of ordering execution, Mehmed reconciles with Radu and moves him into a lavishly furnished palace suite...

The royal scandal becomes prime-time gossip for contemporary Byzantine and European chroniclers, who record the affair in graphic detail to shock foreign courts. Radu remains at the Sultan's side for years to come while his brother returns home. Later, Mehmed deploys the imperial army to install his favorite as the ruler of Wallachia and defeat his brother.

"The king [Sultan] had a [young man] from Wallachia, whom he kept at his court with him, the brother of Dracula... Since he happened to be very beautiful, he completely won the king over."
Laonikos Chalkokondyles Histories

1858: The Imperial Tanzimat Edict

Sultan Abdülmecid I initiates the historic Tanzimat reforms to reframe the legal and administrative foundations of the faltering Ottoman Empire. Guided by a pragmatic desire to align imperial governance with progressive European penal frameworks, the Sultan commands his grand viziers to strip away archaic religious legal codes.

This monumental legislative restructuring reaches its peak with the formal ratification of the Imperial Ottoman Penal Code of 1858. Moving entirely away from corporal and religious punishments, the new federal statutes completely eliminate all anti-sodomy laws, decriminalizing consensual same-sex adult intimacy across all Ottoman lands, including modern-day Turkey. This landmark legal victory occurs more than a century before major Western powers like the UK, Germany, or the United States liberate gay men.

The legal overhaul creates a level of state protection for local men that shields them from judicial prosecution for the remainder of the empire's history and establishes modern Turkey’s unique legislative foundation. Same-sex intimacy remains legal decades before the modern republic is born.
Ottoman Penal Code of 1858

Opinion

The current Ankara regime frames same-sex attraction as a degenerate and immoral Western import in a spectacular display of state hypocrisy. The truth is that Turkey decriminalized gay sex in 1858 while the British had the death sentence for the exact same thing. The modern hostility on the streets of Istanbul isn't an ancient Turkish tradition, it's European. It's the exact same playbook used by the Roman Emperor Justinian to divide and rule and distract the public from economic decay. Only insecure leaders need division.