EXPELLED FROM TV SHOW AFTER COMING OUT
A man has been thrown out of a Georgian reality television series by the producers after he came out of the closet in the programme.
Twenty-year-old Pako Tabatadze was, along with eleven other young people, one of the contestants in the reality show GeoBar.
The programme is centred on a group of people who work in a bar and live together in a house with the aim of winning a prize of around R160 000. The public can vote telephonically to evict the participants.
During the first episode, Tabatadze revealed on air that he is gay – prompting his removal from the project by the show’s producers.
Koba Davarashvili, general director of Rustavi 2 TV, which broadcasts the series, justified the expulsion by saying that “GeoBar is a project which first and foremost should show young people’s relationships and their drive for victory from a positive angle.”
It is believed that Tabatadze is the first person to ever come out on Georgian television.
Although homosexuality is legal in the European country, the largely Orthodox Christian Georgia is considered to be religiously conservative.
Disgusted. I think this is story is disgusting..that in this day and age of enlightenment people and structures should take it upon themselves to think and react on others behalve…its sick..talkiong of about positive angle this was indeed the time to make that positive decision…what a waste…