Putin: Gay people will be safe at Olympics if they "leave kids alone" "One can feel calm and at ease," he said. Just leave kids alone, please. That phrasing - with its intimation that gays might prey on children - hardly seems the kind of guarantee sought by the United States and other Western governments and human rights activists. Gay rights have become a contentious issue at the Olympics, which begin Feb. 7, because Russia passed a law last year prohibiting the "propaganda of nontraditional sexual practices" among minors. The law has been used to ban gay rights parades - children might see them - and to curb discussion of gay issues on television and in newspapers for fear that those under 18 might hear or read about homosexuality. Teachers ignore the subject, isolating gay teenagers. Some homophobes have interpreted the law as encouragement to beat up on gays. The law has provoked deep concern in the United States and other Western countries, where it is seen as an infringement on human rights. European leaders have decided to stay away from the games, and President Obama sent a protest message by choosing a delegation to represent him that includes Billie Jean King, a well-known gay athlete. In speaking to a room full of volunteers dressed in their Sochi warm-up gear, Putin attempted to put Russia on higher moral ground than other countries. Homosexuality is not a crime in Russia, as it was in the Soviet Union. Homosexuality was legalized in 1993. Police, he said, do not pluck gays off the street. In the United States, he asserted, some states impose criminal penalties for homosexual relations. Not Russia, he said. In 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court declared that laws prohibiting gay sex were unconstitutional. "We have no ban on the nontraditional forms of sexual intercourse among people," Putin said in remarks carried by the Interfax news service. We have the ban on the propaganda of homosexuality and pedophilia. I want to stress this: propaganda among minors. These are two absolutely different things: a ban on certain relations or the propaganda of such relations. Putin asserted that the idea of legalizing pedophilia has been discussed in some countries. "There is nothing secret about it, look it up on the Internet and you'll find it straightaway," he said. Parties have raised the issue with certain parliaments. So what, are we supposed to shuffle behind them like obedient dogs toward unknown consequences? We have our own traditions, our own culture, we treat all our partners with respect and ask for our traditions and our culture to be treated with respect as well. One more question: Why, a volunteer asked, do Russia's Olympic uniforms contain the colors of the rainbow, the rainbow being a symbol of gay rights? Don't ask him, the president said. I didn't design the uniform.