I never understood LGBTQ people who identify as Leninists or ML given these regimes heavily persecuted LGBTQ people and continue to persecute them to this day (China for example)

You can check out the new Cuba family code. It was heavily discussed and amended at the lower councils and then passed through to the national level. Also, Fidel did have some conservative beliefs regarding gay people in the past, but he later took back what he said and supported LGBTQ+. The DDR was also wildly progressive on the gender, sexuality, and feminist front. I have heard that the DPRK is slightly culturally conservative in the aspect that public displays of affection are generally frowned upon, but LGBTQ+ are not persecuted, but neither outright celebrated. Similar position to China and Vietnam.

The takeaway for LGBTQ+ rights is not corporate sponsors, pride parades, and consumption – but if they are free to be themselves. Are they committing sewerslide in droves? Being targeted by death squads? In many parts of the West, many of their rights are being rolled back or threatened, especially in Amerika. Not all AES support for LGBTQ+ community is perfect, but that would be due to the limiting factor of traditional, conservative views held by the majority population – not socialism.

I’m aware of Cuba’s recent laws regarding LGBTQ rights. Cuba for decades sent homosexuals and trans people into internment camps because they were “deviants” and only recently has enacted LGBTQ rights because it’s been forced to open up to the rest of the world after the fall of the Soviet Union. Also it’s just one example, whereas the largest ML country, China, heavily represses anyone who is not heteronormative. So does North Korea. So did the Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc. It was in liberal democracies where LGBTQ people first gained rights and have the strongest rights.

https://www.guancha.cn/politics/2019_08_21_514563.shtml

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-lgbt-un/china-urged-to-take-action-on-lgbt-rights-after-backing-u-n-changes-idUSKCN1QO1MU

https://baike.baidu.com/item/%E6%80%A7%E5%B0%91%E6%95%B0%E7%BE%A4%E4%BD%93/19500488

https://issuu.com/undp-china/docs/undp-ch-legal_gender_recognition_-_

Homosexuality in China and Does China Ban the LGBT movement?

China has trans healthcare. You can find LGBTQ stuff on Bilibili or Baidu. China has a three-no policy. No approval. No disapproval. No promotion. As for you – no investigation, no right to speak.

As for Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc goes…

Article 121 (the “anti-gay law” passed by the head soviet) was designed as an anti-pederasty law. If you look at the law text,it mentions or at least implies pedophilia.

To quote The Sangha kommune:

“Article 121, despite its curious reading, appears to have been designed to protect Soviet society from the menace of child abuse and paedophilia, although it is recorded that Soviet academia was interested in the practice of homosexuality from a medical perspective, and attempting to ascertain its root cause (with a number of early Soviet researchers following the Czarist assumption of aberration). This did not mean that homosexuals were persecuted – far from it – the general underlying trend in the USSR was to end all oppression, and facilitate the integration of the individual into the collective.”

https://thesanghakommune.org/2016/12/28/the-ussr-and-homosexuality-article-21/ There’s no objective, verifiable evidence of a persecution of homosexuals in the USSR

To quote Sangha Kommune again:

Research By Adrian Chan-Wyles PhD

"The fact that the Soviet Union was considered enlightened and tolerant demonstrates that these laws were not applied as a deliberate attack upon homosexuals – although in the 1930’s, certain homosexual activity became associated with specific counter-revolutionary activity. In this regard, homosexuals who strove to bring-down the USSR were treated as ‘criminals’ – just as their heterosexual colleagues. Soviet records demonstrate that Joseph Stalin… was responding to various police reports about contemporary counter-revolutionary activities (usually within major cities). "

"Modern (capitalist) Russia has now imported much of the anti-Soviet Cold War disinformation fabricated by the US (and her allies) between 1945 – 1991. As a result, many modern Russian authors side with the reactionary forces of capitalism and adopt this pseudo-history as their own (apparently not realising its ‘racist’ anti-Slavic nature). The above article is anti-Soviet and is designed to give the impression that the USSR carried-out a continued pogrom against homosexuals – even though its author continuously states that there is no evidence to support his claims. Indeed, the only evidence the author can muster is ‘Western’ Cold War authors whose work – as pieces of official fiction – contain no Russian language sources. However, I have quoted this piece where I have been able to verify the facts within Russian language sources. It remains informative on two counts, 1) as a narrative history of homosexuality in Russia from early times to present, and 2) as a study of modern (Russian) anti-Soviet literature. I have found no objective, verifiable evidence of a deliberate persecution of homosexuals in the USSR. "

https://thesanghakommune.org/2017/01/05/the-ussr-and-homosexuality-part-iii-rsfsr-article-154a/

LGBTQ+ being put into camps in Cuba is also straight-up an anti-communist myth.

To say that “It was in liberal democracies where LGBTQ people first gained rights and have the strongest rights.” is ridiculous. AES countries had LGBTQ+ rights first and continued progressing, The DDR was fairly progressive in the 1980s and continued to progress – similar to the USSR and Eastern Bloc, however, I discussed the famous article 121 above how ""homosexuality was recriminalized. Meanwhile, during the Red Scare in Amerika, gays were specifically investigated because they were seen as more likely to be communists. In many parts of the West, it took until the late 20th and early 21st centuries for the advancement of rights for the LGBTQ+ community.

人大常委会法工委:绝大多数国家都不承认同性婚姻

economist.com/…/why-the-communist-party-fears-gay…

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_history_in_Russia#Sovi…

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_rights_in_Cuba#Homopho…

So no, reality doesn’t conform to what you’re saying.

DDR was fairly progressive in the 1980s

It was less progressive than West Germany/West Berlin, and only began tolerating LGBTQ people (not granting them equal rights) after opening up more to the West near the end of its existence.

en.wikipedia.org/…/LGBT_rights_in_the_German_Demo…

Why the Communist Party fears gay rights

Social conservatism plus paranoia about foreign infiltration prompts a crackdown

The Economist