The Metropolitan Opera will open its season tonight with a performance of Tchaikowsky’s Eugene Onegin. The opera has been attracting protests, in part because its Russian conductor and lead soprano are supporters of Vladimir Putin, who has recently passed anti-gay laws that include a ban on all gay “propaganda.” Putin has also banned adoptions by gay couples.

The Met has refused to dedicate opening night to Russia’s gay residents as called for in this petition, which now has more than 9,000 signatures. The petition says:

“Peter Illyich Tchaikowsky is the beloved composer most widely known to have been homosexual and to have suffered for it in his lifetime. For America’s leading opera house to open its season with one of his works, performed by a conductor and a leading soprano who support Putin’s recent laws against homosexual people and those who support them dishonors the work of a great artist and his legacy as well as the progress made in our own country to secure equality for all citizens.”

Met General Manager Peter Gelb explained the decision in a Bloomberg column:

“While I’m confident that many members of our company join me in personally deploring the tyranny of Russia’s new anti-gay laws, we’re also opposed to the laws of the 76 countries that go even further than Russia in the outright criminalization of homosexuality.

We stand against the significant human rights abuses that take place every day in many countries. But as an arts institution, the Met is not the appropriate vehicle for waging nightly battles against the social injustices of the world.”

Some groups have called for opera-goers to at least wear rainbow pins to express support for the gay community. And there may be people picketing outside the opera. The opera will be broadcast on a screen in the plaza outside and in Times Square.