The Juvenile Court of Catanzaro, in a ruling dated May 27, 2008, recently published, denied a father joint custody of his son, because he was deemed immature and imbued with discriminatory and strongly prejudiced feelings towards homosexuals.
The sentence reads:
""As for the second category of banned individuals ("homosexuals"), the statement cannot but raise serious concerns as it carries with it a strong discriminatory and offensive connotation (as in the association: "drug addicts and homosexuals"). This is certainly a conduct that should be foreign to the parent, who must educate the child towards tolerance, the culture of diversity and aversion to any form of racial hatred, a reason for censure not only in civil but also criminal courts. Just recently, moreover, the case law of merit, faced with such attitudes on the part of one of the parents, has "rejected" joint custody. The Court of Naples, in a ruling dated 28 June 2006, in particular confirmed the exclusive custody of a minor to the wife, in the face of the radical and unjustified denial of the latter's parental suitability by the husband, who had unfoundedly accused her of having had homosexual relations, with A highly uneducational attitude toward the minor. It is indeed surprising that the social services report did not take into account the various indicators reported thus far, in addition to the established historical facts, thus proving to be a document from which we must distance ourselves.
The Catanzaro ruling is part of an Italian jurisprudential doctrine that is literally doing justice to the dignity of homosexual persons.
Declaring that it is detrimental to children for parents to instill negative values such as homophobia and discrimination is yet another substitute for the politics that are completely absent in this country.
Therefore, the ruling impacts formidably on three levels: the breaking away from unacceptable equations between homosexuality, reconstructed as absolutely normal, and otherwise irregular behaviors (drug addiction); the role of the family in its commitment to children, to an education based on the affirmation of their dignity and sexual orientation; and the role of social services in ensuring, in different social contexts, respect for the fulfillment of individuals' identities, a role which, in this specific case, as the ruling emphasizes, is lacking due to the inadequacy of the social services involved.
Aurelio Mancuso
National President of Arcigay