The mayor of Bologna dismisses Bindi

For him it should not be resubmitted because it is anti-inflamatory.
Arcigay, with its national headquarters in Bologna, was one of the Democratic Party's biggest supporters and Mayor Virginio Merola's. Merola, after his election, repaid the party's support for organizing a Gay Pride parade in the Emilian city and for including pro-gay couples associations in the local Family Council. This decision infuriated the Curia and prompted the resignations of Catholic organizations, so much so that the Council is effectively blocked. Merola is therefore furious about what happened at the Democratic Party assembly and has now raised the stakes on the issue of party renewal. Among those expected to step aside is obviously Rosy Bindi, at the center of the anti-employment affair. At a delicate time, given the economic crisis and Prime Minister Mario Monti's measures to digest, and with elections looming, the upheaval Bindi has wreaked on the Democratic Party seems almost surreal. With Arcigay announcing its boycott of the upcoming National Unity Festival, mayors and leaders are lining up in favor of regulating all types of couples, opposing the more intransigent Catholic members of the Democratic Party (PD) who are fighting back and supporting the parliamentarian. Sergio Lo Giudice, Democratic Party group leader in the Bologna city council and for years president of Arcigay, says: "Closing the issue on gays like Pier Luigi Bersani and Bindi did is a mistake that will be paid for. Matteo Renzi is ahead on this issue." Bindi risks costing Bersani votes in the primaries (if they are held). This is also because Pippo Civati and Ignazio Marino are on the same page as Lo Giudice. Enrico Fusco, a leader of the Puglia Democratic Party and an Arcigay card-carrying member, sums it up: "The text approved in the PD assembly is archaic, disrespectful, and offensive to human dignity. We're back to the 'dico' [the Italian term for gays], which says nothing. In short: that document is a joke." Meanwhile, Andrea Benedino, the longtime DS civil rights official, has returned his Democratic Party membership card. It won't be easy for Bersani to douse the flames. The fuse was the decision by the president of the Democratic Party assembly, Bindi, not to vote on a document from the Democratic Party committee for rights regarding same-sex marriage. Adding fuel to the wound was Beppe Grillo, who wrote on his blog: "At the assembly of the PDminusL, the party that would like to govern Italy (please don't laugh), the main discussion was about something that should be obvious and undisputed: gay marriage and the rights of same-sex couples. I am in favor of same-sex marriage; everyone should be able to love who they believe in and live their life with him or her, protected by the law." Basically, the problem would be that Bindi doesn't know anything about sex. At Arcigay they remember that Grillo, at the end of a rally in Bologna last year, addressed Nichi Vendola, who was supposed to go on stage shortly thereafter for a Sel demonstration, with these words: "At salut, buson", which translated means: "I salute you, big-ass". Therefore, Grillo's current support (aside from the seriousness of the concept expressed on Bindi) is taken with a pinch of salt and Paola Concia, a Democratic Party MP who is openly homosexual and the first signatory of the unvoted document that sparked the uproar says: "Dear Grillo, but also Antonio Di Pietro, I would ask you not to exploit the albeit tiring but sacrosanct debate within the Democratic Party, which remains the only party that talks about it internally". But the Turin Arcigay calls Rosy Bindi a "Taliban" and asks the regional Democratic Party board to take sides: "because our rights," a note reads, "are not a sacrificial offering to be burned on the altar of an alliance with the UDC." And from Bologna (he is a regional councilor for the Italian People's Republic of Venice), Franco Grillini, founder of Arcigay, takes a swipe at the party that should be his ally: "The GMO Democratic Party has failed. It's impossible to bring together fundamentalist Catholics and Social Democrats. Observant, Vatican-affirming Catholics have an ironclad rule: certain matters cannot be mediated. And the issue of equal rights between gay and straight couples is one of them." While one of the nouvelle vague Arcigay members, Bruno Pompa, states: "When certain issues are defined as 'internal squabbles' or a person like Rosy Bindi states that 'rather than entrust a child to a gay couple, I'd rather have him starve in Africa,' we feel like we're being mocked." The possibility of an internal referendum is gaining traction, self-managed but with the approval of a Democratic Party icon, Renato Zangheri, the legendary mayor of Bologna. It was June 28, 1980, when the then Communist mayor Zangheri met, the first in Italy, with a gay delegation and assigned them a municipal space despite fierce opposition from the Curia. The referendum should definitively establish the Democratic Party's position on the issue, bypassing the statutory bodies that, according to Cesena MP Sandro Gozi, aren't working: "There's a clear problem with the functioning of the Democratic Party's governing bodies due to a unanimistic logic that systematically prevents real debate within the party. This is anything but democracy. We saw it on civil rights, we saw it in the primaries, which were viewed with annoyance by the 'longtime' leaders, as a concession to one individual and not as a great opportunity for debate and mobilization for millions of people." A tense atmosphere within the Democratic Party. Another front is opening in a town it administers, Castel San Pietro, just outside Bologna. The new cemetery regulations stipulate that bodies can be buried nearby only if they were married or related up to the second degree. Even in the cemetery managed by the Democratic Party, there is no option for unmarried couples.