Bologna, December 24, 2013 – Just four days after its launch, Arcigay's petition for a law against homotransphobia "without any ifs or buts" has already garnered 25,000 signatures. The appeal, supported by the Change.org platform and addressed to senators who will soon debate the Scalfarotto-Verini-Gitti bill in the Senate, calls for a law that "without safe-conducts and watering down, establishes for homophobic and transphobic hate crimes the same provisions it has established for decades for various other crimes." Many of the signatories, from all over Italy, have left messages of support for the petition on the petition's wall, expressing their outrage at a country—Italy—where it is necessary to collect signatures to establish a principle of civility. "The complete absence of institutions," comments Flavio Romani, president of Arcigay, "in the face of the evident barbarization of the social fabric is a fact that greatly concerns the healthy part of our country. Among the signatories are many parents who are mobilizing to improve the future of their children, to whom they know they are handing over a violent and unwelcoming world. For this reason, we ask senators to bring the bill against homotransphobia back to the full extent of the Reale Mancino, so that the law also takes care of those children and stops being a refuge for the worst clerical lobby in the world." The petition is associated with a campaign—"Spegniamo l'odio"—featuring an animation that Arcigay created thanks to funding from the Council of Europe's LGBT Project, as part of the activities envisaged by Recommendation CM/Rec(2010)5 to member states on measures to combat discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity. The animation, created by Latte Creative, collects homophobic expressions and phrases uttered by Italian politicians and public figures and broadcast by mainstream media. Particularly recognizable are the words of Vittorio Sgarbi, Daniela Santanchè, Giancarlo Gentilini, Giancarlo Cerrelli, Pino Scotto, Mariano Apicella, Romano La Russa, Padre Livio (Radio Maria), and Alessandra Mussolini.
TO this link it is possible to sign the petition, here, instead, the video of the campaign “Let's turn off the hatred”.
