Hate crimes on the rise, lack of protective legislation

Street insults, online grooming and physical violence. Or health and workplace discrimination, threats and vandalism on association premises. These are just some of the hate crimes committed against LGBT+ people in Italy. In the last 12 months alone, according to the annual report published by Arcigay for the World Day Against Homotransfobia (17 May), 149 cases have been recorded (compared to 133 in 2023).

Their number is growing year by year, as is their intensity. Most incidents, however, are not reported and, even when this happens, it is difficult to protect the victims. In fact, Italy lacks a specific law to prosecute acts of homotransphobia and knowledge of the phenomenon is still limited.

Two and a half years after the rejection of the so-called 'Zan bill', which envisaged an amendment to Article 604-bis of the Penal Code and the extension of the Mancino law (decree-law no. 122 of 26 April 1993) also to discriminatory acts based 'on sex, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity and disability', our country still does not have a law on the subject. Yet, similar laws have been in force for years in no less than eleven European Union countries, and if we look at the Council of Europe, the number rises to 20. In some states, such as Norway and Sweden, such laws have existed since the 1980s.

In Italy, on the other hand, progress is slow: a positive signal seemed to have arrived on 7 May, with the government's adhesion to the declaration against Homophobia, Transphobia, Biphobia of the EU External Action Service and the 27.

'Italy remains the last major western country not to have a law against hate crimes on the basis of the sexual orientation, gender, gender identity or disability of the victims,' says Hon. Alessandro Zan, who resubmitted the bill in October 2022 (C 401), which was then assigned to the Justice Commission, and concludes: 'It is a delay that has been going on for decades, which weighs on the living flesh of people, now aggravated by hateful words that often come from the institutions and by the Meloni government's veritable crusade against Lgbtq+ citizenship'.