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Opinion: What’s Happening in Italy is Dangerous [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2023-10-22  

Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni was widely seen as a great threat to democracy in Italy when she was first elected, given her party’s links to neofascists and her authoritarian populist rhetoric.

It was a pleasant surprise to learn of Meloni’s support for Ukraine and her willingness to be a Western partner; however, that should not take away from what is occurring domestically in Italy.

Meloni’s administration has spent its first months in office accusing minorities of undermining god, the nation, and family, which has had real consequences for migrants, nongovernmental organizations, and same-sex parents.

Meloni has also made efforts to weaken anti-torture legislation and has filled the public broadcaster media with loyalists.

She has attempted to rewrite Italy’s postwar constitution to increase executive power, which is troubling.

She has moderated the way she speaks since becoming Prime Minister. In official settings, she appears considered and cautious.

Oddly, she has televised addresses rather than taking questions from journalists.

She is able to rely on colleagues in her Brothers of Italy party to be more open about their feelings.

L.G.B.T.Q. parents have been one of Meloni’s main targets, party leaders have even called surrogate parenting a “crime worse than pedophilia,” and that gay people are “passing off” foreign kids as their own.

Meloni pretends that she is against such extremism; yet the government extended a ban on surrogacy to criminalize adoptions in other countries and ordered municipalities to stop registering same-sex parents altogether, which leaves children in legal limbo.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/10/22/2200947/-Opinion-What-s-Happening-in-Italy-is-Dangerous?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=more_community&pm_medium=web

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