Italy: Former Prime Minister Berlusconi Claims To Support Gay Marriage

Gay Star News reports:

The former prime minister says he’s in favor of same-sex marriage and he will introduce it if he wins the next general election, but gay groups doubt his words will be followed by action
‘Action, not words’ demand Italian LGBT groups of former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi after he promised same-sex marriage if he wins the country’s next general election.
Last Monday Berlusconi said:
‘I’m in favor of granting legal status to couples who live together, including gays, if there is a majority that makes it possible to change the civil code’.
But Italy’s gay groups are expressing concern and ‘disillusion’.
Fabrizio Marrazzo, Gay Center’s leader, said: ‘The three governments Berlusconi led between 1994 and 2011 did nothing for LGBT people. Concrete proposals are certainly necessary.’
Leading LGBT association Arcigay’s president Flavio Romani said: ‘I have legitimate suspicions about such a sudden change of course. Berlusconi should put his pledge in black and white.’
Enrico Oliari, president of a right-wing LGBT association, welcomed Berlusconi’s remarks: ‘Berlusconi’s opening-up over the recognition of gay couples is a piece of news you cannot fail to take account of.’
Berlusconi, who is facing a trial in Milan for allegedly having had sex with an underage prostitute, said in 2010: ‘It’s better to like pretty women than being gay.’

According to BBC News, Berlusconi won’t be a candidate for MP in next month’s election.

Italy: Sicily Elects Gay Governor Rosario Crocetta

Gay Star News reports:

Rosario Crocetta, an openly gay politician from the Italian Partito Democratico party, has become the first openly gay governor of Sicily.
He won last Sunday’s election on the Italian island with more than 30% of the votes, winning over the right-wing PDL (Popolo delle Libertà), which has governed in Sicily for last decade.
Crocetta is Italy’s second openly gay governor, after Puglia’s Nichi Vendola, who now is running for the leadership of the entire left parties.
Once in power, Crocetta may not be able to do much for LGBT rights however. He won the election leading a coalition with the Union of Christian Democrats, a centrist party very close to the Catholic Church.
And during the electoral campaign, Crocetta reassured his allies, saying: ‘In case of victory, I will say goodbye to sex and sexuality, I’ll be married only to Sicily and to Sicilians’.
According to the new governor, ‘chastity is the best way of life for a politician. When you are dealing with such a responsibility, you have to be quiet and considerate’.
In 2003, when Crocetta was running for the role of mayor in Gela, Sicily, he was ‘victim’ of an outing by his right-wing competitor. But, he went on to win the election and became the first openly gay mayor in Italy.
During the Seventies, Crocetta was a member of the Italian Communist Party (PCI). He said of that time ‘the Communists were homophobic’ and added that his current party Partito Democratico didn’t want him to represent them in 2003 because he is gay. 

According to The Guardian, Crocetta has shrugged off three mafia plots to have him killed:

A gay man who shrugged off three mafia plots to kill him is poised to become Sicily’s first homosexual governor in elections that show the centre left advancing at the expense of Silvio Berlusconi’s right-wing party.
Representing a coalition of Italy’s centre-left Democratic Party and the Catholic UDC party, Rosario Crocetta is leading against the Berlusconi candidate and a contender representing the maverick movement of comedian Beppe Grillo, who trails in third place.
Crocetta, a devoted Catholic, has long claimed that southern Italy is surprisingly relaxed about gay politicians, once stating, “There is a great respect for the individual, making it less homophobic than the north.”
In August he told an interviewer, “After leaving prison in England, Oscar Wilde took refuge in Palermo. Seen like this, there is lot people have to learn about the south.”
As mayor of Gela, Crocetta persuaded local businesses not to pay protection money to the mafia and claimed that coming out gave him a sense of liberation that allowed him to understand how suffocated Sicily had become under the mafia’s yoke.
One mob boss who hired a Lithuanian assassin for a failed bid to kill Crocetta was less than tolerant of his sexuality than voters, describing him in a wiretapped call as “this queer communist”.
A local magistrate said at the time: “The clans may ridicule Crocetta’s sexuality, but it’s the backing he gave businesses that refuse to pay thepizzo [protection payment] that really drove them mad.”
Crocetta has suggested that a surprising number of members of Cosa Nostra are themselves gay, claiming, “The idea that the mafia is all church, home and shotguns makes me laugh.”
Palermo magistrate Antonio Ingroia has said he believes there are a number of gay bosses, adding “It remains a taboo since they are scared of being ejected from the mob.”

Italy: Democrat Party Leader, Pier Luigi Bersani, Shows Support Of Recognizing Marriage Equality

Universo Gay reports:

The Italian politician Pier Luigi Bersani, secretary general of the Democratic Party of Italy, is in favour of marriage between same sex after the country’s European LGBT organizations have pressed in recent days in favour of equal marriage law .

The secretary general of the political formation of center-left has made visible the need to allow gay couples to marry to demand the debate on the issue from a party that won in elections last year 2008 a total of 11 million votes, 33.7% of the total, so the importance of political education in a future law of equal marriage is essential.

“We have to move. Stable unions between homosexuals should find an answer. We have to give a solution to this issue,” said Luigi Bersani on marriage between same sex.

Since the Italian organization for sexual minorities Arcigay recalled the general secretary of the Democratic Party that “we must not only progress on this issue, but finding a permanent solution, looking directly at the experience of most civilized countries.”

“These countries have adopted gay marriage as a form of recognition of same-sex couples and families, ensuring equality. Any solution to the floor only revealing a shameful treatment of homosexuals and heterosexuals, being unacceptable,” have expressed from Arcigay.

Italian Footballer Claudio Marchisio Backs Equal Marriage

Pink News UK reports: 

Claudio Marchisio, a midfielder on Italy’s national squad has spoken out in favour of equal marriage rights for gay couples, a week after a team-mate said he hoped there were no gays on their team.

Antonio Cassano, Marchisio’s team-mate on the squad, which is due to meet Ireland at the Euro 2012 championship this evening, had said last week he hoped there were no “queers” on the team.

But 26-year-old Juventas mid-fielder Marchisio told Italian Vogue that Cassano is a “good person”, and said he is himself in favour of equal marriage rights for gay couples.

He told the magazine: “Personally, I agree with marriage between persons of the same sex.

“But in our particular environment, in fact, the topic is a bit rigid. If someone comes out at their workplace, fortunately it is no longer a sensation.

“Doing so at a football training camp, however, one cannot imagine the same scene. It is not fair.

“In terms of adopting children, I find that instinctively the more traditional figures are those of a man and woman. I tend to think that children need balance, but it’s a complicated issue.

“It cannot be argued that a heterosexual couple can necessarily be able to provide more love to a child.”

Of his teammate he said: “Sometimes he does naive things. And one almost has the impression that he does not really want to become an adult.

“But no one ever writes that, above all else, he is truly a good person. But we know it.”

Photo Of The Week: Benito Villella 

Song Of The Day: Il Volo’s Gianlua Ginoble & Giuliana Danze - Vivo Per Lei

Italy: Transgender Woman Survives Valentine’s Bashing

The Advocate reports:

A 22-year-old transgender woman is in critical condition after being brutally beaten in Catania, Italy outside of a pub on Valentine’s Day. 

Michelle Santamaria was attacked by about a dozen young people while she was dancing, according to a translated article in La Sicilia. Santamaria, from Licata, said no one in the pub came to her defense, including the pub’s owner. Eventually, she escaped her attackers, but she was chased out of the establishment by people armed with knives. She eventually reached a police station, where she filed a complaint. Santamaria was then rushed to a nearby emergency room, where doctors diagnosed her with a fractured thoracic vertebrae, a head injury, and other injuries.

Italy: Government Plans To Tax Vatican’s Commercial Properties 

Italy: ARCIGAY - Ti Sposerò

Oh, Italians… I’ve gotten in some deep water for a couple of them in the past, but aren’t they just adorable? 

A dream for Marriage Equality in the most Catholic country in the world. Is it possible? Portugal, Spain & Argentina have it, so although it won’t be easy, at least to have in in the public’s consciousness will do the job to get it eventually. 

Benetton’s UnHate Campaign Clip

City Of The Week: Naples, Italy 

Song Of The Day: Laura Pausini - Strani Amori

Italy: Lesbian Couple Rejected As Blood Donors

The Advocate reports:

A hospital in Rome has been accused of turning away a lesbian blood donor.

The woman, 39, who’s being referred to in the media as “Angela,” says an official at Policlinico Umberto I hospital turned her away, saying she was “considered at risk,” even though she told the official she had been in a monogamous relationship for more than the 120 days required.

According toWorldcrunch, this is “the third such case in recent years” in which a health official has rejected a potential donor because of the so-called health “risks” of being gay.

The director of the blood transfusion center at Umberto I says there is no law against gay people donating blood. “In general, ‘at risk’ people cannot do it,” she said. “It’s up to the examining doctor to determine the risk on the base of the information provided.”

Read the full story here.

Folkloric Music Of The Week: Il Volo - Il Mondo