International Day: Extremadura reaffirms its commitment against LGTBIphobia

Extremadura has reaffirmed this Tuesday its commitment against LGTBIphobia and has stressed the importance of education to prevent and combat hate crimes based on sexual orientation and gender identity, which are on the rise.

The Assembly of Extremadura has celebrated the institutional act of the International Day against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia, in which the Minister of Equality, Isabel Gil Rosiña, has participated; the president of the legislative chamber, Blanca Martín; the presidents of Fundación Triángulo y Extremadura Entiende, Silvia Tostado and Pilar Milanés, and the prosecutor against hate crimes and discrimination of Cáceres, María del Carmen Barquilla.

The event began with the screening of the short film ‘Elsa’, by director Albert Carbó, which is inspired by a trans minor from Extremadura and helps make transsexual childhood visible, and concluded with a piano performance of the song ‘Over the rainbow ‘ by pianist Paloma Sánchez Rodríguez and soprano Gloria Jaramillo.

The Minister of Equality, Isabel Gil Rosiña, has remarked that this celebration of the International Day against LGTBIphobia takes on special significance in the face of “moments of setback” that materialize in the increase in hate crimes and aggressions towards the group.

Complaints of hate crimes

Thus, he explained that in the past year 2021 there have been 477 complaints of hate crimes and motivated by sexual orientation or sexual identity in Spain, a reality that should not be alien to governments and institutions.

In this sense, the step taken with the start-up of the offices of psychological and legal attention to victims of LGTBIphobia in Extremadura and that provides attention that was included in the Extremadura LGTBI law was highlighted.

Gil Rosiña has defined the law of social equality for lesbians, gays, bisexuals, transsexuals, transgender and intersexuals and of public policies against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity in Extremadura as an essential step although it does not change the way of feeling or think of the company “from one day to the next” after its publication in the BOE or DOE.

For this reason, he insisted on the need to continue working on said regulation and its development, especially with regard to the education of tomorrow’s citizens, at which point he recalled that not all parliaments in Spain can hold a act like the one that has been developed in Extremadura.

“The commitment of this parliament and the regional government, together with LGTBI organizations, is a palpable and demonstrable reality. Let’s continue making it possible with everyone’s effort, let’s continue making it possible so that in the following years we can all be here together again », he has sentenced.

Triangle Foundation

The presidents of the Fundación Triángulo and Extremadura Entiende, Silvia Tostado and Pilar Milanés, have agreed that the International Day Against LGTBIphobia commemorates the anniversary of the depathologization of homosexuality by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 1990.

Thus, Tostado recalled that it took a long time to get to this point and recalled that there are still countries where homosexuality is persecuted, at which point he stressed that breaking the rules established by the “cisheteropatriarchy” regarding sexual orientation and gender identity or expression involves “risks that can cost your life.”

In this sense, it has been asked if every time figures of victims or violence suffered are reported to public opinion, the citizens who listen are capable of interpreting the “seriousness” of the numbers, since behind them “there are lives and rights trampled on.”

«Behind all this there is injustice that has to be answered from all spaces. This is our day to day life, but so is our struggle and our ability to say loud and clear enough is enough, enough hate, enough discrimination, enough questioning our lives, enough making offensive comments about identities trans, stop threatening to withdraw or repeal our rights”, he indicated.

Tostado has also stressed that he tells those who fuel discrimination against the LGTBI group from institutional spaces “loud and clear” that they are not “afraid” of them and added that he would love not to be disguised or welcomed by any government in exchange for the dignity of LGTBI people, since they cannot be “neither a target nor a bargaining chip”.

On the part of Extremadura Understand, its president, Pilar Milanés, has considered that this is a very important day of celebration because it comes to remember what has been advanced, what remains to be done and what can be lost.

In the same way, he has highlighted that in Extremadura there is one of the reference regulatory frameworks and it has stopped in people who have passed through the psychological and legal attention offices for victims of LGTBIphobia, especially in trans women.

Also, and like Tostado, he has referred to the “intersections” of the group, since not all start from the same base or the same point, something that shows the need for equitable processes in public policies.

Milanés has also appealed to society and the media, as well as to the unions so that the LGTBI reality is taken into account in work environments and to the parties so that in the region there are no cracks in the consensus with which the LGTBI law was born. .

For her part, the prosecutor against hate crimes and discrimination in Cáceres, María del Carmen Barquilla, explained that once a month in the CC Prosecutor’s Office there is the possibility of requesting an appointment with the representative of the Public Prosecutor’s Office when dealing with victims. of this type of crime or associations that represent victims.

He has also indicated that another of the functions of the Prosecutor’s Office is to protect the victims and witnesses throughout the entire procedure and has added that an important task in this regard is to avoid secondary victimization.

Barquilla has pointed out in the same way that it is necessary to carry out the prevention of these crimes through education and education in values, in addition to raising awareness in society and making them visible with the aim of preventing the perpetration of criminal acts in the future. .

Finally, the President of the Assembly, Blanca Martín, advocated continuing to demand that the achievement of equality, peace and solidarity prevail in Europe as a basic principle.

Martín has highlighted that the legislative chamber maintains its commitment to the fight against LGTBIphobia and has considered that it is important that these types of acts be visualized in parliaments, since he has lamented that it is beginning to be an “exceptionality” in other institutions as a consequence that certain political forces “boycott” them.

In this way, it has been advanced that this coming Thursday the four parliamentary groups represented in the Assembly will once again approve an institutional declaration in which they express their commitment to the fight against LGTBphobia.

Blanca Martín added that after a week in which Europe’s commemorative events have taken place in the region, it is necessary now that a war is also being waged on the continent, to continue claiming the principles of equality, peace and solidarity.

Thus, he recalled that two countries like Hungary and Poland have decided to “go against social rights” and “attack equality between women and men” and the rights of LGTBI people, something that neither the Member States nor those that they want to incorporate.