Controversial Referendum, Democracy or Discrimination?

People all over Slovakia have been receiving a letter from the pro-referendum campaigners for this Saturday’s referendum on depriving gays of certain rights, with a massive billboard campaign also underway and canvassers on the streets.

Rainbow Pride 2010 (c) The Daily.SK

The referendum, set for tomorrow Saturday 7th February has caused a rift in Slovak society as it poses three questions on whether same-sex couples should be able to adopt children, whether marriage should be exclusively a union of one man and one woman, and whether parents should be able to prevent their children from taking part in lessons on sexual behaviour and euthanasia in schools.

The Alliance for Family that instigated the referendum with over 400,00 signatures knows that a high turnout is crucial if it is to get its wishes respected, as over 50% of the electorate must take part for the results to be acknowledged, The LGBT community and others who are against the whole principal of the referendum are calling for people not to take part, ensuring its invalidity.

Banska Bystrica Governor Kotleba's LSNS party protesting against gays in 2011 (c) The Daily.SK

In addition to the churches calling for everyone to take part, you may also see billboards all over the country asking you to say Yes to all 3 questions, or of the Pope giving a thumbs up to the referendum, which was not endorsed by the Church.

Almost ironically, the letter that was sent out said it was ‘a battlefield for fundamental rights and values’, also calling homosexuals a ‘freak minority’. As many of the campaigners are of the opinion that homosexuality is some kind of illness, this poses the question as to when other people will have certain rights taken away from them if they suffer from some mental or physical handicap, depression, schizophrenia and so on. Once a society starts differentiating and dissecting itself up  into classes with different rights, we might find ourselves walking a dangerous path backwards to darker times that Europe can still remember.

 

1 Comment

  1. Slovakia’s Upcoming Referendum On Gay Rights Is Being Used to Obscure Other Social and Economic Problems!

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