'Not OK to rap women on gender grounds'
Supreme court knocks Jail Needs Man In Charge article
12 March, 17:21
(ANSA) - Rome, March 12 - It is not OK to criticise women on
the grounds of gender alone, Italy's highest court said Friday.The Cassation Court, Italy's highest court of appeal, upheld a 2009 appeals ruling stemming from a newspaper article saying a southern jail run by a woman needed a man's hand. The supreme court found a journalist and a trade unionist guilty of "gratuitous" comments "without factual reference to the way the jail was managed".
The article, headlined Jail Needs Man In Charge, appeared in a Caserta paper in 2002.
In it, the trade unionist was quoted as saying that, after inmate protests against conditions, "male management would be better".
The supreme court ordered the two men to pay the warden 3,500 euros for defamation and a further 7,000 euros in damages.
The ruling, which sets precedents, was hailed by Equal Opportunities Minister Mara Carfagna as "a major step forward along the way to zero tolerance against discrimination".
Rightwing MP Alessandra Mussolini, who in 1999 gained global headlines for protesting a 'Tight Jeans Alibi for Rape' verdict, called the ruling "positive".
"We have to follow it up with legislation bolstering the presence of women in management roles," she said.
Well-known writer and feminist Dacia Maraini said: "There are forms of injustice which aren't immediately visible" and the ruling "punishes one of these"".
"You hear this kind of verbal discrimination all the time and they can be very offensive. I think it's right to deter them," she said.
The Union of Italian Women, a leading feminist group, said "it is mortifying to have to take legal recourse to obtain a recognition that should be normal, for which common sense should be enough". Italy's first transgender MP, Vladimir Luxuria, said "there is still a backward mentality in our country which takes it for granted that a person's ability depends on their gender".
"Certain professions, such as lawyers or magistrates, are still dominated by men. This sentence is important as a strong sign of respect". Another feminist group, AFFI, said "it's very funny that they should wake up to the problem after 40 years of struggles for women's rights." photo: Cassation Court
