EU: Controversial Lunacek-Report brings Conservatives into trouble

By J.C. von Krempach, J.D. | January 30, 2014

Next Tuesday the European Parliament will vote on the controversial “Lunacek-Report“, and the outcome is hard to predict.

Surely, if the opinion of ordinary European citizens had a decisive role to play, there could be no doubt that the draft would suffer a spectacular defeat. While the internet platform “CitizenGO” has alone collected 120.000 signatures for a petition to reject the Lunacek-Report, there are several other petitions (for example here, here and here) that have drawn a lot of support, so that the total number of protest letters that citizens sent to one or several Members of the EP can be safely estimated at 200.000 or higher. To counterbalance this, the taxpayer-funded LGBT lobby group “ILGA-Europe” has set up a petition to support the “Lunacek-Report”, which (since yesterday evening, i.e. in 19 hrs) has garnered the spectacular amount of 85 signatures… If there ever had been any doubt that ILGA-Europe is an artificial sock-puppet that has no link at all to real civil society, here is the proof. One nearly feels sorry for them.

Inside the European Parliament, however, things are very different. Greens, Communists (GUE/NGL), Socialists (S&D), and Liberals (ALDE) must be expected to vote nearly en bloc in favour of the controversial proposal, with very few defections. This is partly due to the fact that these groups have a deeply entrenched aversion against the natural family, which they see as something that needs to be destroyed and overcome. And they are simply not concerned about what the ordinary citizen thinks on those matters – they know better than ordinary citizens.

Among the Conservatives (ECR) and the European People’s Party (EPP), by contrast, the situation is more complicated, and votes on social issues often create considerable internal tensions. On the one hand, a majority of their MEPs are clearly opposed to the Anti-life and anti-family agenda for which the trademarks Estrela and Lunacek stand – because they very well know that this is what their electorate expects of them. But on the other hand, they have handed over all responsibility for those “soft” issues to politicians who do not represent the mainstream of the electorate they should be representing. It all seems based on a strange misconception about “expertise”: responsibility for women’s rights is handed over to radical feminists (of which, in a large political group like the EPP, one will always find a few, even if they are not the mainstream), and responsibilities for issues related to marriage and family are controlled by gay (or “gay-friendly”) politicians, as if these were the only stakeholders. As a result, the feminist/homosexualist ideology is grossly overrepresented, even inside the more conservative political movements.

Regarding the “Lunacek-Report”, a particularly strange role is played by EPP politicians Roberta Metsola (Malta), Véronique Mathieu (France), Michèle Striffler (France), and (Manfred Weber), who are doing all they can to get the draft adopted despite the massive criticism it receives from inside and outside the party. Among other things, these politicians have prevented the tabling of an alternative motion that, while making a clear statement against the discrimination of homosexuals, would have avoided at least the most problematic content of the Lunacek draft.
As matters stand now, MEPs will face three options. One is to accept the controversial Lunacek draft. The second is to reject it, so there will be no resolution. The third is to vote for an alternative motion that has been tabled by the EFD (Europe for Freedom and Democracy) group.

The third option is the most interesting one. The problem is that EFD is the political groups comprising the radical Euro-sceptics, spearheaded by the media-savvy Nigel Farage of the UK Independence Party, and comprising political movements such as the LEGA Nord (Italy) or the Vlaams Belang (Belgium), which promote regional separatism within their own respective countries. But on the other hand, the EFD motion is drafted in very sober and perfectly reasonable terms, and it will be difficult for MEPs, including from the House’s left wing, to vote against it. What it says is the following:

 

This is a very clever move. The text is neutral. In fact, it also mentions (among other possible grounds for discrimination) sexual orientation, so it clearly cannot be accused of “homophobia”. This alternative motion will be the first one to be voted on – if it is accepted, the Lunacek draft falls (this is the same thing that happened to the Estrela-Report last 10 December). In other words, before the Lunacek draft can be voted, the MEPs supporting it (this includes, as we have mentioned, the Green, Communist, Socialist, and Liberal Members, but also some EPP politicians) will have to make a statement that they are AGAINST “ensuring the full and equal enjoyment of all fundamental rights by all citizens”. And that would pretty well evidence what the whole Lunacek controversy is about.

So, this is the unique occasion – just timely before the upcoming elections – to see how sincere the green-left-liberal rhetoric about discrimination really is. Who is for protecting the human rights of ALL citizens, and who is for granting privileges to people with unusual “sexual orientations”? We will see it on Tuesday.

However, whatever the outcome will be, the pro-family movement can already now be considered to be the winner of the debate. The Lunacek-Report, if it gets adopted, will not be legally binding anyway. But the huge mobilization against it evidences that the real concern of people is not about so-called “homophobia”, but about the surreptitious falsification and manipulation of human rights. The public has now awakened, and it will become increasingly difficult for politicians to ignore this.

 

P.S.: a small update: the homosexual network inside the EP (aka the “Intergroup”) has now also tabled an alternative motion. Think of that – Mrs. Lunacek proposes an alternative to her own draft! Is the purpose only to create confusion? In any case, Lunacek (new) is exactly the same as Lunacek (old), except that, as a “concession”, it contains also a vague statement on “the freedom to express and display one’s beliefs and opinions”. This comes at a very late stage (in fact, even after the official deadline, which raises questions regarding admissibility) – but it is completely inapt to dispel any of the criticism that civil society has voiced. In other words, it does not really change the situation. The rather strange attitude of the LGBT-lobby towards freedom of religion is well known from a variety of occasions.

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