On a sweltering June day in 2005 cheers and applause broke among a group of colorfully clad activists in the public gallery of the national parliament, as Spain became the third country in Europe to legalize marriage equality. There were similar scenes of euphoria in the grounds of Dublin castle in 2015 when Ireland became the first country in the world to introduce equal marriage by popular vote. These two events, ten years apart, bookended an extraordinary decade of progress when the march towards LGBTQ equality seemed utterly unstoppable.
For many years, the EU was content to largely ignore Poland’s and Hungary’s authoritarian rule, waiting until Orban’s third term before initiating serious legal proceedings for repeated violations of EU law. By then, however, the far right rot had spread to the heart of the EU. With the triumph of Geert Wilders’ Freedom party in last year’s general election the Netherlands became the seventh EU country with a far right party at the heart of government.
In other member states, like Spain, just being in opposition seems to be enough to successfully roll back LGBTQ rights. In Madrid, for example, the far right Vox party handed the presidency of the Madrid region to the right wing Popular Party’s Isabel Diaz Ayuso in exchange for a commitment to partially repeal the region’s gender identity legislation, a promise which Ayuso duly made good on following her reelection in 2023.
Despite the surprise defeat of the far right in last weekend’s Romanian elections (which will see the centre left mayor of Bucharest, Nicusor Dan, become president), reactionary populism more generally shows no sign of abating, and remains implacably hostile to both the concept of LGBTQ+ equality and its practical expression through rights legislation. Not only has the far right succeeded in reversing hard won progress on LBGTQ+ rights and protections, but the movement has successfully challenged the long held assumption that an increasingly progressive Europe, in which the rights of sexual minorities are respected, is somehow inevitable.
John Boyce an Irish freelance journalist who divides his time between Spain and Iceland. He has written for a wide variety of publications, including Iceland Review, History Ireland, Barcelona Metropolitan, and Private Eye, and is a regular feature writer on politics, history and LGBTQ issues for Madrid Metropolitan magazine. His portfolio can be accessed here.
