Gay and human rights activist Peter Tatchell will head up a demonstration outside the Dolce And Gabbana flagship store in London on 18th March between 1-2PM
The demonstration comes hot on the heals after the two openly gay fashion designers insulted same-sex parents and their children. The pair have also strongly opposed same-sex marriage.
Speaking to the Italian magazine Panorama, alongside his business partner, Stefano Gabbana, Domenico Dolce said children should be born to a mother and a father:
“The only family is a traditional one. I’m not convinced by those I call the chemical children, synthetic babies…They are wombs for hire, semen chosen from a catalogue … psychiatrists are not ready to confront the effects of this experimentation.”
Stefano Gabbana added: “The family is not a fad.” In 2006, he told the Daily Mail: “I am opposed to the idea of a child growing up with two gay parents.”
LGBT rights and human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell, Director of the Peter Tatchell Foundation and co-organiser of Thursday’s protest, said:
“It is hypocritical for Stefano Gabbana to oppose gay parents, given that in 2006 he expressed a desire to have a child via artificial insemination and surrogacy. He’s guilty of double standards. Gabbana wanted for himself what he now condemns other gay men for wanting.
“These comments are not only an attack on same-sex parents but on all parents who’ve had children with the aid of fertility treatment, including thousands of heterosexual couples.
“Dolce and Gabbana are echoing ill-informed, outdated and homophobic prejudices about gay parents. Research spanning 40 years shows that children bought up by gay mums and dads are just as happy and well-adjusted as those from traditional heterosexual families. The key to a child’s welfare is the love of their parents, not the parent’s sexual orientation.
“They are playing into the hands of the Vatican and far right political parties that oppose gay families, said Mr Tatchell.
The boycott trend #BoycottDolceAndGabbana trended all weekend forcing Gabbana to put out a statement yesterday saying, “It was never our intention to judge other people’s choices. We do believe in freedom and love.”
Co-organiser of the protest, Edwin Sesange, director of the LGBT Out and Proud Diamond Group, added,
“Please join us in sending a clear message to Dolce and Gabbana that same-sex families are loving, happy families. This issue is not about same-sex families alone but also about the many straight families who have benefited from fertility treatment. Dolce and Gabbana’s statements add to the stigma, shame, prejudice, rejection and intolerance often suffered by same-sex parents and their children. They should withdraw their statements and apologise.”
Mr Tatchell concluded,
“Dolce and Gabbana are entitled to their views but we are entitled to protest against them. We urge everyone – gay and straight – to boycott their clothes.
“It’s intolerable for these designers to make millions out of the gay community and then turn around and insult our families. They’ve stabbed us in the back.
“Dolce and Gabbana have been exploiting the gay market for decades. Having made their millions, they seem happy to trash loving, responsible same-sex parents and their children.
“Professor Susan Golombok of the Centre for Family Research at Cambridge University is the world expert on same-sex families. She’s been studying them since 1976. Her latest research is in her new book, Modern Families, published last week. Surveying studies worldwide spanning four decades, she found that children with same-sex parents flourish, despite the stigma they sometimes face,” said Mr Tatchell.
