“We can only be happy and satisfied about this order by the Supreme Court of Cassation, accepting our appeal and recognizing our right to be atheists and agnostics and to say it loud. As trivial as this sounds, it took seven years of legal battles to be put black on white.”
With this comment Adele Orioli, in charge of legal initiatives at the Union of Rationalist Atheists and Agnostics (Unione degli Atei e degli Agnostici Razionalisti, Uaar), hailed the order which cancelled a discriminatory sentence by the Appeal Court in Rome, as requested by the Italian humanist organization.
The story dates back to 2013, when Uaar launched its campaign “Viviamo bene senza D” (loosely translatable to “We’re good without God”), whose graphical punchline was the word “Dio” (“God”) with its first capitalized “D” letter stricken out by a big white cross, leaving in evidence “io” (“I”). This pun was followed by this sentence: “10 million Italians live all right without D (as in “Dio”). And when they’re discriminated, Uaar has their back.” Posters were pasted all over Italy, except in the city of Verona, where the local administration censored them arguing that their content was “potentially injurious against any religion”.
“After a long battle, today the Court of Cassation establishes the opposite is true”, says Orioli: “Atheists and agnostics have the right to profess a belief consisting in the refusal of any religious confession. The freedom of conscience, sanctioned by the 19th article of our Constitution, protects this right just as it does for any positive religious creed (i.e. the adherence to a certain religious confession). Now Rome’s Appeal Court is compelled to reexamine this lawsuit taking in account the Supreme Court’s argumentations. In the meanwhile, we as Uaar want to thank our attorney Fabio Corvaja, who represented us in this fight with professionalism and tenacity till victory. It’s a victory for Uaar, but also for all the people, believers and non believers, because the freedom of conscience belongs to everybody. And the recognition of a fundamental human right strengthens the rights of everyone of us, none excluded.”
Press release
I remember from secondary school that a point of the revolutionary movements in 1848 was “freedom of print and expression”. But now we are in XXI century!! Unfortunately the achievement of rights shall continuously be reaffirmed in order not to be lost.