A 17 and an 18-year-old man were asked not to hug by a beach resort in southern Italy! Accused of homophobia, this young couple was at the Lido Arcobaleno beach resort in Caserta, Campania. They hugged while in the pool at the public facility but were approached by a lifeguard who asked them to stop.
The couple said that they were “intimidated” by the guard who deliberately asked them not to embrace each other while did not create any problem with the heterosexual couples who were also hugging.
The 17-year-old said that the lifeguard came up to them and asked them to stop, as there were “children present in the facility”. He also told them to behave in a more “composed” way.
The President of the Caserta regional branch of Rain Arcigay, an Italian LGBT activist group, said that the discrimination is rife in the Italian tourism industry, even though there are laws ensuring equal rights for gay couples. She even focused on the fact that government should introduce new rules for the protection of the LGBT communities.
