Whoever, both directly or indirectly, lives with any disability is aware of how often you have to face more or less clear forms of discrimination. Not only the ubiquitous architectonical barriers (that notably complicate movements and, in general, the disabled people daily life), but also (and especially) due to hard to die prejudices, whose effects are visible at school, at work and, generally speaking, whenever you have to compare to other people.

Too often, who’s subjected to discrimination -due to unawareness or because he’s sure not to have at his disposal ways to defend himself- accepts with resignation what happens, withdraws into himself, as it happens in case of bullying.  Yet, there are many ways to defend yourself (even legally, if needed).

For instance, the “Franco Bomprezzi” Center Against Discrimation in Milan, launched in July 2015 by LEDHA (the League for the Rights of Disabled People) and named after a great journalist and writer, who was affected by a severe disability and spent his life fighting personally to see the rights of people with disability acknowledged and defended. He was among the promoters of this project.

The center aims to assist disabled people subjected to discrimination, providing them, their relatives or the organizations that represent them with listening, information, consulting and, if needed, defense. So, it aims to boost the awareness of disabled people, and of the whole community, towards cases of discrimination, both those that have been legally sanctioned and those that would have to.

During its first year of activity, the center collected almost 1300 warnings of discrimination cases: 236 of them were discriminations due to the disability of the person (in accordance with the 67/2006 law).

how to benefit from the service against discrimination?

If you are subjected to discrimination due to your disability or someone in your family is discriminated due to his disability or, again, if you see discrimination against someone with disability, you can point it out to the center, calling 026570425 (answering from Monday to Thursday, from 9:30 am to 1:30 pm) or sending an e-mail to antidiscriminazione@ledha.it. If you just want more information about the service, please write to info@ledha.it.

“promoting, protecting and safeguarding the full and equal enjoyment of all the human rights and fundamental freedom by disabled people and promoting respect of their inherent dignity” (Art. 1, Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities) 

Do you know similar initiatives in other cities and regions as well? Share them with me and I’ll be happy to talk about them!