Born in Juneda, in Les Garrigues, Ferran Poca, now a businessman and LGBTQ+ rights activist, spent 35 years exactly what people expected him to be: "I worked at La Caixa bank and became a regional manager with many employees under my supervision and a salary higher than I've ever had." But his life took an unexpected turn: "I heard an inner voice telling me that this wasn't what I was meant to do."

In the United States, where the Department of Defense has been renamed the Department of War, anything that could be considered an offense to the military could ignite the fuse of Donald Trump's administration. The latest victim of the US administration's snubs has been a Netflix series that tells the story of a young gay man who enlists in the 1990s. marinas looking for a way out of a life marked by the bullying he suffered at school. Recruits It is an LGBT story that focuses on the birth of diverse friendships in the most adverse conditions – the ultraviolent training camp of the marinas–, but the result has not pleased the Pentagon at all, which has already rushed to criticize it.

"And you, how many lesbians do you know?" The question is asked by Isabel Franc, lesbian writer and activist, co-author with Rosa Navarro of Behind the blinds, a comic about the silence that has historically surrounded lesbianism. In fact, trans women and gay men were the only faces of Franco's repression and the fight for the rights of the LGBTQ+ community, which has gained acronyms over the years. In the images from the period that photographers like Colita did in the first demonstrations at the end of the 70s, lesbian women (those that refer to the L) do not appear. "Trans women stood up "because they had nothing to lose and were already visible," Franc replies.

The arrival of tourism to the Costa Brava in the 1950s and 1960s marked a radical change in lifestyles. In Lloret de Mar, where hotels replaced the large Indiano houses, the first gay bars appeared in the early 1960s, thus becoming pioneers in LGBTQ+ leisure on the Costa Brava. As Xavier Orri, secretary of Plurales, the LGBTQ+ Association of Lloret de Mar and employee of the Lloret de Mar Municipal Archive Service, who has conducted extensive research on the subject, recalls, tourism brought about a "significant change in the mentality of the population of Lloret de Mar, who quickly adapted to new social trends and knew how to maintain an attitude of respect and distance from the Catholic morality imposed by the Franco dictatorship."

Cristina Del Puerto-Pez (Manlleu, 2000) shares three things with Elisenda, the protagonist of her first novel, Women without men (Empúries): both are lesbians, they are fascinated by it Haruki Murakami and know how to use an axe. From then on, the entire story of this woman, blocked by her sexual identity and gripped by the pain of losing her mother, is fiction. "I needed to write about love and mourning to understand them, but I was interested in creating someone far removed from myself. I didn't want to be asked if I was the protagonist. One day, while running, I suddenly visualized Elisenda, this woman who was a little depressed but also very Puerto," she and I finally told each other.

LGBTI-phobia is on the rise at a time when hate speech and anti-rights discourse are rampant on social media, in the streets, and even in institutions. 113 centers of the SAI (Comprehensive Care Service) network and 72 more in the department's Office of Equal Treatment and Non-Discrimination Feminism. In total, 479 complaints were filed, at least one each day, against LGBTI-phobia, in an institutional event also attended by President Salvador Illa and representatives of the movement's associative network. efforts" to counter messages and attacks against sexual diversity and gender expression. In this regard, Menor has warned of the risk of "normalizing" these attacks, especially among the younger population, the group where hate messages are most prevalent. According to the latest survey by the Generalitat (Catalan government) on discrimination, 25% believe the attacks should be more moderate and less visible. They curtail rights within the European Union. For the minister, the 8% increase in complaints in just one year is an "alarming" fact that cannot leave anyone indifferent.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has intensified his war on the LGBTI community. This week, Hungary amended its constitution to restrict the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex people. The controversial constitutional amendment, championed by Orbán and widely approved by Parliament (140 out of 199 votes in favor), recognizes only two genders: male and female. Furthermore, Hungary has also reinforced its ban on Gay Pride marches by putting "the protection of children" before fundamental rights such as freedom of assembly and freedom of expression.

More than 25% of girls – one in four – of Generation Z [born between 1997 and 2012] identify as non-heterosexual. This percentage is double the way their older sisters, the millennials, identify, and also distances themselves from their male peers, who show a more normative sexual orientation. This data is extracted from research by Maria Rodó-Zárate, a researcher at the Pompeu Fabra University of Barcelona (UPF), and Joel Cantó Roche, a doctoral student at the Canadian University of Toronto. Based on two official surveys of 4,000 young Catalan women of both generations, they analyzed how between 2017 and 2018, "more and more young people are opting for less rigid identifications, and moving away from fixed labels such as... gay either lesbian", the authors of the study point out, while adopting "more open positions, such as bisexuality or other forms of sexual diversity".

At the entrance to a Barcelona sports complex, the PA system broadcasts a Barça match, which turns into a distant murmur as, on one of the pitches, the balls strike a melody. The spectacle welcomes players who prefer to pass with one or two touches rather than dribble. They enjoy a match without a scoreboard. Applause, shouts of support, and jokes accompany the evening. "Free" football also exists in the city.

Nemo's Eurovision win would have been a moment of celebration and euphoria, but for those who represented Switzerland it was an opportunity to put on the table the shortcomings regarding freedom of expression in the contest. Although Eurovision is a symbol of sexual liberation and diversity, Nemo has found the limits of this maxim. The interpreter of The code He explained in the subsequent press conference that he had to sneak the non-binary gender flag, with which he identifies, into the contest after the organization told him he could not show it.

Catalan Home Affairs Minister, Joan Ignasi Elena, has explained that groups of people who "meet and go hunting" to attack homosexuals have been detected, although there is no evidence that they are "organised plots". According to Elena on RAC1, they are people "'from here, of different ages", who attack LGTBI collective thanks to a "certain permissiveness in the rejection of difference". "They live installed in hatred and fed by the culture of hate", he said, and has ensured that the Mossos d'Esquadra are very much on top of these aggressors.

The European Union often functions in practice as a club of states, but in the minds of its founding fathers (De Gasperi, Schuman, Adenauer, etc.) and in the letter of the treaties it is a community of values. Specifically, Article 2 states: "The Union is founded on the values of respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and respect for human rights, including the rights of persons belonging to minorities. These values are common to member states in a society characterised by pluralism, non-discrimination, tolerance, justice, solidarity and equality between men and women". But what happens when one or more member states flout the letter of the treaty and pass homophobic laws, as Hungary and Poland have done, or limit judicial independence, as Poland has done? This Thursday, the European Commission launched legal action against these countries for violating the fundamental rights of the LGTBI community.

Thousands of attacks against religious minorities, women, migrants or the LGTBIQ collective go unpunished every day throughout the European Union. Between 40% and 90% of victims of so-called hate crimes choose not to report the attack, partly because they distrust official institutions or are afraid of reprisals for pointing out who their attackers are. The Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA) warns of this in a report in which it encourages reporting and making visible expressions of intolerance. Extrapolating from this, the 1,700 complaints of discriminatory attacks that were registered in Spain in 2019, the last year collected by the CGPJ, are the tip of the iceberg.

The National Police have arrested three young men for the murder of Samuel, 24, on Saturday at dawn outside a nightclub in A Coruña, Galicia. The group that assaulted him to death shouted "faggot" at him. Those arrested are between 20 and 25 years old. According to the police, more arrests are not ruled out and the investigation will remain open "until the total clarification of the facts". The National Police, in the tweet they have published to report the case, has not assessed the motivation behind the crime. But the murder of Samuel has created "maximum concern" in the LGTBI collective of Catalonia, which in recent weeks had already warned of an increase in physical attacks.

"Samuel is not dead. Samuel has been killed". This is one of the most repeated messages in the last hours, as well as "Justice for Samuel". On Saturday morning Samuel, 24 years old, was beaten to death outside a discotheque in A Coruña, Galicia. His death has shocked the LGTBI collective because witnesses explain that the group that assaulted Samuel to death called him a "faggot". The murder has created "maximum concern" in the LGTBI collective of Catalonia, which in recent weeks had already warned of an increase in physical attacks. The last one has been known a few hours ago: the Mossos d'Esquadra investigate the aggression to a young man in Sant Cugat del Vallès, who was left unconscious, while they also shouted "faggot" at him.

The trans and equality law for the LGTBIQ community will be approved in the ordinary Council of Ministers, which has to close years of demands and months of negotiations between the two partners of the Spanish government. The law recognizes what some regional laws already recognize: the free determination of gender. That is, it makes it official that transsexuality is not a mental illness and from now on it will only require an administrative procedure in the offices of the Civil Registry. Also minors, from 14 to 18 years old, will have the same requirements but only if they are accompanied by their parents or legal guardians.

Today, June 28th, is LGTBIQ+ Pride Day and tomorrow the Spanish Council of Ministers is expected to approve the new trans law, which will allow a person to change their name and gender from the age of 14, without the need for tests, witnesses or medical reports. Ana Valenzuela, President of the Chrysallis Association of Families of Trans Minors, has assessed this path in an interview with ARA and has hoped that during the processing it will change the point that makes adolescents between 12 and 14 years old have to go to a judge to take the step. "We do not agree that adolescence has to be taken to a judicial process and that a judge has to verify gender identity. Only we can say who we are".

New multiple homophobic aggression in Barcelona. A dozen boys assaulted, insulted and robbed a 52-year-old man on Saturday at dawn in a gazebo in Parc Güell. The Policia de la Generalitat de Catalunya have confirmed to ARA that the victim, who was slightly injured and the next day announced the facts, described the attackers as "young people between 20 and 25 years". According to the complaint, the group assaulted him with punches and shoved him, insulted him because of his sexuality and stole his wallet containing cash and credit cards. For the moment the police have not yet identified or located the perpetrators.

Two gay male couples suffered a homophobic attack on Saturday night on the beach of Somorrostro in Barcelona. The multiple aggression was around 10 p.m. and the Mossos d'Esquadra have already opened an investigation after receiving the complaint, but have not yet found those responsible for the attack and have not been able to make arrests. As advanced by the digital magazine Tot Barcelona, the victims were talking quietly with other friends on the beach when a group of "very violent" young men burst in, spat at them, insulted them with phrases such as "fucking faggots" and threatened them.

"I accepted myself", "Everything fit", "I discovered myself for the first time": LGTBIAQ+ people have very different stories, but most of them agree that their lives changed the day they met someone they could identify with. They remember it as a "liberating", happy moment; which at the same time contrasts with the disapproving looks, insults and aggressions that many of them also report having suffered for not fitting in with the norm. In this report we make visible some of their lives at the moment of expansion of the collective.