Jetten warns of rising hate at WorldPride conference

Prime minister Rob Jetten has warned that hatred and intolerance against the LGBTQI+ community are growing, and that “hard-won progress” on equal rights is eroding around the world. He was speaking at the WorldPride Human Rights Conference in Amsterdam.

He said that many countries are backsliding on equal rights legislation and that homophobic hate speech is becoming more overt and aggressive. This is fuelled, he said, by “toxic, highly organised and well-funded groups hiding behind the façade of freedom of expression.”

He also referred to the Islamist attack at Berlin’s pride event on July 25, in which one person was killed and 29 injured. The suspect was later shot dead by police.

Jetten said despite the anger and sorrow, his “heart was filled with hope” when thousands gathered at Amsterdam’s Homomonument, the memorial to LGBTQI+ victims of persecution, days later in commemoration.

The prime minister’s speech was interrupted immediately after he took the stage as pro-Palestinian demonstrators began chanting “where is your red line” – referring to the protests against the Gaza war last year. One shouted “shame on you being at a human rights conference when you’re complicit in genocide.”

He responded as the protesters were being escorted out by asking the audience to give them a round of applause and describing the situation in Gaza and the West Bank as “horrific.”

Online hatred rising

Homophobia is spreading so rapidly because big social media companies are “barely moderating content for hate speech,” Jetten said.

Hate groups “no longer feel restrained,” he continued, “in my view, the rise of online hatred is one of the biggest threats facing LGBTQI+ people today… Misinformation – and disinformation – can be spread in the blink of an eye, with a single mouse-click.”

“Reaching much further than NGOs, youth workers and health organisations can.
This is always how hatred takes hold: In the shadows. Outside the spotlight of society. Underestimated by everyone.”

Funding and education initiatives
Over the next three years the government will invest €7.5 million annually in improving the safety of the queer community, Jetten said, and that a public information campaign will be launched to combat discrimination and disinformation.

Some of the money will fund Purple Friday, the day on which Dutch schools devote special attention to diversity, with pupils and teachers wearing purple to show their support. It has been run since 2010 by the GSA network of LGBTQI+ rights organisation COC and now involves thousands of primary and secondary schools.

The day has also become a point of contention. Surveys by NOS and RTL in 2024 found three-quarters of participating schools had run into problems, from posters being torn down to rainbow flags being set alight, and some had dropped it or rebranded it as a general “be yourself” day.

The conference comes 25 years after the Netherlands became the first country in the world to open marriage to same-sex couples. Four couples married at Amsterdam city hall a minute after midnight on April 1, 2001, and some 36,000 same-sex couples have married since.