Turkish opposition party leader Temel Karamollaoğlu yet again targets LGBTI+s

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Turkish Islamist opposition Felicity Party (SP) leader Temel Karamollaoğlu on March 26 targeted LGBTI+ families in his speech at the party’s provincial assembly, according to online news outlet KaosGL.

Speaking on the issue of "family," Karamollaoğlu used discriminating language against same-sex couples and said, "If the concept of family breaks down, you cannot sustain society. We cannot consent to the degeneration of the concept of family. The family consists of a man, a woman and children. We do not accept how two men or two women can create a family.”

This is not the first time the Islamist leader targeted the LGBTI+ community. Speaking to Habertürk's Nihal Bengisu Karaca on Dec. 31, 2022, he had said: "LGBTI+s are a handful of people. If you look at the fuss they make, you would think that 90 percent of humanity is like them, but in reality, they are a handful of people.” In the same speech, he had also implied that LGBTI+s are detrimental to civilization by destroying family values. 

Karamollaoğlu had also thrown his support behind anti-LGBTQ rallies organized last year and said in another speech: “What is this gender issue? The family consists of a man and a woman. Two men cannot form a family, it's called perversion."