în afară de tine, nimic special

“How was your family like?” “I’ll tell you what: I was raised without a father. He was a wealthy man but too much of a playboy so my mom divorced him in 1945. She was ahead of her time and it stuck to me. I never felt the desire to get married and it always angered me not being able to adopt without the obligation of a ring! Today when we discuss adoption by same sex couples and straight couples as well, I give this a thought: “Who was I born with? And who did I grow up with?” and I answer those questions: with two women, my mother and my grandmother. Get kids out of orphanages, they won’t grow up badly with two fathers or two mothers, I had two women. Does it look like I came up badly?”

This was Raffaela Carrà, a woman so ahead of her time, an outspoken mind for what was right even if it meant going against popular beliefs and shocking the public. She rose to stardom back in a time when Italy was still drowning in bigotry, when women were still seen as a possession of their husbands, she openly spoke about same sex couples in a time when just the existence of the LGBTQ+ comunity was erased and denied. She sang “se ti lascia lo sai che si fa? Trovi un altro più bello che problemi non ha” [“if he leaves you, you know what you’ll do? Find a better looking one who doesn’t give you problems”] in a time when Italy’s law still allowed “il delitto d’onore” or honor killing, she dressed however she wanted to because she owned herself, even if it meant wearing costumes that were considered outrageous.