A carnival in the Spanish city of Torrevieja has been accused of promoting pedophilia and sexualising children as a group of young girls were dressed up like “prostitutes” while carrying LGBT rainbow flags.
Footage that has emerged from an LGBT-themed performance “Grand Carnival Parade” from last Monday in the city of Torrevieja in southern Spain has sparked heavy criticism throughout the country and internationally over the Osadía dancing troupe dressing young girls in high heels, stockings, nipple covers and rainbow flags.
According to the El Español newspaper, social media comments from Spanish users criticised the performance over the “sexualisation” of children, while others raised questions such as: “What pedophile set this up?” and “Do those girls have no parents?”. Meanwhile, the Catholic news outlet InfoVaticana characterised the scantily clad outfits worn by the young girls as being similar to those worn by “prostitutes”.
On Tuesday, the Spanish Christian Lawyers Foundation announced that they are preparing to take legal action against the parade [pictured above, adult performers from the 2023 season], while accusing the local city council, run by the supposedly centre-right People’s Party, of allowing similar “atrocities” for years.
Poland Castellanos, the president of the Spanish Christian Lawyers Foundation, said: “It is reprehensible and falls into the category of corruption of minors. We hope that justice will act so that the innocence of children is not lost or used in this way.”
People’s Party Mayor of Torrevieja Eduardo Dolón defended the performance, saying in a statement per El Pias: “Carnival is criticism, satire, provocation, fun… and taking out of context and dimensioning an event like the one being criticized is totally out of place.”
“I am sure that the intention of the fathers and mothers of these children was not, at all, to hypersexualise their children with their costumes,” but instead to levy “criticism of the political and social situation in Spain,” Dolón said.
The supposedly centre-right politician declared that the city council “does not and will not come in to censor or monitor the costumes that the troupe creates each year,” and that the troupe “has complete freedom to decide what they want to represent.”
Pablo Samper, a city council member for the local Sueña Torrevieja party, also defended the “groundbreaking troupe” for using “costumes that move away from the classic”. Samper vowed to stand by the lewd performance “in the face of the threat of retrogrades” whom he likened to “Taliban lawyers.”