" Femicide is a murder like any other. Men and women are equal. There's no need to protect anyone from others, and therefore everyone should be subject to the same rules. A crime isn't more or less serious based on the sex, skin color, or religion of the perpetrator or victim: this is true equality."

This is what the leader of Futuro Nazionale, Roberto Vannacci , said on the sidelines of the party's constituent assembly underway in Rome.

"A job," the general continued, "is earned based on merit, not on what someone has under their pants; that's equality. Why don't we introduce gender quotas for blacksmiths or bricklayers, and instead introduce them for politicians or managers? Just as there is violence against women, there is violence against the elderly, and there is no such thing as elder murder . I am against femicide," Vannacci concluded, "because it is a murder like any other."

Vannacci's words sparked immediate political reactions. Italia Viva senators Daniela Sbrollini , leader of the group on the Femicide Committee, and Dafne Musolino , slammed the general's remarks as "extremely serious and offensive to the many women victims of violence and their families . Denying the specificity of the phenomenon means ignoring a reality that continues to affect our country and against which institutions have a duty to intervene decisively."

Flamur Sula, the father of Ilaria Sula , the twenty-two-year-old student killed last year in Rome by her ex-boyfriend and found in a suitcase abandoned in a ravine, also commented on the matter. "Our daughter was taken from us without a reason, without a motive. Femicide and murder are two very different things. The laws must be severe for those who harm women. Only those who have experienced it can understand what it means; speaking for others is too easy," Sula told ANSA.