Gypsies and gay men, "the most discriminated Romanian people"

According to a survey conducted by the National Council for Combating Discrimination, in most cases, Gypsies and gay men are a daily target of bias and discrimination.

Moreover, the survey reveals that discrimination influences mostly the possibility of finding a job.

Unlike the majority, the minority perceives discrimination mostly in public institutions such as City Halls or hospitals.

The lowest discrimination level is noticed in schools.

Moreover, according to the same survey, population is more indulgent with Germans or Hungarians than with Gypsies.

The majority’s opinion

Regarding the majority’s awareness, the Council asserts that Romanians think about themselves that they are industrious, laborious, tolerant (more hospitable), generous, disunited, coward, less self-confident, unreliable, dishonest.

Romanian's opinion about Hungarians: they are laborious, industrious, united, intolerant, aggressive and mean.

Romanian's opinion about Germans is that they are laborious, industrious, honest, reliable and mean.

Romanian’s opinion about Jewish people: they are united, laborious, industrious, self-confident, peaceful, reliable and mean.

Furthermore, the survey adds that on the one hand, 58 percent of Romanian people have a good and a very good opinion about the most of Romanians.

On the other hand, 61 percent of the minority has a good or a very good opinion about most Romanians.

Instead, 17 percent of Romanians have a good or a very good opinion about most Gypsies.

Gay men are ‘avoided’

NCCD talks about ‘a significant probability of homophobia among Romanian people’ and argues that 55 percent of population finds inconvenient the daily contact withh a gay man.

It was revealed that 56 percent of the inquired people wouldn’t eat at the same table with a gay man and 85 percent wouldn’t like to drink from the same glass that a gay man drank from.

While 85 percent of those who answered that they would be bothered if a same sex person tried to seduce them, 48 percent of those who had participated to the survey declared that they would find inconvenient to stay around a HIV infected person.

The survey was conducted between October and November on about 1,400 people with more or less than 2.6 percent margin of error.

Translated by: Cristina Anamaria Maricescu and Andreea Velicu
MA Students, MTTLC, Bucharest University