Italian activist warns young women surrendering hard-won rights gains

Italian television presenter, author, and women's rights activist Serena Dandini has sounded the alarm over what she describes as a troubling generational retreat on women's rights, warning that younger women are not carrying forward the battles their predecessors fought and won.

"Some achievements are taken for granted, but young people from Gen Z are more conservative than their grandparents," Dandini said, speaking to La Repubblica.

Dandini argued that the danger lies precisely in complacency — that decades of hard-won protections are increasingly treated as permanent fixtures rather than fragile gains that require active defense. She cautioned that rights left unguarded can quietly erode.

Her broader message, framed around the concept of overcoming fear, was an appeal to solidarity across generations and genders. Women's rights, she insisted, are not a sectional interest but a foundation of universal human rights — and their defense is a collective responsibility that belongs to everyone, not only to women themselves.