Sankt Veit am Vogau is a former municipality in the district of

Leibnitz Leibnitz ( Slovenian: ''Lipnica'') is a city in the Austrian state of Styria and on 1 Jan. 2017 had a population of 12,176. It is located to the south of the city of Graz Graz (; sl, Gradec) is the capital city of the Austrian state of Sty ...

Styria Styria (german: Steiermark ; Serbo-Croatian and sl, ; hu, Stájerország) is a state (''Bundesland'') in the southeast of Austria. With an area of , Styria is the second largest state of Austria, after Lower Austria. Styria is bordered to ...

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

. Since the 2015

Styria municipal structural reform The Styria municipal structural reform (German: ''Steiermärkische Gemeindestrukturreform'') was a local government reform in the Austrian state of Styria, which was made effective January 1, 2015. This reform nearly halved the number of Styrian ...

, it is part of the municipality

Sankt Veit in der Südsteiermark Sankt Veit in der Südsteiermark is a municipality since 2015 in the Leibnitz District of Styria, Austria. The population was 4,069 residents (as of 1 January 2016). The municipality, Sankt Veit in der Südsteiermark, was created as part of the S ...

Homophobia Homophobia encompasses a range of negative attitudes and feelings toward homosexuality or people who are identified or perceived as being lesbian, gay or bisexual. It has been defined as contempt, prejudice, aversion, hatred or antipathy ...
and
Islamophobia Islamophobia is the fear of, hatred of, or prejudice against the religion of Islam or Muslims in general, especially when seen as a geopolitical force or a source of terrorism. The scope and precise definition of the term ''Islamophobia ...

In March 2013 the small town created a large nationwide publicity, when the town's mayor, Manfred Tatzl from ÖVP told falter.at in an interview, "Wir sind hier auf dem Land, Homosexualität verurteilt ein jeder." ("We are living in a rural area, everybody here condemns

homosexuality Homosexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or sexual behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions" to pe ...

.") and added, "

s gebe S, or s, is the nineteenth letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''ess'' (pronounced ), plural ''esses''. History ...

"Gott sei Dank" keine Muslime im Ort" (there were, "Thank God, ..no muslims in town.") in order to defend the town's reverend Karl Tropper, who had been preaching against homosexuality and Islam for years.kurier.at
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References

Cities and towns in Leibnitz District {{Styria-geo-stub