Spain. During the Francoist regime, many single mothers were told their newborn children were dead. They weren’t allowed to see the corpse, and the baby, which wasn’t dead, was given to a married couple. Many years later, the graves of many of these supposedly dead babies were found to be empty. This was done with the absolute cooperation of the Catholic church.

England. I don’t know how unknown this is but Alan Turing who helped to break Nazis’ enigma code was arrested for being gay and was chemically castrated by the government he helped years ago. He was banned from GCHQ and the US which greatly effected his career. He killed himself in 1954.

In Italy a r*pist could marry his victim to avoid any legal persecution (this practice was called "matrimonio riparatore"). The women were pressed to accept the marriage to avoid social shame. Franca Viola, in 1948, was the first woman to refuse to marry her r*pist, but this practice was abolished by law only in 1981.

Sweden used to treat Sami natives in northen Sweden as second class citizens for the longest time and we barely learn about it in school. As late as the 70s Sami children were still forcefully taken from their Sami parents and adopted by Swedish parents to ”make them Swedish”

Norway. How terrible we have suppressed the Sami people and how we forcefully assimilated them in order to “fit in” with the “Norwegian culture”. And how the racism against them still exist very much to this day. They are still treated horrible by Norwegians and we are barely learned anything about their history in our schools.

Australia. Basically everything to do with the First Nations/Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Mostly the stolen generations but there was a whole lot more f*cked up sh*t.

France. Forced sterilization of intellectually disabled people was a very common thing until the early 2000s. There's now a law requiring consent since 2001, but I wouldn't be surprised to learn forced sterilization still happens.

Poland is ranked as the most homophobic country in the EU

I think many people, that don't live in german-speaking countries, don't know that Austria was a fascist dictatorship for 4 years before the Anschluss

Portugal has massive problem with domestic violence (including femicide and child abuse). Strict catholic patriarchy was THE rule until 1974, so it's still hanging around in older generations and trickling down on their descendants. And most offenders get off with a slap on the wrist because we still have courts full of old ass judges.

Spain is only second to Cambodia for missing persons cases that were never resolved. There is a government run online search tool for finding mass graves.

Huge collaboration of Dutch people during WW2 , snitching where people were hiding. Supporting the Nazis, joining the forces. The Dutch railway company (NS) transported Jews, Sinti and Roma to Germany. Royal Dutch Shell reported their jewish employees to the Nazis to be deported.

Lithuania often ranks among the top countries by suicide rates. It's like ~1/4000 lithunians is gonna kill themselves.

Germany. Female genital mutilation in Germany. It makes me incredibly angry as it is an more or less unpunished crime for decades now and nothing is done really. Every few years, when somebody decides to report about it measures are announced, but nothing will be really done.

Turkey. There is overwhelming violence against women in Turkey. And the first thing [anyone] asks: well, what was she wearing?, what is she doing there this late?

Romania. A few years back there was a scandal of a pediatric doctor that did extremely painful medical experiments on children he was supposed to be treating, such as putting a metal rod near their backs and putting screws into their spines to "fix" scoliosis or something similar with bones he considered weren't growing properly. He mostly targeted poor families, or families with kids with weird conditions because he figured they wouldn't be able to or have the power to question his practices. Also the fact that it's been revealed several orphanages drug the kids there and tie them to their beds to keep them compliant. I've also read a religious article of an "exorcism" that was performed on a little kid they called posessed because "he would suddenly go very still and start shaking violently" (to anyone with a brain it's obvious he was just seizing). Instead of following the procedure for a seizure, which is making sure he isn't in danger of hurting himself by bashing his head or something, they rushed him to a church and placed him on the floor there (and it wasn't a soft floor by any means). Or the fact that we've had gay people thrown in prison for being gay several years after communism fell (I think either late 90's or even early 00's). Or, not that sinister but just plain stupid and more recent: the church brought "moase" (aka remains of "saints") during the current pandemic and hundreds of people just lined up to kiss them, all on the same spot too :) (it's a /s smile, don't get me wrong).

Russia. Most Russians actually support their government and especially Putin

The regional languages in France were progressively replaced by French from 1789. Only a few are still remaining (mostly those who aren't understandable by a French speaker, like Breton, Basque, Corsican, Alsatian, Francoprovençal etc.) but apparently more than 90% of our regional languages are now dead. You only find them in regional accents.

I don't know if it's not known but Italy passed racial laws during WWII. More recent: the "trattativa stato mafia" aka "state-mafia negotiations" in 1993 and 1994. Essentially it was a secret negotiation between very high government figures and Sicilian Mafia chiefs, at the end of the "massacre season" in which Mafia carried out literal terrorist attacks, since there was a very strong battle against them carried out by the Palermo group (pool di Palermo). The prosecutors Falcone and Borsellino died at the end of the massacre season, after they hit hard the Sicilians with the Maxiprocesso (aka Mega-Trial)

Turkey. The years 1980-1983 were very dark years for Turkey - a paranoid nationalist military junta coupled with guerilla warfare in the countryside and massive political repression. Add torture in military prisons, kangaroo courts, and state-funded assassinations to that. Pardon my French, but the bastard who caused all that died before his jail sentence was approved.

France. I'd say war against colonised Algeria. It is really a shameful thing involving war crimes, torture, ... A lot of veterans won't talk about it because of how ashamed they feel. Look it up.

In Ireland we were under such control of the Catholic church until 2000s. Our constitution was drawn up with their approval and still says that women have a role in the home. Anyway the control of the church meant that the church got away with shielding and transferring paedophile priests ( well known). The not so well known was the following three things outside Ireland are: Mother and baby homes - This was where unwed mothers were brought. They were a shamed, has their children taken away. The children either died or were adopted illegally to Irish and American families. They also burned their records and one in Tuam Co Galway dumped the bodies of many children who died in a septic tank (tank where sewage is stored from houses not connected to the main sewage system). Magdalene Laundries - this was where runways and some troubles were brought. They were slaves in a laundry and received nothing and were treated terribly and the religious orders made money off the backs of this slavery. The last one wasn't closed till the 90s which is messed up. Also corporal punishment in schools until the late 60s early 70s especially in industrial schools (some of which were for troubled boys and the abuse there was messed up. So yes we have a dark past. Now it makes sense why there are few young Catholics in Ireland. We don't mention it much but we know and it makes me ashamed and I'm 25.

Georgia. State of LGBT rights. They are non-existent, you can easily get killed by religious people and nobody will give a sh*t.

In Ireland homosexuality was only decriminalised in 1993, after a 16 year legal battle which ended up in the European Court of Human Rights in 1988 (it took 5 years to implement the courts ruling).

In Crete most if not all people have at least one kind of gun in their house (anything from a hunting rifle to the latest fully automatic rifle) and some time ago (maybe even now I have no idea) the rest are Vendettas where families (by families I mean a group of people that have the same surname) would go into all out war between each other for any kind of reason I'm from Crete but I Grew up in Attica and my family used to be in a Vendetta when someone was operating my Great Grandfathers excavator and he rolled over and died and his family blamed my great grandpa and I don't know how that ended

South Africa had a inter-tribal genocide between 1815 and 1840 resulting in the death of between 1 - 2 million people. The genocide, called the Mfecane, or the crushing in Zulu, was perpitrated by Shaka Zulu, and the Zulus, as he was establishing his kingdom. This lead to the depopulation of the interior which created room for the white boer settlers (voortrekkers) to move in and settle the area from 1836, basically uncontested in unclaimed territories.

Spain. How we left behind West Sahara and Equatorial Guinea people in the 70s, who spoke Spanish and held Spanish IDs at the time. I’m not very familiar with the root causes and would like to read more about it though. Political turmoil caused by the imminent Franco’s death played a major role though. It became a tradition among some people here to bring in West Sahara children over for summer holidays every year.

Finland had concentration camps after the Finnish civil war, holding some 80000 "reds"

Well, interwar Poland had a prison, or concentration camp, for political opponets, 3,000 imprisoned, 7-15 died

Greece. We are the only country in EU where the Sharia law is still legal.