Greek singer Aggeliki Iliadi has demanded respect for her opinion that same-sex couples cannot be considered parents while warning she will take legal action over online videos that mention her children.
Speaking in remarks broadcast on Monday, November 2, 2026, on the Greek television programme Happy Day, Iliadi said she respects other people's opinions and expects the same treatment in return without pressure or oppression.
The performer added that holding her view on family structure does not mean she does not wish for the happiness of all people. Her comments followed a backlash over social media posts she published in mid-October arguing that only a man and a woman can create a child and be regarded as parents.
Legal warning over comments about her children
During her Monday appearance on Happy Day, Iliadi disclosed that she has already passed several videos to her lawyer to evaluate her next legal steps against critics.
She stated that commenters could say whatever they wanted about her personally, but warned that when people spoke about her children, the law and the courtrooms would take over.
Iliadi is a prominent Greek laiko singer who has been active in the country's music industry since the late 1990s and is the granddaughter of the celebrated traditional singer Kaiti Grey. Greece legalised same-sex civil marriage and joint parental rights for same-sex couples in February 2024, a reform that prompted sustained debate among politicians, religious figures and entertainers.
Instagram videos on family and parenthood
The dispute began on October 15, 2026, when Iliadi posted a series of video stories on her personal Instagram account after watching a clip recorded by a young woman who appeared to be between 20 and 22 years old.
According to Iliadi, the young woman questioned her earlier remarks on family by asking whether a child raised by a single parent or by a grandmother did not count as a family. Iliadi responded that she had never claimed a single-parent household or a grandmother raising a child was not a family, and she accused critics of distorting her words and pretending not to understand her point.
In the Instagram posts, the singer argued that God ordained human creation through a man and a woman. She asked why critics pretended not to understand how children are created, insisting that a man and a woman make a child and therefore form the family and the parents whether critics like it or not.
Iliadi maintained that two men together or two women together are not parents. She argued that critics were attempting to pass unnatural ideas on to the younger generation and said that such arrangements remained unnatural according to God regardless of how progressive commentators wished to appear in 2026.
References to Saint Paisios and modern progress
In the same social media remarks, Iliadi contended that modern civilisation and social progress had created widespread problems. She argued that if God had intended for same-sex couples to reproduce, He would have made two men or two women biologically capable of procreation.
To support her view, she cited Saint Paisios, the 20th-century Greek Orthodox monk from Mount Athos who was canonised by the Ecumenical Patriarchate in 2015 and remains widely referenced by religious conservatives in Greece. Iliadi said Saint Paisios had warned that humanity had managed to destroy everything through civilisation.
She argued that while people in the past faced death through war, modern society faces sickness across many areas of life brought about by civilisation. While acknowledging that progress has delivered many benefits, she claimed that most of its consequences have been harmful and warned that society was approaching a point where children would soon be produced in factories.
Calls to parents over school lessons
Closing her remarks, Iliadi said she was speaking with love and called on other parents to rise up alongside her over what is taught in schools. She claimed that educators were trying to teach pupils that multiple types of family exist, insisted that a household headed by two men or two women is neither normal nor natural, and said parents must teach their children what she described as the proper family.
Her initial October 15 outburst also drew public disagreement in Greece the following day, October 16, when actor and screenwriter Haris Romas stated in response to Iliadi that he had same-sex friends who were raising children in excellent conditions.
