Newsgroup: it.media.tv
Titolo: I've changed my mind about Italy

I've changed my mind about Italy
My love affair with Italy is over. The romance is dead. Now I see the 
country for what it is: rightwing, racist and corrupt
di Martin Kettle
I had been wondering how to begin this piece explaining why I have 
changed my mind about Italy, why over the last decade I have become 
increasingly indignant about a country and culture that used to delight 
me so much, and why I now almost do not care if I ever set foot in the 
place again. But I need not have worried, a Guardian story gave me my cue.
John Hooper's report from Coccaglio near Brescia brought together much 
of what is wrong with modern Italy in one seasonal package, all 
perfectly presented in extravagant wrapping paper and tied up with a 
great bow in the way that only Italians can manage. Christmas in 
Coccaglio, Hooper reports, is being marked by a house-to-house search 
for illegal (ie black) immigrants. The search, which is sponsored by the 
local Northern League-controlled council, has officially been dubbed 
Operation White Christmas and finishes, ho ho ho, on 25 December. One 
Coccaglio councillor has said Christmas is a feast of Christian 
identity, not a celebration of hospitality. The whole crackdown has been 
complimented and backed by Silvio Berlusconi's government.
As a northern European, I grew up with a northern European's readiness 
to have a love affair with Italy. It had warmth instead of cold, 
brightness instead of dark, extroversion instead of introversion, 
passion instead of repression. To go to Italy, as I did most years for a 
large part of my life, was somehow to be released into a world of the 
senses, where the heart ruled the head, where beauty replaced ugliness 
and where easygoing moral naturalness replaced all the buttoned-up 
severity of the protestant world. As I got older I became more 
interested in the language, the art, the history and of course the opera 
and the women. I became fascinated by the politics too. The Italian left 
seemed to possess a uniquely learned and subtle way of looking at its 
country and the world. It offered a beguiling combination of socialism 
and style. In Bologna they seemed to have invented the perfect modern 
city, combining intellectual dynamism, excellent local government and 
some of the best cooking in Europe. Like others of my generation, I 
lapped it all up and wondered why we in Britain could not be more like 
Italians.
That was a long time ago. I see things differently now. The easy thing 
to say would be to blame it all on Berlusconi, on his grotesquery, his 
corruption, his shamelessness and his racism -- and of course to some 
extent I do. As George W Bush did to the global standing of the US, so 
Berlusconi has done to that of Italy. But with this big difference: at 
least the rise of Bush made possible the eventual corrective rise of 
Barack Obama. On the contrary, the rise of Berlusconi seems only to feed 
itself and to propel Italy ever faster down the track of 
media-dominated, media-controlled politics. I sometimes fear this may be 
our future in Britain too, if we do not watch out. My Christmas quiz to 
readers is this. Who would be the British Berlusconi?
Back to Italy. When British observers looked at the US a decade ago and 
asked how could they elect someone like Bush, there was at least a 
fairly clear psephological answer to their question (and it was not 
simply the obvious retort in 2000 that they didn't elect him). Americans 
elected Bush twice because American voters, especially white male 
American voters, tend to be culturally and politically more rightwing 
than white male voters in most of Europe.
We must ask a similar question about Italians. How could they elect 
someone like Berlusconi, and then do it again, and then do it a third 
time? They do so, I suspect, for much the same psephological reasons as 
Americans chose someone like Bush. Look back over 150 years of Italian 
history and you have long periods of rightwing rule, each followed by a 
short period of catastrophe and then by a reassertion of the right. 
Italy has never been the liberal Eden that progressive Europeans 
sometimes delude themselves into imagining it to be. It is actually a 
majority rightwing country. It is a much more corrupt, smut-driven, 
racist and lawless country than the middle-class tourists, armed with 
their EM Forster fantasies and seeing only what they want to see, 
imagine. Coccaglio is not merely a corrective to this. It is the way 
Italy is. Forget the Italy of Dante. Forget the Italy of Verdi. Forget 
the Italy of your fantasies. Welcome to the Italy that calls a raid on 
migrants Operation White Christmas, to the Italy that says the American 
president has a good sun tan -- and to the Italy that then sniggers about it.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/24/goodbye-noughties-italy-rightwing-racist

 I've changed my mind about Italy
U FAKING COMMUNIST PAIED BY POLPOT FRIENDS!
-- 
XBOX/PSN Tag: SydneyBlue120d
http://www.gamingcafe.it/forum/
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BMW E87 120d Attiva driver 

 U FAKING COMMUNIST PAIED BY POLPOT FRIENDS!
polpette? chi ha parlato di polpette?

 polpette? chi ha parlato di polpette?
Piovono Polpette! Da vedere preferibilmente in XpanD o in Sala 3 Nexus di BS 
:D


 
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/24/goodbye-noughties-italy-rightwing-racist
Mi � venuto da piangere. Non scherzo.
-- 
Roberto Rosoni

 Mi � venuto da piangere. Non scherzo.
Pi� o meno su questa lunghezza d'onda ne conosco parecchi. L'Italia si 
sta mangiando un capitale di immagine che ha un valore inestimabile.
Carlo