We have a problem in the United States. Our government has spent the past eight years or so acting in a manner that an honest, independent observer would describe as "borderline-fascistic." Definitely some hard-right, authoritarian leanings. But to describe this characteristic of the Bush Administration thusly, you will be called a number of heinous things, as we dare not insult the right wingers by tying them to Fascism, or worse, racism.
Italy's got a different problem:
[The] National Alliance, are coalition partners in Berlusconi's government. In case anyone missed that, when the Alliance's Gianni Alemanno was elected mayor of Rome in April, his supporters gave the fascist salute chanting "Duce"
Duce. As in "Il Duce." As in Mussolini. And scariest of all his supporters were chanting that.
Here's the deal. There are a lot of things that are pretty spooky about a right-wing government that controls the discourse to the point where any connections between them and anti-democratic governments are verboten. However, at the very least, we do get to hear some lipservice. At least, we can still argue against some policies by making authoritarian comparisons. When you cross that line, when you start responding to claims of fascist leanings with "Damn right! Long live il Duce!" Then I think we start having bigger problems.
And here's the real issue: the situation is worsening. The mayor of Rome is a Fascist. And means it. And doesn't just say that he is to win the votes of some disaffected jackasses. His party - part of the governing coalition - is taking real steps to act on racist, fascistic motives.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/...
Silvio Berlusconi's new rightwing Italian administration announced plans to carry out a national registration of all the country's estimated 150,000 Gypsies - Roma and Sinti people - whether Italian-born or migrants
Yeah, a national registry for all people who are of a certain race. Not immigrants or even something like that. Just any Gypsy in Italy has to register with the government. Because the assumption is now, that ALL Gypsies are criminals until proven otherwise. What does this registration entail? Well, you get fingerprinted. Unlike your fellow citizens, never mind the fact that your family has been in Italy for hundreds of years.
You'll see your courts make rulings like this one:
Italy's highest appeal court ruled that it was acceptable to discriminate against Roma on the grounds that "all Gypsies were thieves",
You can't just be racist because you don't like them, but if they're all thieves, do whatever you want, seems to be the opinion here.
What else can you expect from your government? Well, if you look here: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/...
you'll find that:
Gypsies identified in the census will receive a card giving them access to Italy's social and health services, but Roma parents who keep their children out of school and send them to beg on the streets will lose custody.
Just special rules for the Gypsies. Anyone else - feel free to send your kids out to beg. We don't care.
And how do some people respond with this broad acceptance from the government of hatred?
an orgy of racist violence against Roma camps by thugs wielding iron bars, who torched caravans and drove Gypsies from their slum homes in dozens of assaults, orchestrated by the local mafia, the Camorra.
And if those people acted because they thought the government would at least tacitly support them, they got what they wanted:
Northern League leader Umberto Bossi declared: "The people do what the political class isn't able to do."
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People are fighting back, though. This isn't all of Italy or even most of Italy, just their government. So far, the resistance is loud and angry:
Catholic human rights organisations have damned the fingerprinting of Gypsies as "evoking painful memories".
Those painful memories are an explicit link to the Holocaust, by the way.
Roma groups have demonstrated, wearing the black triangles Gypsies were forced to wear in the Nazi concentration camps, and anti-racist campaigners in Rome this week began to bombard the interior ministry with their own fingerprints in protest against the treatment of the Gypsies
Famiglia Cristiana, Italy's most widely read Catholic magazine, condemned the scheme this week as racist and indecent.
and
Maria Rita Verardo, head of the Association of Juvenile Court Magistrates, called it "an odious form of racial discrimination".
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I don't know what we can do from here in the United States, so please, if anyone has information, post in below. But I do know what our government is doing so far:
So you might have expected that Berlusconi would be taken to task for his vile treatment of the surviving Roma of Europe at the G8 summit in Japan this week by those fearless crusaders for human rights, George Bush and Gordon Brown. Far from it. Instead, Bush's spokesman issued a grovelling apology to the Italian prime minister on Tuesday for a US briefing describing his "good friend" Berlusconi as "one of the most controversial leaders of Italy ... hated by many".
Thanks to Auguste at Pandagon for the story and links:
http://pandagon.net/...