tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-81265701550016339572024-03-05T20:57:41.421+01:00JOURNOLINGUISTjournolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.comBlogger20125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-56163735502340572242013-03-22T09:25:00.001+01:002013-03-22T09:31:58.551+01:00Science, it's so gay!<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 18px;">According to <a href="http://www.vice.com/it/read/intervista-movimento-5-stelle-gian-paolo-vanoli">Gian Paolo Vanoli</a> (of Grillo's M5S) vaccination jabs cause homosexuality, which, is obviously an illness and future generations will suffer the repercussion of the genetic transmission of the disease.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">Another Movimento 5 Stelle member, new spokesman Claudio Messora, famously declared that AIDS is a big con and that HIV is not transmissable.</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 18px;">Homophobia + mumbo jumbo, a match made in heaven!</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-38033443903180421422013-02-25T09:57:00.000+01:002013-02-25T12:07:49.025+01:00Italian elections: THE BALLOT BOX AND THE KLEENEX BOX<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0wtTUQHcHotm3h9KZ47Ni240uKxN5Z2BA06plqJbTbcn7l59v_o4xx6aLTIcDLr5gm-oKCeG_b8CgHW6jd3RdCGWrFJT9RTFAEJhh2k5U41Ntfto8PxHfek4x9XAfGvFFSKBBO341uQ9k/s1600/altan-che-perda-il-peggiore.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0wtTUQHcHotm3h9KZ47Ni240uKxN5Z2BA06plqJbTbcn7l59v_o4xx6aLTIcDLr5gm-oKCeG_b8CgHW6jd3RdCGWrFJT9RTFAEJhh2k5U41Ntfto8PxHfek4x9XAfGvFFSKBBO341uQ9k/s320/altan-che-perda-il-peggiore.jpg" width="249" /></a></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">This morning I went to vote holding a roll of toilet paper. I had to explain that it was not a political statement, but I had run out of tissues. I had to explain that wasn’t a political statement either, just a bad case of running nose. Yet around there were several faces looking like they could use a kleenex and not because of a cold.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">More than for any other Italian election (and that’s something) I hear of people going to the ballot place with a sinking heart and not coming back much relieved. Many are not going altogether. But you don’t want to hear about that, the <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/interactive/2013/feb/21/italian-elections-right-left-square-one">Guardian</a> has already explained Italian politics superficially enough and that’s all you need to know.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Foreign newspapers seem to be unusually interested in the Italian elections this round, media attention from abroad inversely proportional to the locals' enthusiasm. I have the impression that we were much more taken by the US elections than by our own, no wonder. It’s nothing new for Italians to go to the ballot box only so that the worst-man may lose (which seldom happens anyway). So much for hope.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">And yet, one thing these elections managed to do for me is surprise me. I am not talking about the outcome, that can hardly be surprising, I am talking about people.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Berlusconi has been in power in this country for most of my adult life so far and yet I only know a handful of people who voted for him and even less who admitted doing so. Well, that’s obvious, I’ve always thought, we tend to hang out with people holding opinions similar to our own.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">As the electoral campaign trickled down Facebook posts in the past few months, I was genuinely flabbergasted by how many of my Facebook friends were going to vote for Beppe Grillo. The shock was such that I hardly had the stamina to react. You may want to turn elsewhere for a socio-political analysis of Movimento 5 Stelle, and if you can read Italian I recommend the analysis by the writers’ collective <a href="http://www.wumingfoundation.com/giap/?p=11977&fb_action_ids=10151346216898261&fb_action_types=og.recommends&fb_ref=addtoany&fb_source=aggregation&fb_aggregation_id=246965925417366">Wu Ming on how to tell the left from the right</a>. My point here is that I would have never expected that, out of the blue, I’d disagree so profoundly with so many people I know.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Emma Goldman said that if voting changed anything they would make it illegal. I actually think it is true, but I’d amend my personal version to: if voting changed anything <i>for better </i>they would make it illegal. The problem is that voting, and NOT voting, can change things for worse.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">So I went out this morning, armed with a roll of toilet paper. Blew my nose and clamped it tight and voted so that the worst-MEN may lose.</span></div>
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journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-26781587598041460662012-05-17T14:36:00.000+02:002012-05-17T14:36:31.581+02:00VISIBILITY<!--StartFragment-->
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBjV97lTThped8mk9knlEzli8-wKs8FXbFaVoKWbQwZUAVFO0uR-7_dIqK1KheuBfD8-kWLE5WNI8-q40c18HbAh-jOnAWFu16Aay92YPXKKWVS3LBkIUebf3dN_bfLx6QmS7q-7zk-1mT/s1600/226711_10150179071318261_610408260_6869649_2567632_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="133" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBjV97lTThped8mk9knlEzli8-wKs8FXbFaVoKWbQwZUAVFO0uR-7_dIqK1KheuBfD8-kWLE5WNI8-q40c18HbAh-jOnAWFu16Aay92YPXKKWVS3LBkIUebf3dN_bfLx6QmS7q-7zk-1mT/s200/226711_10150179071318261_610408260_6869649_2567632_n.jpg" width="200" /></a><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">How many times
did you come out today?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">It’s a question
I often ask myself. Because, like it or not, coming out isn’t a once-in-a-lifetime-finally-lift-this-weight-from-my-chest
thing, and out I am. Breathe. <br />
After you’ve done your big ones: you’ve come out to yourself, your parents,
your friends, your co-workers and sometimes your soon to be ex heterosexual
partner… then you start the daily coming out routine. You come out at the newsagent’s,
at the grocery store, the hospital, the post office. Or at least, I think you
should.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Visibility is to
us like the air we breathe, vital. Not because we are inescapably flamboyant
and ostentatious, though there is nothing wrong with that. Not because we feel
compelled to <a href="http://www.polarimagazine.com/opinion/shove-it">“shove it in people’s face”</a>. But, literally, because if we are not
visible we are dead. Our relationships don’t exist, our lives don’t exist, we
don’t exist.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Yesterday I went
to have my legs waxed (yes, contrary to popular opinion even lesbians sometimes
do that) and the lady at the parlour told me: “Your wife came last week, she’s
lovely”. She made my day. I don’t mean because she said my wife is lovely,
which she is, but because she said YOUR WIFE. Not your “friend”, not “the other
girl”, not “is that your sister?”, but wife!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Words are
important. They are the way we get closer to understand each other. It is not
just wrong word = wrong message. Wrong word and the further away we are slammed
from one another.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">One of the
reasons we got married was that we wanted my grandmother to understand what we
meant to each other. Marriage was something she could understand, it was in her
language.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">She couldn’t
make it to the wedding in Amsterdam, but my then 89 years old, Italian,
catholic, conservative grandma’s present to us were the embroidered bed sheets of
her wedding night.<br />
“Partner” is too modern a word for an 89 years old lady, but with “wife”, you
can’t go wrong.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Words are
important and words are alive. Every time I come out saying I am married and I
have a wife, the word marriage blossoms with new meaning. <br />
Sometimes when we say “my wife” we get a sort of comedy of errors effect. It
doesn’t just cause surprise, it makes people uncomfortable. Sometimes people ask
“are you the man then?” – “Nope…”. And the dismantling of heteronormative,
patriarchal discourse begins, while you are buying vegetables. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">A word in the
wrong place? No, a word in a different place.<br />
So marriage equality is not about being all the same, it’s about being all different.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">In a great strip
from Alison Bechdel’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Dykes to Watch Out
For</i> Sydney proposes to Mo: “Will you do me the honor of paradoxically
reinscribing and destabilizing hegemonic discourse with me?”<br />
We put it on our invitations. We found it hilarious. Most straight friends
didn’t get it. But, hey, education is a process!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Every time you
come out you are educating someone, you are making things better.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Is it exhibitionistic?
I really don’t think so. Sometimes it is fun to shock people, you get some
truly remarkable reactions. I have a whole collection. Hysteric laughter from
the real estate agent, “well done” from the baker, a discouraging amount of
questions about sexual mechanics, general embarrassment, and some people just
flee. Most of the time coming out again and again is difficult, tough,
annoying, possibly even dangerous.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Visibility is
hard work, not only does it make you vulnerable in many ways, it also wears you
out. Tell a story, explain, explain, explain.<br /><br />
</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">I understand that there are people who have very good reasons to stay in the
closet. I accept it. I don’t respect it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">When I got
married a dear friend said she couldn’t come to the wedding because other
people might realize her homosexuality, by association. You go to a queer
wedding, you must be gay. My visibility threatened her.<br />On a personal level I accepted it, though it hurt, on a social and human level
I never will.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Each and every
out LGBT person has paid a price for their visibility, the consequences of
their so called “<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">lifestyle</b>”. It has
never been easy for anyone, but thanks to all those who came out before us and
come out every day, it becomes easier. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">In this sense
every silent closeted gay or lesbian is a threat to our <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">life</b> in much the same way wailing bigots are. I might feel
differently if I lived in Uganda or in Saudi Arabia, or in any of the countries
where gays and lesbians are killed, imprisoned and persecuted for their sexual
orientation. Precisely because I don’t live in one of these places, coming out
is a duty.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Precisely
because I live in Italy, coming out is a duty. In this province of the Vatican
state homophobia is rampant, tolerated and at times endorsed by representatives
of the institutions. Visiting the Netherlands, our former Prime Minister,
swamped in sex scandals, could think of nothing better to say than that his “passion
for girls was better than being gay”. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">When we got back
from the Netherlands, proudly and happily married, we dared not go right away
to our town hall to ask for the transcription of the wedding on the Italian
register. We didn’t dare to because we knew it couldn’t be done and we weren’t
ready to hear that no, we were not married, not so soon, not yet.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Six months later
we were walking back home from the register office, waving a piece of paper. It
says that the transcription of our marital status had to be refused because
it’s “against the public order”. The officer who had to put a stamp on the
piece of paper was sincerely sorry and puzzled, and even if she hadn’t been, we
would still have made a difference. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Georgia; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">How many times
did you come out today?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<!--EndFragment-->journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-67278061766999574172011-11-17T08:55:00.000+01:002011-11-17T08:59:52.360+01:00The Resurgence<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444;">(WARNING: This is post contains personal political beliefs.)</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444;"><br />
</span><br />
Not only has the Berlusconi era thrashed the last bit of dignity of this country, most tragically it has exterminated its hope, will power and, ultimately, brains.<br />
<br />
You know that a country has really sunk beyond revival when its people are imposed a government of barons, bankers and bigots and they genuinely cheer about it... because they have been told that it's the solution to a crisis caused by barons, bankers and bigots.<br />
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Don't get me wrong, I am ecstatic about Mr B's long due departure. I am not happy at all about how it happened. We needed Revolution, we got Restoration.<br />
<br />
We are back to the roots now, back to the old-line liberal conservative politics of 150 years ago, as Norma Rangeri wrote on <i><a href="http://www.ilmanifesto.it/">il manifesto</a> </i>today. We are celebrating the 150th anniversary of Italy, we are really celebrating the 1st... Let's see how it goes this time.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRlBDKDHlj4wmqdYhurfzziO9B80MItoU81O2pGZdidI6n1ofH-7iElbp4dzrhXjIADMkZaNizRemwOcEujvsoXrlUjlDGf3tWA9nW6ajnM1JrkGEJNHr_Z2hbzEGSfVldU1tNwoxt4Ebt/s1600/20111117primapagina.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRlBDKDHlj4wmqdYhurfzziO9B80MItoU81O2pGZdidI6n1ofH-7iElbp4dzrhXjIADMkZaNizRemwOcEujvsoXrlUjlDGf3tWA9nW6ajnM1JrkGEJNHr_Z2hbzEGSfVldU1tNwoxt4Ebt/s320/20111117primapagina.gif" width="231" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b>The bankers of God</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Monti's supposedly <a href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/11/16/MN391M07AK.DTL">technical</a>, non-political <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-15762791">government</a>.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div>journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-48514095972633132582011-11-17T08:27:00.000+01:002011-11-17T08:58:40.746+01:00The week that changed Italy - a minimal press gallery<span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #333333; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 15px;"></span><br />
<h1 style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-bottom-color: rgb(214, 29, 0); border-collapse: collapse; border-left-color: rgb(214, 29, 0); border-right-color: rgb(214, 29, 0); border-top-color: initial; border-top-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; line-height: 1.154; margin-bottom: 2px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; width: 460px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 15px;"><h1 style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-collapse: collapse; border-left-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-right-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-top-color: initial; border-top-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; line-height: 1.154; margin-bottom: 2px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; width: 460px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: none; border-collapse: separate; color: #333333; font-family: 'Droid Serif', Cambria, Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 20px;"><h1 class="instapaper_title" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font-weight: bold; font: inherit; line-height: 1.333em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; vertical-align: baseline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><h1 class="instapaper_title" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font: inherit; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; vertical-align: baseline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/nov/14/technocrats-europe-bad-politics-economics"><b>Letting technocrats run Europe is bad politics and bad economics </b></a></span></h1><h1 class="instapaper_title" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font: inherit; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; vertical-align: baseline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">It's a mistake to put unelected officials in charge of Italy and Greece (ADITYA CHAKRABROTTY - The Guardian)</span></span></h1><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><div><br />
</div><div><b><a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/the-staggers/2011/11/european-greece-technocrats">Government of the technocrats, by the technocrats, for the technocrats</a></b></div><div>Democracy must not be regarded as merely an optional extra when solving economic problems. (DAVID SKELTON - NewStatesman)</div></span></span></div><div></div></span></span></h1><h1 class="instapaper_title" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font-weight: bold; font: inherit; line-height: 1.333em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; vertical-align: baseline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></span></h1><h1 class="instapaper_title" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.333em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; vertical-align: baseline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><a href="http://prospect.org/article/bankers-choice"><b>Banker's Choice</b></a></span></h1><div class="region region-content-header" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font: inherit; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><div class="block block-views" id="block-views-meta-block" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; clear: both; font: inherit; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><div class="block-content content" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font: inherit; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><div class="view view-meta view-id-meta view-display-id-block view-dom-id-1" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font: inherit; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><div class="view-content" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font: inherit; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><div class="views-row views-row-1 views-row-odd views-row-first views-row-last" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font: inherit; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><div class="post-author" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; display: inline; float: left; font-weight: bold; font: inherit; line-height: 2em; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-transform: uppercase; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: nowrap;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; line-height: 21px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Imagine letting Goldman Sachs and Bank of America select our president — </span></span></span></span></div><div class="post-author" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; display: inline; float: left; font-weight: bold; font: inherit; line-height: 2em; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-transform: uppercase; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: nowrap;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; line-height: 21px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small; font-weight: normal; line-height: 21px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal;">that's just what's happened in Italy and Greece. </span></div><div class="post-author" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; display: inline; float: left; font-weight: bold; font: inherit; line-height: 2em; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-transform: uppercase; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: nowrap;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal; line-height: 21px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">(HAROLD MEYERSON - The American Prospect)</span></span></span></span></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></span></span></span></h1><h1 style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-collapse: collapse; border-left-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-right-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-top-color: initial; border-top-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; line-height: 1.154; margin-bottom: 2px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; width: 460px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></span></span></h1><h1 style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-collapse: collapse; border-left-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-right-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-top-color: initial; border-top-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; line-height: 1.154; margin-bottom: 2px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; width: 460px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></span></span></h1><h1 style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-collapse: collapse; border-left-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-right-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-top-color: initial; border-top-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; line-height: 1.154; margin-bottom: 2px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; width: 460px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></span></h1><h1 style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-collapse: collapse; border-left-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-right-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-top-color: initial; border-top-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; line-height: 1.154; margin-bottom: 2px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; width: 460px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></span></h1><h1 style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-collapse: collapse; border-left-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-right-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-top-color: initial; border-top-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; line-height: 1.154; margin-bottom: 2px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; width: 460px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></span></h1><h1 style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-collapse: collapse; border-left-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-right-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-top-color: initial; border-top-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; line-height: 1.154; margin-bottom: 2px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; width: 460px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/nov/13/how-europe-propped-buffoon-silvio-berlusconi">How Europe propped up the buffoon Berlusconi</a></span></span></span></h1><h1 style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-collapse: collapse; border-left-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-right-color: rgb(0, 97, 166); border-top-color: initial; border-top-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; line-height: 1.154; margin-bottom: 2px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; width: 460px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/nov/13/how-europe-propped-buffoon-silvio-berlusconi"></a></span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small; font-weight: normal; line-height: 20px;">Italian politics was a joke. But, within the security blanket of the eurozone, most people simply shrugged their shoulders (JACKIE ASHLEY - The Guardian)</span></h1><h1 style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-bottom-color: rgb(214, 29, 0); border-collapse: collapse; border-left-color: rgb(214, 29, 0); border-right-color: rgb(214, 29, 0); border-top-color: initial; border-top-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; line-height: 1.154; margin-bottom: 2px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; width: 460px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span></span></span></h1><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small; font-weight: bold; line-height: 18px;"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/10/berlusconi-exit-italy">Berlusconi's exit – what does it mean for Italy?</a> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small; line-height: 20px;">Seventeen years of Berlusconi has meant rising poverty, rampant price-fixing, strengthened organised crime, a burgeoning black market and a shocking brain drain. So what next for troubled Italy? (TOBIAS JONES - The Guardian)</span></span></span></span></h1>journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-1015250418503015202011-10-18T10:06:00.000+02:002011-10-19T09:37:11.219+02:00Occupy the world - Meanwhile in Italy<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiw9pjxHy04NknnVXizj1Vx59UwSJg5bwaO1u8CQdJoMMI6YC9OonAjREIID0gn3IDvMr_KBTkU2bBpKQQB30JpWTW1r_3IzWWI0hfl6YJJtuGtZHQIg0EoiGuV1oZsl3YSimR-ybPB-MN3/s1600/313311_10150323166103261_610408260_7993584_849054407_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiw9pjxHy04NknnVXizj1Vx59UwSJg5bwaO1u8CQdJoMMI6YC9OonAjREIID0gn3IDvMr_KBTkU2bBpKQQB30JpWTW1r_3IzWWI0hfl6YJJtuGtZHQIg0EoiGuV1oZsl3YSimR-ybPB-MN3/s200/313311_10150323166103261_610408260_7993584_849054407_n.jpg" width="141" /></a></div>Sorry about the interruption... we were trying to occupy everything.<br />
<br />
Dismayed by how things turned out for the worst in Rome, this blog has avoided commenting on the October 15th <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/interactive/2011/oct/18/occupy-protests-map-world">worldwide</a> protest.<br />
There we go again, we thought, we always stand out for the worst: the worst government, the worst police, the worst little violent proto-fascist few.<br />
Following the news about the "Rome riot" we felt exactly what the mainstream media wanted us to feel: shame or scorn.<br />
Some of us were ashamed because Italy was ruining the party for the whole movement. The other half was looking with contempt, having confirmed that the pinkos out there are dangerous.<br />
<br />
So while the whole world was making a difference, we were plunged back in the same usual pit of petty politics, recrimination and whining.<br />
In the Italian press you won't find news about what an incredible day the 15th of October was on planet Earth, but you can profusely read the comments and reactions of pretty much any obscure public figure, you can be lectured about the deep roots of violence in this country, you can find improbable interviews to mysterious black bloc members.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEin599SkMZLtB9tghCn9C2kCm8qyEQbbtRIZMUSQql_0dTWA8oL3VG3AHE0zEjJmevlrFDAVZ9fvVR-IR1_rfCLjAh2BLLNwj50cW2tzmYJVDDiSoypIm3XAxtzaYyhNSHIbc_s2meX0sll/s1600/299200_2516242711938_1429335984_32829656_510944522_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEin599SkMZLtB9tghCn9C2kCm8qyEQbbtRIZMUSQql_0dTWA8oL3VG3AHE0zEjJmevlrFDAVZ9fvVR-IR1_rfCLjAh2BLLNwj50cW2tzmYJVDDiSoypIm3XAxtzaYyhNSHIbc_s2meX0sll/s320/299200_2516242711938_1429335984_32829656_510944522_n.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />
<br />
Once again we are the 99%. Once again only the other 1% counts.<br />
<br />
Millions of people in 82 countries, 951 cities across the world, participated to the Day of Rage, peacefully. [<a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/infocus/2011/10/occupy-wall-street-spreads-worldwide/100171/">pictures</a>] 500,000 people in Madrid listened together to Beethoven's 9th symphony, massive demonstrations of the indignados all over Spain (350,000 in Barcelona, 100,000 in Valencia, 40,000 in Zaragoza). There were amazing scenes of cooperation in New York where 10,000 protesters 'took their message from the outpost of Zuccotti Park into the heart of the city, thronging into Times Square' (<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/oct/16/occupy-protests-europe-london-assange">the Guardian</a>). And then London, Berlin and Tokyo, Athens, Chicago, Copenhagen, Frankfurt am Main, Santiago del Chile, Toronto, Zagreb, Sydney, Lisbon, Brussels, Cairo...<br />
...and yes, Rome with 200,000 marching and a few idiots smashing, with the compliance of the police and the government.<br />
<br />
As <i>Repubblica</i> journalist <a href="http://zucconi.blogautore.repubblica.it/2011/10/15/roma-brucia-missione-compiuta/">Vittorio Zucconi</a> commented:<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">A government that is unable to grant order and security during an authorized and peaceful protest, a government that is unable to foresee what we all feared, a government that allows a few hundreds smashing professionals to easily join the flow of the march, wearing uniforms and gas-masks [...], should resign rather than exploit the actions of these hooligans. All the more, if the same day in no other world capital, where similar demonstrations were taking place, anything like this happened.</span><br />
<br />
Now the Italian government will be discussing <a href="http://www.euronews.net/2011/10/17/new-laws-for-italian-police-following-riots/">special laws</a> to increase the police power and put a stop to<br />
"Preparatory acts to commit violence".<br />
Acts such as surrounding a square of mostly peaceful protesters, obstructing all ways of escape? Driving a police van at full speed in a square full of people? Or raiding a school in the middle of the night, beating people and planting evidence(<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jul/17/italy.g8?INTCMP=SRCH">*</a>)?<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgS6qKLd_2giwgGdCdqKtSS2xolIm0SSRXoJvm0YXg58-KJrtyrttDY0fRDmc2-kj02ydc5cyUmot9gw7u93kugHyN8jBNg7Gez-b0yZWmVcW8MQa8udTz4yHiXI2bpu385qBWEbUekzhtM/s1600/poliziascontri_pp_166.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="67" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgS6qKLd_2giwgGdCdqKtSS2xolIm0SSRXoJvm0YXg58-KJrtyrttDY0fRDmc2-kj02ydc5cyUmot9gw7u93kugHyN8jBNg7Gez-b0yZWmVcW8MQa8udTz4yHiXI2bpu385qBWEbUekzhtM/s400/poliziascontri_pp_166.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />
Oh wait a minute, the last two are not preparatory acts to commit violence, they are just plain acts of violence, so sorry about the misunderstanding.<br />
<br />
Condemning young people to unemployment and precarious work<br />
Cuts to the health system and to education<br />
TVnews and politicians daily fomenting hatred against immigrants<br />
Taxing the poor and letting the rich prosper<br />
...<br />
ARE all preparatory acts to commit violence.<br />
<br />
The occupation goes on, spread the word, join the protest, occupy everywhere, "<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CBDqQ3UxmM">crush the hatred play your ukulele naked</a>".journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-56048344536492947502011-09-02T09:01:00.000+02:002011-09-02T09:05:03.596+02:00Ex-patriates<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 16px;">«</span>I'm leaving this shitty country of which I'm sickened!<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 16px;">»</span><br />
<br />
It was not an unemployed researcher joining the stream of Italian fleeing brains, who said this.<br />
It was not a lesbian woman or a gay man, who got married in Amsterdam or New York and who does not have any recognition and spouse rights in Italy, who said this.<br />
It was not a factory worker, who after twenty years on the job watches the production being displaced to more profitable countries, who said this.<br />
It was not an immigrant, arrived with immense strain, who hoped for a better life and found exploitation, injustice, discrimination, who said this.<br />
It was not a pinko, an "indignado", a dissenter, a communist, who just couldn't take it any more after 17 years of Berlusconi, who said this.<br />
<br />
It was <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/sep/01/berlusconi-vows-leave-shitty-italy">Berlusconi</a>, who said this.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMfm-QuR5v8xFpArTzwdif8CVzrvo2Nd4zIr60Od4VIfQWp3ja63I44iVZCI-DjcdcAkpfuNb1U5kU-_gfSzK44VPuqItf2eQH8cC8yubNzpsUlG4Z9hlFgfnpwsNux7NIjltowCkWl6g-/s1600/ITALY.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="136" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMfm-QuR5v8xFpArTzwdif8CVzrvo2Nd4zIr60Od4VIfQWp3ja63I44iVZCI-DjcdcAkpfuNb1U5kU-_gfSzK44VPuqItf2eQH8cC8yubNzpsUlG4Z9hlFgfnpwsNux7NIjltowCkWl6g-/s320/ITALY.png" width="320" /></a></div><br />
"One of them things you say late at night!"<br />
<br />
Yeah, he said that too. After all what Prime Minister hasn't... <br />
"late at night, with half a smile on your face, paradoxically, as something that does not exist".<br />
<br />
No worries, he reassured he is not going anywhere, he's staying right here "to change the country", to solve the big, ominous problem of Italy...<br />
<br />
phone tapping!<br />
<br />
For once Berlusconi and I have something in common: rampant unpatriotism. Though if he really wishes to leave this fraudulent dump, I might as well stay.<br />
<br />
ITALY, LOVE IT OR LEAVE IT<br />
<b><br />
</b><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/NnyFhSi5tPc?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><br />
don't miss the new movie by Gustav Hofer e Luca Ragazzi, award winning authors of <a href="http://www.suddenlylastwinter.com/improvvisamente/">Suddenly last winter</a><br />
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journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-40217190828660969312011-08-11T09:58:00.000+02:002011-08-11T12:18:45.605+02:00They may not have a future, but they got smart phones - the UK riots according to the Right-wing pressThe London riots are all over the Italian press, as well as all over the media in every corner of the world. The conservative papers choose the virus metaphor and they seem to revolve around the question "are we going to get infected too"?<br />
Hardly surprising.<br />
<br />
But while the international copy-cat panic creeps through the front pages, another copy-cat phenomenon meets the eye.<br />
<br />
The Berlusconi family newspaper <a href="http://www.ilgiornale.it/esteri/blackberry_londra_facebook_cairo_blog_iran_rete_nasce_rivolta/10-08-2011/articolo-id=539430-page=0-comments=1">il Giornale</a> embraces the interpretations and the visions of its British ideological twin, the Daily Mail and offers its readers an enlightened and profound explanation of what is going on in the streets of London and the streets of Birmingham.<br />
<br />
One leading commentator of the paper writes:<br />
<br />
<h1 class="titolo_articolo fn entry-title" style="color: #34548f; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 5px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Sbandati e vigliacchi senza passato né futuro In Inghilterra va in scena la guerra della feccia</span></h1><div>which sounds something like</div><div><h1 class="titolo_articolo fn entry-title" style="color: #34548f; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 5px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Morally-wrecked and cowards without a past or a future</span></h1><h1 class="titolo_articolo fn entry-title" style="color: #34548f; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 5px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">England stages the war of scum</span></h1></div><div><br />
</div><div>The fact that they have no past and, especially, no future, does not seem to insinuate any doubt in il Giornale (or in the Daily Mail) about the causes. </div><div>There does not seem to be much interest in understanding WHY this is happening. The Daily Mail this week alternatively blamed <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2023254/Tottenham-riot-Mark-Duggan-shooting-sparked-police-beating-girl.html">twitter</a>, the <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2024690/UK-riots-2011-Britains-liberal-intelligentsia-smashed-virtually-social-value.html">liberal intelligentsia</a>, moral decline, <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2024348/LONDON-RIOTS-2011-Metropolitan-Polices-Paul-Stephenson-crippled-liberalism.html?ITO=1490">phone hacking hysteria</a>. and so on.<br />
<br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcXGQZlMzKtrSn8FsBiGl1C_iLgvjrhTLt6BRWvlTYnylzv1xF6ILdMHgLuHc1MUQWjepqqb9CTp6wpRfzp_WUwZAGb8tKB-mmNvU25CjOc5KFH2Pk8LArfGrWISo6r9ndPyGnB099xZW3/s1600/Daily-Mail-002.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcXGQZlMzKtrSn8FsBiGl1C_iLgvjrhTLt6BRWvlTYnylzv1xF6ILdMHgLuHc1MUQWjepqqb9CTp6wpRfzp_WUwZAGb8tKB-mmNvU25CjOc5KFH2Pk8LArfGrWISo6r9ndPyGnB099xZW3/s320/Daily-Mail-002.jpg" width="239" /></a></div><div><br />
</div><div><br />
</div><div>The media hum-drum repeatedly let us know that these looters have blackberries and i-phones, that it isn't as if they were starving or something, sure they have no future, but hey one cannot have it all.</div><div><br />
</div><div>Il Giornale's writer (Tony Damascelli) tells us it's really about <b>greed</b>: "they are hungry for luxury and never satisfied". And don't forget, it's obviously about <b>drugs</b>: <span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #9fc5e8;">"</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 15px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #9fc5e8;">this is to make money, to by drugs, to go back to their holes and refuse education, refuse jobs"</span>. </span><b>Slackers</b> and <b>junkies</b>, that's it and of course... they are <b>black</b>!</div><div><br />
</div><div>The writer goes on saying that unfortunately David Cameron is not Margaret Thatcher, that there is "no rigor and no vigor", that the government is fragile, the police is fragile and it's because of the chaos created by the phone hacking scandal (where have I already hear this one?).</div><div>So far we have learned that Tony Damascelli is a Daily Mail reader. But it gets better and better. In the following paragraph he assimilates the looters to Adolph Hitler, for no particular reason, but the fact that it is a right wing commentator's habit to nazify the "other" (remember Glenn Beck?).</div><div><br />
</div><div>The article then concludes explaining that there is no class war going on, it's just pointless violence and crime, they are nothing but rats, let's sanitize:<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #9fc5e8;"> "</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 15px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #9fc5e8;">The rats' <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2024120/London-riots-2011-suspects-Photos-released-know-looters.html">faces </a>are on the front pages of every newspaper. They can't get away from the island"</span>.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOqjJ0LnmVz46BxtER2tZzPZdeYIzVGiksdKGFEw30U4Do4brA5VNnC_3kKmODt2PdVQ1W6GuqANn0yWYx7T7el8lwISN3LLKu5JltNmsidOrqkEBbylwki-cTo-aSYFXNQj0hd4oukMdR/s1600/847.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOqjJ0LnmVz46BxtER2tZzPZdeYIzVGiksdKGFEw30U4Do4brA5VNnC_3kKmODt2PdVQ1W6GuqANn0yWYx7T7el8lwISN3LLKu5JltNmsidOrqkEBbylwki-cTo-aSYFXNQj0hd4oukMdR/s320/847.jpg" width="237" /></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span></div><div>Since there is no socio-economic cause but nihilistic greed, there is no need for any socio-economic solution, punishment is all we need. Conservatives and right wingers of the world unite.</div><div><br />
</div><div>But wanting to understand what is going on in the UK does not mean endorsing or even justifying crime and violence, it means looking at a picture that is bigger than one's own spectacles and trying to solve a problem that goes beyond the cuts in the UK, goes beyond the contingent financial crisis and is rooted much more deeply into our society.</div><div><br />
</div><div>So far most commentators, in the UK and abroad have failed to see that, the right-wing press blames it on the "scum" of society, the left-wing one on right wing governments. Replace hoodies with immigrants and Cameron with Berlusconi and the recipe works for every national palate.</div><div><br />
</div><div>However</div><div><br />
</div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;"><b>The looting was, on one level, pure nihilism; on another, it was a crude attempt by rioters to mimic the conspicuous consumption exercised by the affluent and credit-rich. It was an expression of the values of a society in which we have been taught that, in the words of the former Labour minister Alan Milburn, to lead a good life is to "earn and to own".</b></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"> (<a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/uk-politics/2011/08/riots-violence-social-speed">theNewStatesman</a> 10.08.11)</span></div>journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-21933643788091027542011-08-11T08:25:00.001+02:002011-08-11T11:28:40.407+02:00in the map of shame<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisIg-K-Y0arJYFUS4_8yfJBsTXWihifvF8v7XiVFuAVmC4xjhHfTR4-GfHNBKBJHsDANQLXJqMxADddYSarf-KiGFsES_y5nFquEaDk2LjVVmaZVmsQdGwoVArXT2OgGaJVGS0RYRBceMY/s1600/6a011570c131b2970c014e8a2e0a5e970d.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisIg-K-Y0arJYFUS4_8yfJBsTXWihifvF8v7XiVFuAVmC4xjhHfTR4-GfHNBKBJHsDANQLXJqMxADddYSarf-KiGFsES_y5nFquEaDk2LjVVmaZVmsQdGwoVArXT2OgGaJVGS0RYRBceMY/s400/6a011570c131b2970c014e8a2e0a5e970d.jpg" width="316" /></a></div><br />
journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-254930534112903212011-08-04T10:02:00.000+02:002011-08-04T10:14:09.802+02:00Meet the marketsYesterday Italian journalists spent the day telling the Italian public that we were all nervously waiting for Berlusconi's crisis (or anti-crisis) speech at the Parliament. Many also told us that while we still had to wait in trepidation we shouldn't expect anything new or useful.<br />
Nothing new or useful was said after all and all newspapers opened this morning with big dull titles about same old same old. The media hasn't found <u>the</u> morbid crime of the summer yet.<br />
If you want to hear what a failure the prime minister's speech was, the foreign press is eager to tell you: <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/aug/03/italy-debts-economic-reform">the Guardian</a>, <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/berlusconi-says-italy-is-sound-but-fails-to-convince-the-markets-2331442.html">the Independent</a>, <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2022025/Berlusconi-holds-fresh-bunga-bunga-party-Italys-economy-brink.html?ito=feeds-newsxml">the Daily Mail</a>, the <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903366504576486160703012234.html">Wall Street Journal</a>, the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/04/world/europe/04italy.html?_r=1&ref=europe">New York Times</a>,<a href="http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/finance/2011/0804/1224301822815.html"> the Irish times</a>, <a href="http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/markets/market-wrong-on-italy-berlusconi/story-e6frg916-1226107935696">the Australian</a>, the <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-14392943">BBC</a>, <a href="http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,15291416,00.html">Deutsche Welle</a>, you name it...<br />
<br />
But what I'd like to discuss is something that may sound even more un-newsworthy and obvious, that is the way we are used to talk about markets. The way we are taught to think about <b>the markets</b>.<br />
The radio was quacking in the background all day and I kept hearing "the markets ... the markets ... the markets ...." and after a while I felt for them, <b>the markets</b>, poor chaps, poor family, poor rock band... But WHO are these markets anyway?<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijjvhcGleaFxaFMuiC1Y0bfpAle179tK0amel30Sw-1eLsJ1pHMvFyKixrQUnqzBXVO0khsWgKrItd-ekZBSzL4lJIlZYAzSpVBaNpchZKKpVwFvFQoxZhwENWkQR7iw811adaKeSWS3ca/s1600/faceless_family.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijjvhcGleaFxaFMuiC1Y0bfpAle179tK0amel30Sw-1eLsJ1pHMvFyKixrQUnqzBXVO0khsWgKrItd-ekZBSzL4lJIlZYAzSpVBaNpchZKKpVwFvFQoxZhwENWkQR7iw811adaKeSWS3ca/s1600/faceless_family.png" /></a></div><br />
<br />
In Italian, as well as in English, there seems to be a massive tendency to anthropomorphize the markets. Just reading through the articles mentioned before we find plenty of examples, there are "stunned markets", "nervous" markets, the Deutsche Welle titles "Berlusconi seeks to soothe market nerves".<br />
So it's <b>normal</b>, that's how one conventionally speaks about the markets, the economy and lots of other inanimate things, we make them human, it a bit like seeing a smiley face in the moon (we do that all the time, it's called <a href="http:/">pareidolia</a>) it's the way our brain works, we just can't help it, can we?<br />
<br />
I did a very informal analysis of how <b>the markets<i> </i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;">are represented in the Italian media, looking at the past month's news on a variety of outlets (moderate, left wing and right wing dailies, financial papers, catholic press, weeklies) and the picture that emerged was very much homogeneous. The markets are people, just like you and me.</span></b><br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><br />
</span></b><br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;">They have cognitive processes:</span></b><br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><i>the markets judge, the markets have understood, the markets don't give much weight to the declarations, the markets think, the markets obviously doubt about it, the markets are skeptical, the markets will start to make conjectures, the markets believe, the markets are ever more convinced, the markets know, the markets are not stupid ...</i></span></b><br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><i><br />
</i></span></b><br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;">Emotional ones:</span></b><br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><i>the markets remained indifferent, depressed the markets, calmed the markets, worried the markets, shocked the markets, scared the markets, the markets' nervousness, the markets' mood, the markets' euphoria, the markets' fear, the markets' relief, the markets might loose confidence, the markets are worried, the markets wish, the markets are taken by surprise, nervous session for the markets ...</i></span></b><br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><i><br />
</i></span></b><br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;">They are involved in communicative interactions:</span></b><br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><i>convince the markets, give a signal to the markets, the markets demand, make the markets understand, his first interlocutors will be the markets, that's what the markets ask, the markets reply, the markets are telling us, the markets can't give an adequate answer, </i><i>and the markets said "...", listen to the markets ...</i></span></b><br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><i><br />
</i></span></b><br />
They have senses, in particular sight:<br />
<i>the markets look with apprehension, is seen by the markets, the markets foresee, the markets look attentively, the perception of the markets, right or wrong the markets perceive, the markets like, the markets don't like ...</i><br />
<i><br />
</i><br />
They do very human things:<br />
<i>the markets wait </i> (they appear to do a lot of waiting)<i>, the markets cheer, the markets hunt, the markets menace, the markets will punish, the markets attack,</i><i> the markets go on the rollercoaster, the markets bite Italy ...</i><br />
and as for biting one needs teeth, the markets seem to have many more human body parts:<br />
arms <i>the markets wave</i><br />
legs <i>the markets stagger</i><br />
shoulders <i>the markets leave behind their backs</i><br />
lungs <i>the markets are gaping, the markets exhale with relief</i><br />
hearts <i>the markets are in fibrillation</i><br />
they <i>suffer</i> and they <i>keep on suffering, </i>they have <i>serious health problems</i><br />
<i><br />
</i><br />
There is <i>the markets' revolt </i>and <i>the markets' dictatorship</i>. Still WHO these markets are we don't know, human in every respect, but with no faces.<br />
<br />
Berlusconi's speech will be forgotten tomorrow, the global accumulation of patterns humanizing inanimate and abstract things in our language stays and strengthens every day. The more obvious, the more NORMAL it gets, the more problematic. We are to talk to, listen to, respond to, blame ... <b>the markets </b>but we can't. The markets have no name, no picture, no criminal record, no job to loose, shoes to buy, rent to pay, pets to feed, kids to see through school, relatives to bury... The markets are not accountable, people are.<br />
<br />
In the meantime "Silvio challenges the markets" and off on holiday he goes (yesterday's was last session for the Italian parliament) ... the markets of course don't sunbathe and don't 'bunga bunga' party, do they?<br />
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</span></b>journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-78312951263280514942011-07-08T14:41:00.000+02:002011-07-08T15:22:22.879+02:00"Like a butcher's shop"<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Remembering G8 Genova 2001-2011</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dwKUShMP6pPLUE9rp0mtpyKLj-6YZW_ut3aoWl0-bOWKY2-Am_pLwUFalg-5i3ZfTLbyzjCv00YfxVN6GJU' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><br />
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</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">Like a butcher's shop - was the description by one of the convicted police officers, Michelangelo Fournier, of the way Italian police beat innocent protesters at the G8 summit in Genoa 2001.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div>read more:<br />
<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jul/17/italy.g8">Nick Davies on the Guardian 17 July 2008</a>journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-88624181697204300232011-07-04T16:02:00.000+02:002011-07-04T18:20:01.131+02:00from the media closet the perfect moral panic, goes with everything, right for any occasion, ladies and gents meet the Black Bloc<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"></span><br />
<div class="story-body" style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; width: 464px;"><span class="story-date" style="color: #505050; display: block; float: left; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 13px; width: 290px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 18px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: yellow;">Police blamed the disruption on left-wing "black bloc" extremists from Italy and neighbouring countries,</span></span></b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: yellow;"> AFP news agency reported.</span></span></span></span><br />
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</div></div><div style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;"><div class="story-related" style="clear: both; color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 24px !important; margin-left: 0px !important; margin-right: 0px !important; margin-top: 0px !important; overflow-x: visible; overflow-y: visible; position: relative; width: 464px;"></div></div><div style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;"><br />
</div><div style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">institutions, politicians, commentators, dutifully followed and fomented by the media have embraced the black bloc story.</div><div style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;"><br />
</div><div style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">"Terrorism", "attempted murder", "illegal violence" (no problem with legal violence) are just a few of the expression clouding the news about the Val di Susa protest.</div><div style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;"><br />
</div><div style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">The mainstream media don't get the numbers right, they don't get people, causes, effects, they just don't get the story right, because it's so much more convenient to rely on the easy scapegoat. And on goes the humdrum about English speaking anarchists, the black bloc is back! </div><div style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;"><br />
</div><div style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">But there is a strong and resourceful local community reclaiming and protecting its territory that will not be silenced.</div><div style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">You can follow the adventures of the Val di Sherwood on Twitter #notav</div><div style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;"><br />
</div><div style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">Activists online (on initiative of the writers collective Wu Ming) bewildered by the absence of #notav in the list of most tweeted hashtags, have collectively started an hashtag guerrilla, hijacking the tag #saldi (sales).</div><div style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;"><br />
</div><div style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">Experiment and resist!</div>journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-69850478532761363112011-07-04T08:41:00.000+02:002011-07-04T08:41:01.882+02:0070 thousand NO<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/Hp0oAKHGxfw?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><br />
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<a href="http://www.notavtorino.org/">learn more about the NO-TAV movement</a>journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-48051994035766834982011-07-01T16:10:00.000+02:002011-07-01T16:13:54.113+02:00Marco Travaglio, Italy's foremost investigative journalist (from the Independent)<div class="tagline" style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 14px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/press/the-thorn-in-silvios-side-marco-travaglio-has-made-a-career-out-of-exposing-the-italian-pm-2305045.html">The thorn in Silvio's side: Marco Travaglio has made a career out of exposing the Italian PM</a><br />
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He is even founding a newspaper based on The Independent to report on him.</div><div class="author" style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-weight: 700; line-height: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><author>By Lillo Montalto Monella</author></div><div class="author" style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-weight: 700; line-height: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div class="author" style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.2em; font-weight: 700; line-height: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><author><br />
</author></div><div class="author" style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.2em; font-weight: 700; line-height: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><author><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 15px;"></span></author></div><div class="font-null" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">For politicians everywhere, if you get hammered in two consecutive rounds of elections, you've only yourself to blame. Or at least, the opposition – for having done its job well.</div><div class="font-null" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"></div><div class="font-null" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">But in Italy, the reverse is true. As a result, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi held the media solely responsible for his defeat in last month's local elections (when he suffered a major setback in some 90 Italian cities, almost losing the right-wing stronghold Milan to a communist lawyer and Naples to a former prosecutor).</div><div class="font-null" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">In particular, Berlusconi blamed a couple of journalists. One of them is Marco Travaglio, who has been a thorn in the premier's side for more than a decade.</div><div class="font-null" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Travaglio has a nose for all sorts of political and judicial intrigues, even though they are never particularly hard to find in Italy.</div><div class="font-null" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">In September 2009 he founded a newspaper modelled on The Independent, to provide a medium for his regular criticism of the Italian establishment.</div><div class="font-null" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">He was in London in June to chair a debate about Berlusconi's approach to politics and the media. The debate, "Italians are better than their Prime Minister", was organised by London Metropolitan University and Il Fatto Quotidiano (The Daily Fact) Travaglio's paper, which shifts 150,000 copies per day, a big deal in a country where the top paper, Il Corriere della Sera, sells around 480,000 copies every day.</div><div class="font-null" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">With sales figures on the up and a net profit of €9m for 2010, the paper has built its success on Italian scepticism towards traditional media outputs, which are regarded as biased and unreliable.</div><div class="font-null" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Travaglio's speech outlined his approach to the issue: "In Italy, a journalist who finds a news story spends more time trying to convince his editor to publish it than in finding it. Our paper was born for this purpose: giving shelter to those reporters who would like to consider their job done once they have found a story to tell."</div><div class="font-null" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Il Fatto Quotidiano's character reflects Travaglio's and its editorial policy has been clear since its first cover story, which uncovered an ongoing investigation into Berlusconi right-hand man, Gianni Letta, which "nobody dared to talk about". After years digging behind the scenes, Travaglio was thrown into the spotlight in 2001, when he published the book L'odore dei soldi (The Smell of Money) a controversial account of the origins of the Italian PM's fortunes. The allegations in the book sparked a huge debate after the author appeared on a chat show, giving many Italians their first chance to hear about the mysterious origins of Berlusconi's media empire and his alleged ties to the Mafia. The PM sued for millions for having "literally shattered his public, political and entrepreneurial reputation," but was unsuccessful.</div><div class="font-null" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Travaglio is now touring Italian theatres with his vitriolic show, General Anaesthetic, in which he ridicules the contradictions of a country anaesthetised by a media that is a "servant to the political power" and oblivious of its role as society's watchdog.</div><div class="font-null" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">As well as appearing on stage and in print, his tongue-lashing editorials are the flagship part of the successful talk-show AnnoZero, broadcasted on Italian state television, despite being on Berlusconi's blacklist.</div><div class="font-null" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Summing up his quest, Travaglio told his London audience: "We just do what journalism is all about: we call thieves 'thieves' and gentlemen 'gentlemen'. It does look obvious but, believe me, it is not in Italy."</div><div class="font-null" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><i><br />
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<i>(The Independent </i>01.07.2011)<br />
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<i>Lillo Montalto Monella is an Italian reporter and photojournalist. A version of this article originally appeared at <a href="http://blogs.independent.co.uk/" style="color: #125581; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">blogs.independent.co.uk</a></i></div>journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-68849270933268704822011-06-23T11:10:00.000+02:002011-06-23T11:10:03.879+02:00The face of power - by Massimo GramelliniTo know the face of Mr Bisignani is the privilege of few. The 10 or 11 million Italians who talked to him over the phone have never met him in person and the man in the street who has only lately learnt about his existence see every day the same picture, one taken ages ago, with drop shaped glasses on a smooth face.<br />
It’s a paradox, isn’t it? We keep being told that we exist only if we are visible, and in the meantime nobody knows the people with the real power. Never spotted a banker on talk shows’ chairs, not even in the States. The puppeteers send the puppets to shamble on TV. May be they are worried that by having their image reflected on thousands of screens their soul would be taken away. Or may be they simply know that power feeds on fear and nothing makes fear fade as familiarity.<br />
Just one step below the invisibles, are the audio-authorities: those who do not participate to TV shows, but phone the studio live, voicing their looming monologues from the top, over the faces on screen. Another step below there is the one who appears speaking from abroad, on a broad screen the size of a Mao poster. But he appears, which mens he does not count much. The ones that really do not count a thing are the habitual TV guests. The puppets hugging their chairs, clattering for attention, for a close up, while the mutter the mantra “I didn’t interrupt you, do not interrupt me”. The despondent people despises them and votes them. The faceless power despise them and uses them.<br />
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</div><div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">[Translation by Anna Marchi. Original available </span><a href="http://www.lastampa.it/_web/cmstp/tmplRubriche/editoriali/hrubrica.asp?ID_blog=41"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">LA STAMPA</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> - 23.06.2011]</span></div></div><div><br />
</div>journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-59173675674682376422011-06-23T10:04:00.000+02:002011-06-23T11:13:02.260+02:00P4 and the 4Ps: pimps, prostitutes, plunderers and profiteersItalians are learning about the P4, the latest and updated version of the masonic gang that rules the country behind the scenes.<br />
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Bisignani is the man in the shadow, politics, media, business, banks, he seems to have been running things in every district of power. He is all over the front pages, but there is just one old picture of his face, we can read everything he said over the phone, but we can’t see him and don't know much about him.<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://anna-marchi.blogspot.com/2011/06/face-of-power-by-massimo-gramellini.html">(On this issue my translation of an excellent column by Massimo Gramellini)</a></b></span><br />
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Immediately the more visible 4Ps sitting in the government and the parliament rush to push through the gag law to impede the kind of phone tapping that is exposing the underbelly of power.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoBE8p6uFQza5CQ58A87iErrhloQIP5xrCIqrdO5WuCdN-K8USQgrrKXDAHFGTpN8KcZfithFXZVpr_XkFK9yvTpYOBQn1LrXm6VUqX61y80JABH7NL-CmkM7t4a91KG3N0uBr2qIngqb6/s1600/de14b6fe69fabe107b947f88945c8601-resized.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoBE8p6uFQza5CQ58A87iErrhloQIP5xrCIqrdO5WuCdN-K8USQgrrKXDAHFGTpN8KcZfithFXZVpr_XkFK9yvTpYOBQn1LrXm6VUqX61y80JABH7NL-CmkM7t4a91KG3N0uBr2qIngqb6/s400/de14b6fe69fabe107b947f88945c8601-resized.png" width="270" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;">(“It’s a useless government” / “Monsters, jerks and sluts”)</div><br />
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While pimps, prostitutes, plunderers and profiteers sit in the government, the right wing press tells us Brunetta was right about the “worse part of Italy”, it’s there and it’s the precarious teachers, “so called teachers” says <i>ilGiornale</i>, who protested outside the Parliament asking Berlusconi to quit.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIDSUJnTNsAWzWs2yDAKUiJcZR6ZYfcVhQOPggMGhf-ffta2dPVFenlJCfXC44wPszmLgkEuavZ8V6RRlWSxDAlGMuARtIw-JOl3VdujlaJM6iBLmj02J3rFl9_J_3yUCER2R-p8lsuAtQ/s1600/653abd08e67b27604e70b72cfe3436de.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIDSUJnTNsAWzWs2yDAKUiJcZR6ZYfcVhQOPggMGhf-ffta2dPVFenlJCfXC44wPszmLgkEuavZ8V6RRlWSxDAlGMuARtIw-JOl3VdujlaJM6iBLmj02J3rFl9_J_3yUCER2R-p8lsuAtQ/s400/653abd08e67b27604e70b72cfe3436de.jpg" width="296" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;">(Brunetta was right / There you are, the worse Italy)</div><br />
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<i>IlGiornale</i> and <i>Libero</i> also tell their readers they shouldn’t worry about P4, that doesn’t exist, just like mafia, the real P4 are magistrates (also called PM in Italian, how very convenient for a nice tabloidy headline).<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijzAajOjQImfb0JoMWxW0b_zqwAEHH6xMR_hSUAx2oAgUtznNw1zI4ZjFXJy0uSbrKkPtvxrFVEm-205GtvlIV1GHz3oo9O-UAYzQ0mB8P0TUFOaJ4UD6_iwaUJRGfijlTxQvTWMuIE2FR/s1600/3fa3a225b51b5c0fdde7aefdf1709f45-resized.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijzAajOjQImfb0JoMWxW0b_zqwAEHH6xMR_hSUAx2oAgUtznNw1zI4ZjFXJy0uSbrKkPtvxrFVEm-205GtvlIV1GHz3oo9O-UAYzQ0mB8P0TUFOaJ4UD6_iwaUJRGfijlTxQvTWMuIE2FR/s400/3fa3a225b51b5c0fdde7aefdf1709f45-resized.png" width="272" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;">(They only spy the government. The real P4 are the magistrates)</div><br />
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Berlusconi won yesterday a confidence vote and vowed to <a href="http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Berlusconi+says+resign+despite+electoral+flop/4988671/story.html">stay until 2013</a>. He said he has to because “the majority is strong and cohesive”, he said he has to because it would be “folly” to leave the country in political and financial instability, “ending up like other European countries which are virtually bleeding”, he said he has to because there is no alternative to his government, he said he has to although it is “a great sacrifice” but someone has to do it.<br />
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</div>journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-27135661788804108382011-06-17T10:05:00.000+02:002012-05-19T09:45:48.759+02:00The worst part of Italy - a post PC storyThis is a post PC story. It's not a post Personal Computer story, it's not a post Italian Communist Party story (though it may well be), it is a post Political Correctness story. Post implicates an ante, which is probably a misleading concept in the Italian context, but in the global world please allow the idea that we can be post PC, without having ever been there.<br />
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On June 14th the web on this shore of the big world was invaded by a <a href="http://tv.repubblica.it/edizione/roma/brunetta-non-risponde-ai-precari-siete-l-italia-peggiore/70773?video">viral video</a> where the Minister for Public Administration and Innovation Renato Brunetta calls precarious workers "the worst part of Italy". Within minutes a Facebook page requesting the resignation of the Minister was created and within an afternoon it collected more than 10 thousand subscriptions (the number this minute is 37,508 and growing). Brunetta readily <a href="http://video.unita.it/media/Virus/Brunetta_sottotitolato_Non_mento_modifico_i_ricordi__2949.html">replied</a> from his webcam claiming he was attacked by a bunch of <i>drag-precari</i> that were in fact brigadists exploiting the dramatic situation of so many young Italians, in order to push through their own agenda. These people who savaged and insulted him, he said, "are not the victims of precariat<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">(1)</span>, they are the victims of their own failures".<br />
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Apparently in Italy there are about 4 million losers, victim of their own failures.<br />
They used to call them "flexible", flexible is good isn't it: it bends it doesn't break, it folds you can carry it everywhere, it's soft it doesn't hurt.<br />
It doesn't hurt, but they get hurt, another name for them is "casualised workers", doesn't it recall "casualty" = <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="SEP" context="DEFINITION-before" space="yes" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><a class="QUERY" href="http://www.macmillandictionary.com/search/british/direct/?q=someone" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: black; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="someone">someone</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><a class="QUERY" href="http://www.macmillandictionary.com/search/british/direct/?q=or" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: black; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="or">or</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><a class="QUERY" href="http://www.macmillandictionary.com/search/british/direct/?q=something" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: black; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="something">something</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><a class="QUERY" href="http://www.macmillandictionary.com/search/british/direct/?q=that" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: black; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="that">that</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><a class="QUERY" href="http://www.macmillandictionary.com/search/british/direct/?q=is" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: black; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="is">is</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><a class="QUERY" href="http://www.macmillandictionary.com/search/british/direct/?q=damaged" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: black; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="damaged">damaged</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><a class="QUERY" href="http://www.macmillandictionary.com/search/british/direct/?q=or" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: black; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="or">or</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><a class="QUERY" href="http://www.macmillandictionary.com/search/british/direct/?q=suffers" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: black; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="suffers">suffers</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><a class="QUERY" href="http://www.macmillandictionary.com/search/british/direct/?q=as" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: black; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="as">as</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><a class="QUERY" href="http://www.macmillandictionary.com/search/british/direct/?q=a" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: black; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="a">a</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><a class="QUERY" href="http://www.macmillandictionary.com/search/british/direct/?q=result" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: black; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="result">result</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><a class="QUERY" href="http://www.macmillandictionary.com/search/british/direct/?q=of" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: black; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="of">of</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><a class="QUERY" href="http://www.macmillandictionary.com/search/british/direct/?q=something" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: black; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="something">something</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"><a class="QUERY" href="http://www.macmillandictionary.com/search/british/direct/?q=else" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: black; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="else">else</a></span>. Then you have "intermittent workers", as if you could live intermittently, intermittently pay rent, intermittently eat. "Temporary workers", hey don't look at me everything is ephimerous, just go and "hold eternity in an hour".<br />
Then the word "precarious" arrived. Unsteady, unbalanced, unstable, DANGEROUS. The people at the top planned it to be dangerous for us, and indeed it is, but it turned out it is dangerous for them too. Precariat will become the new proletariat. Then it is a post Communist Party story!<br />
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So the new communicative strategy is making the "precarious worker" disappear. A conservative politician won't be caught dead saying the words. "Precarious worker" is a political label not a socio-economic category. Let's just refer to "project worker" (it makes it nearly sound as if they have a plan), "freelance workers" (it makes it sound as if it was their choice), or "self-employed" (that is empowering!). But those "precarious workers", those bogus precarious workers I mean, they are just the worse part of Italy.<br />
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Recently ISTAT (the National Institute of Statistics) revealed that there are 2 million young Italians who don't do anything. They don't count as unemployed, because they are not even looking for a job, they don't study, they live with their parents, relying on the family as lifejacket. They are called the idle "lost generation", though the Italian term used to describe them is much more revealing. They are "rassegnati", they are <u>hopeless</u>. About 1/5 of Italian youth, between 18 and 34, is hopeless; after that we become plain useless.<br />
HOPELESS is an interesting lexical choice. It suggests that it's our responsibility having lost hope, rather than conveying the idea that somebody stripped us of our future.<br />
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According to senator <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3wgWlQzidQ&sns=fb">Giorgio Clelio Starcquadanio</a> (PDL),<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 15px;"> </span> Berlusconi's party lost the regional elections and the referendum, because on the other side there is an army of 4 million slackers "who have fuckin' nothing to do and spend all day fiddling on the web" and making a hell of a rack.<br />
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Hopeless, losers, failures, the worse part of Italy, slackers, squadrists, web-jerkers... I told you it was a post politically correct story.<br />
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The FB page requesting <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Go7cMxRnxy8">Brunetta</a>'s resignation has in the meantime reached: <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: grey; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=105487952876746">37,749 attending</a></span>.<br />
The tenor of the comments is admittedly quite offensive and unimaginative. They pick on him for his "stature", now that is a low blow! On the other hand if they had hit higher they'd have probably missed the target.<br />
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It's post PC baby, or just call us: differently stable.<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">1) It is necessary here to stress that the words “precarious-precarity-precariat” are a linguistic innovation, which in the last year has spread from Italy and Spain to all the European networks engaged in a reflection on casualisation. Superseding the better known terms “flexibility-flexworker”, the introduction of “precarious-precarity-precariat” marks the emergence of struggles that are constituent of a new terminology and new imaginary from which, in turn, new rights come to light. (</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">Marcello Tarì and Ilaria Vanni, </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #111111; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 18px;"><a href="http://five.fibreculturejournal.org/fcj-023-on-the-life-and-deeds-of-san-precario-patron-saint-of-precarious-workers-and-lives/%20precarious,%20casualised,%20sessional,%20intermittent,%20temporary,%20flexible,%20project,%20freelance%20and%20fractional"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">On the Life and Deeds of San Precario, Patron Saint of Precarious Workers and Lives</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">)</span></span><br />
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</span></span></div>journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-8888116613536343672011-06-14T10:13:00.000+02:002011-06-14T10:22:01.155+02:00Freedom is participation - evolve or die!It was a joyous sunny morning reflecting on the wet pavement. We were walking home after the busride from Rome and an amazing Europride parade.<br />
You might have heard of it by now, you certainly know about <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFtz88dlOvE&feature=player_embedded">Lady Gaga's speech</a> and what a powerful, moving and serious speech it was. I felt proud and honored to be there and grateful.<br />
We went to the newsagent, we wanted to see our day printed in sticky ink. A discussion started around the counter covered with papers, "look at that, this Lady Germanotta attracted 1 million people, she brought 1 MILLION people in the square with a 30 min show, while we have to make all this effort for the referendum". I raised my head in disbelief, sleep brushed away by a sudden anger, "you may find out - I said - that we would have been in that square anyway". I wanted to say more, but I left, my stomach churning, leaving silence behind.<br />
We would have been there anyway, I thought again as I was going to vote. We flooded Rome's streets for our rights, we flooded the electoral box the next day for our rights, and yours too. But that man at the newsagent's did not seem to notice how the two things were connected. Some "friendly" newspapers did not seem to notice either. L'Unità - a left- wing committed newspaper - decided that 500,000 people marching and a gathering of 1 million deserved a small mention somewhere on page 22, after 20 odd pages about the referendum. Most media thought, as the man at the newsagent's, that it was all about Lady Gaga, they failed to register that as she brought thousands of people together, it was thousands of people together bringing her in the first place.<br />
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I have no problem with the fact that a Versace dress tickles journalists' pens more than <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jOFGzwaAxk8&feature=player_embedded">the broken voice of a lesbian parent</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGAlZmc6H0U&feature=player_embedded">the swelling heart of a mother</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZsNnBqlF7Q&feature=player_embedded">the stinging words of the president of the transgender movement</a>, but I want the man at the newsagent's, I want journalists, I want everybody to realize that the meaning of the Europride parade is not different from the meaning of the referendum. As the Italian songwriter Giorgio Gaber said "Freedom is participation". The Pride parade is a carnival, it is an expression of sheer joy, it is a show of us being us and of us being here, it is a protest, made of energy and rage and exhilaration. And you Mr newsagent's man should have been there too. Besides it was a fabulous dress and boy what a voice ;-)<br />
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Today it is another joyous day, the sun is struggling to break through the clouds, the street is filled with cheering chats about the referendum and I am grateful to all 26,130,637 Italians who voted.<br />
It is priceless to see the papers spread on the counter spread with YES, even more priceless to see this:<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgc9jcBeNXD-Q8jI6HBEv5rJmRieoSu5wJzz1qrav0uqgum62zeELWI6wpiuh4wWuvacXVa47abRzYHsf6oWC6GvKP1m0iL56UIl5LmpruN_TZntuvjasJhWNpUHt2CW9megJ5h0U0hk4ex/s1600/80b4c7353133755424427e0ac024448c-resized.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgc9jcBeNXD-Q8jI6HBEv5rJmRieoSu5wJzz1qrav0uqgum62zeELWI6wpiuh4wWuvacXVa47abRzYHsf6oWC6GvKP1m0iL56UIl5LmpruN_TZntuvjasJhWNpUHt2CW9megJ5h0U0hk4ex/s320/80b4c7353133755424427e0ac024448c-resized.png" width="218" /></a></div>But hey, 26 million, listen, you should have been with us too. And if you still think that we are not talking about the same kind of RIGHTS... well "evolve or die".journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-51978370584688553092011-06-10T14:10:00.000+02:002011-06-10T14:21:55.776+02:00The revolution will not be televised - Bring your own camera!Such is the moral pillage, the devastation of hopes, the bonfire of ideas perpetuated by Berlusconism in this country, that we hang with desperation to voices from abroad.<br />
A famished readership of Italians, tired of walking the globe gaunt and apologetic, has spent the morning posting the Economist's front page on their Twitter and Facebook accounts, as if crying <i>LOOK LOOK, DO YOU SEE IT NOW? The king is naked! </i><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKh6c8vxBbX5JtuiohHrUaT_hBKlX7lXCt5jWUeB7CJfDPHfoR-9tNUpwVKqK9sVceuu5gOHf_yFEzKxGs0ezry0zX3Ky-XiFEmG_SXrttaC6d0qsJxuxdDWg9CB1Tjoe6uoU6ViXUa2V4/s1600/20110610_economist.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKh6c8vxBbX5JtuiohHrUaT_hBKlX7lXCt5jWUeB7CJfDPHfoR-9tNUpwVKqK9sVceuu5gOHf_yFEzKxGs0ezry0zX3Ky-XiFEmG_SXrttaC6d0qsJxuxdDWg9CB1Tjoe6uoU6ViXUa2V4/s320/20110610_economist.jpg" width="283" /></a></div><br />
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But, is he? The foreign press has declared Berlusconi dead many times, unfortunately this country ain't the foreign press. If you want change, go out and get it, go out and MAKE it!<br />
The campaign for this weekend's referendum is "Vote YES to say NO!". We should learn the lesson, quit shaking our hanging heads in disapproval, shame, dismay and DO something.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiC4Rnp6ksGlZgxMgx6KDC-QHy3MBILTzYtFTEsairEjjWlr15CCWjpi0hUkkXLSPi3f7x2Rr47hXN-4c8ouMKQjJEg9Jrvt_-uRmHBiiMMmiPJ1an1KonzGlSNWxZNfdjw30A0VgJd1qFm/s1600/a5cebf37ad.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="195" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiC4Rnp6ksGlZgxMgx6KDC-QHy3MBILTzYtFTEsairEjjWlr15CCWjpi0hUkkXLSPi3f7x2Rr47hXN-4c8ouMKQjJEg9Jrvt_-uRmHBiiMMmiPJ1an1KonzGlSNWxZNfdjw30A0VgJd1qFm/s200/a5cebf37ad.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><br />
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We can "like" The Economist as many times as we wish, but it won't make our revolution.<br />
Vote, make a difference, protest, march at the Europride, strike, climb on the roofs! And while you are there, <b>bring your own camera, because the revolution will not be televised</b>.<br />
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PS: On the margin of this quick rant, I'd like to thank the Economist and to inform <a href="http://www.ilgiornale.it/interni/riecco_vero_berlusconi_ottimismo_e_tasse_giu_nonostante_leconomist/10-06-2011/articolo-id=528506-page=0-comments=1">ilGiornale</a>'s readers that they might want to ask around before ruling it out as <i>yet another Communist pamphlet</i>.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjY5Y9EaazrZ4KM4hHL5fO-Z77s3ibLzAW-D4jvVHznFuKONhiAwPiXrpZEX412e_-SbezfT-Rht_9luWHdr7O17p9TUXvR15aldwtgMTRR1Q7sRme1Lo39cDyikAmSo_el1hj7DTYOyItm/s1600/Screen+shot+2011-06-10+at+14.07.06.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjY5Y9EaazrZ4KM4hHL5fO-Z77s3ibLzAW-D4jvVHznFuKONhiAwPiXrpZEX412e_-SbezfT-Rht_9luWHdr7O17p9TUXvR15aldwtgMTRR1Q7sRme1Lo39cDyikAmSo_el1hj7DTYOyItm/s400/Screen+shot+2011-06-10+at+14.07.06.png" width="348" /></a></div><br />
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But this article is just too hilarious, you need to have a taste of it. A rough translation of the opening paragraph follows:<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 15px;"><i>The Economist, once a serious British business magazine and now playground of the European leftist lobbies, throws some more mud on Italy and on Berlusconi. Put together a bunch of stale articles read on LaRepubblica and ilFatto Quotidiano, add a vulgar headline (The man who screwed an entire country) and done, your front cover is ready[...] </i></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 15px;"><i>It is as if today we had titled: "Economist, it's shit". And who could controvert. Or "Queen Elisabeth's a cockblock". Sure we would be deemed quack and vulgar, slimy scribblers on the paycheck of power. Those dumbos at the Economist, however, today will be praised as free and refined analysts.</i></span><br />
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</i></span></span>journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8126570155001633957.post-38595387199079967012011-06-01T10:06:00.000+02:002011-06-01T10:20:13.363+02:00Silvio gets a blast at long last and it's a newspaper feastMay 31<br />
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Natural disaster metaphors cover all the front pages: it's an earthquake. The Prime Minister's party "reduced to rubble in the cities" says <i>Corriere della Sera</i>, among others, and one cannot but think of the real rubble of l'Aquila, left behind and covered up by the Italian government and its media.<br />
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In the meantime Berlusconi warns the liberated citizens of Milan and Naples "You will regret this" and predicts the incumbent catastrophe "pray the Lord to be saved". A suspicious mind may have maliciously wondered who he meant by Lord.<br />
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Berlusconi, the papers remind us, turned this local elections campaign into a referendum on his persona and his leadership. The people's response is splashed all over the press: FAILED!<br />
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With a few exceptions, today's front pages are all about the Emperor's defeat, rather than about the winners, only the (real) left wing papers do not miss a rare chance to rejoice. "I can't believe it!" titles <i>ilManifesto</i>, "Thank you Italy" goes <i>l'Unità</i>.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEga4tIoFa9B0QxOf_E_vGqK7ywd8k3-IFAxm4kO6vu2Xz4WDo_-5T2MvAP5kknSwyM4wwyZkaBxb98P82-s8PPPGSLBrX2HZOIileOBMUdHRGfHecDKlPkFcWOdGLF9yOFdpotoSieRMBSv/s1600/20110531primapagina.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEga4tIoFa9B0QxOf_E_vGqK7ywd8k3-IFAxm4kO6vu2Xz4WDo_-5T2MvAP5kknSwyM4wwyZkaBxb98P82-s8PPPGSLBrX2HZOIileOBMUdHRGfHecDKlPkFcWOdGLF9yOFdpotoSieRMBSv/s320/20110531primapagina.gif" width="231" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKJghRhI4ZHWXDcX1XCKlFOukONNhU_s3FyIzL1ghtXuGBDtbvNYf2bxBe2BR9Wc9vddsP4TZ4p6XYp-aT1fAU8uIuztYmldQpKX-j0L8H-wrl_SgRYk3fayeyPGqQIq-Lhr7BE9JZ-211/s1600/20110531_cover_302.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKJghRhI4ZHWXDcX1XCKlFOukONNhU_s3FyIzL1ghtXuGBDtbvNYf2bxBe2BR9Wc9vddsP4TZ4p6XYp-aT1fAU8uIuztYmldQpKX-j0L8H-wrl_SgRYk3fayeyPGqQIq-Lhr7BE9JZ-211/s320/20110531_cover_302.jpg" width="220" /></a></div><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUGZqp4yJ6Jb7mNZ8Qr2mFtLtk-U3kilWxskDLy9hVZuKQEfmHwfWgJJjHSKx1E7AohTWl9HN2fQtVHpbFd1etgymBNUhwSG-sAHJa97RY78JoTz7HEZK9Xf2e2F1FZ1B648_vnJfK62Sq/s1600/Screen+shot+2011-06-01+at+09.33.47.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="220" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUGZqp4yJ6Jb7mNZ8Qr2mFtLtk-U3kilWxskDLy9hVZuKQEfmHwfWgJJjHSKx1E7AohTWl9HN2fQtVHpbFd1etgymBNUhwSG-sAHJa97RY78JoTz7HEZK9Xf2e2F1FZ1B648_vnJfK62Sq/s320/Screen+shot+2011-06-01+at+09.33.47.png" width="320" /></a>But on a day like this one really does not want to miss the right wing press. In an early online edition yesterday <i>Libero </i>chose to open with the winners:<br />
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"NOW ENJOY COMMUNISM".<br />
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The morning edition though throws the ball back to the looser, hitting with satire:<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgklfQ3Z7iIUOfCRsjHVlUBDZBVsvMplGuMd_iQk4XW1tIqVk66pts-GlLbR8csQxzPPqOYr9TCHlmB48b51Pewkl1ydNXZ0uaC6RpoVkJJxPleE2UKDZ0Kgiw4Ovqu6huUQAbO5hYNBldv/s1600/4f56a83074cadcf7ece2680edbc48836-resized.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgklfQ3Z7iIUOfCRsjHVlUBDZBVsvMplGuMd_iQk4XW1tIqVk66pts-GlLbR8csQxzPPqOYr9TCHlmB48b51Pewkl1ydNXZ0uaC6RpoVkJJxPleE2UKDZ0Kgiw4Ovqu6huUQAbO5hYNBldv/s320/4f56a83074cadcf7ece2680edbc48836-resized.png" width="218" /></a></div>"Blow for Silvio<br />
Crying and not shagging"<br />
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(The headline is difficult to translate, because one should be able to render the Neapolitan dialect. What it made me think of and I found quite hilarious is "BLOW NOT BLOW JOB").<br />
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The Berlusconi family paper <i>ilGiornale </i>managed to avoid the discussion about winners and losers by turning the whole business into a sentence of insanity.<br />
Despite the intentions, it was a treat to see a Che Guevara flag on the front page:<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAXuXiXeGK0j1M5STTc5xdaeV9QBRGWNUDNa65znYDelctXdhCIe7ofsYQduFL5GHaNZWGqc9vyVCfUeQUTHZ3yWISKv-sha3JIxCEZN5AkA0VwdIMB2Fb2j3KOcQG-uKxdRF9VUyhdphf/s1600/f1920431f6780ff2952d52f19291bc51.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAXuXiXeGK0j1M5STTc5xdaeV9QBRGWNUDNa65znYDelctXdhCIe7ofsYQduFL5GHaNZWGqc9vyVCfUeQUTHZ3yWISKv-sha3JIxCEZN5AkA0VwdIMB2Fb2j3KOcQG-uKxdRF9VUyhdphf/s320/f1920431f6780ff2952d52f19291bc51.jpg" width="237" /></a></div>The newspaper's "psychodrama": "The left talks about 'liberated cities' but they are ready to give them away to gipsies and muslims".<br />
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What a day...journolinguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05874411540914791030noreply@blogger.com0