Orwell, I wish you could see this
I don't usually post much about politics in my country. The first reason is that I'm deeply ashamed of my country and its government, the second is that I don't think any foreigner person would honestly believe me, let alone understand just how bad things are. But I think these things deserve repeating, and spreading.
I will put it behind a lj-cut anyway, because the post is lengthy, but please read it anyway. It's about the internet scoring one over the media, about people finally getting fed up enough to do something about their country. About a comedian getting serious on arguments no one wants to talk of. About a honest prosecutor being dishonestly prosecuted for prosecuting a dishonest Minister of Justice. And about my government trying to gag up the net.
September the 8th was the V-Day. 'V' as 'vengeance', but mostly 'V' as 'vaffanculo' - Italian for 'fuck you'. Over 300 thousands Italians gathered in the squares of all cities to sign their approval to a popular law that requests that anyone with a criminal record must be declared unsuitable and ineligible to any public or political office. Well, duh, is most of you likely thinking, of course a criminal would be unsuitable to a public relevant office. Well, tell that to the 24 criminals sitting in our government - all investigated, put on trial and found guilty of several charges ranging from arson to bribery, complicity to homicide, theft and association with mafia groups. A comedian orchestrated all of this through his blog. A comedian, because apparently ever since politics become a joke, it's time for jokers to get serious. A comedian, Beppe Grillo, one of the few people left that publicly talk about the skeletons the government is trying to hide.
In the history of our republic it never happened that 300 thousand people would gather to put their signature for a law. Never. I don't think there's been such a big demonstration in the last thirty years or so. On September the 8th, not ONE tv channel or paper included this manifestation in their headlines. Neither did they in the previous months, while this event was planned and organized only through the net, because none of the media would talk about it. Not. A. Word. I thought something had to give, because there was no way they could ignore us all.
And they didn't. Politicians accused Beppe Grillo of lying, of slandering poor innocent people, and even more ridiculous statements I will not bother to repeat. After a couple of weeks of pure slander about Beppe Grillo, hypes of bullshit were thrown around by the media, purposefully misreading and misrepresenting the facts and outright lying at times. After that, the usual heavy, stony silence about relevant news fell once again on the media.
And now things are actually worse. Prosecutor Luigi De Magistris has been leading an inquiry on the Minister of Justice, Mr Mastella, about abuse of office, illicit financing of the parties, collaborating in fraud in relation to European and national financing. The investigation was close to an end, and the prosecutor had enough evidence to push the inquiry to the next lever and start pressing charges. Please note the use of the past tense. What did you think happened? After threats and various kinds of pressure failed, the Minister demanded for the prosecutor's immediate transfer to another district. Because prosecutor De Magistris allegedly had it in for him. The prosecutor was investigated in turn, and after months the transfer request was denied. So in turn Minister Mastella basically blackmailed the Prime Minister and all the government into helping him, and the government pressured the Chief Judges into taking the prosecutor off the case. And the Chief Judges complied.
In the early 90s, they blew up two judges to stop them from investigating on the ties between the heads of the biggest mafia families and the government. Today they don't even need to get flashy with bombs to do that.
And in all answer to Beppe Grillo's wonderful stunt on 11/8 thanks to his blog? Oh, don't think our beloved politicians are going to let it go easily. They are going to gag the net. You didn't see that one coming, mh? Let me say it again. They are going to gag the net.
Quietly, without anyone knowing - as the media of course ignored this event - a draft of law was approved by the Council of Ministers. According to this, anyone owning a blog or a website is supposed to register it with a special Association, get a publishing company headed by journalist signed on the official Register of the Order of Professional Journalists - yes, there is such a thing in Italy - get the appropriate certificates and pay the appropriate taxes. Anyone failing to do that would be charged with illegal diffusion of defamatory content, which is actually a penal offense that would result in a heavy, heavy fine and jail time.
Did you understand what I just said? It so ridiculous it's hard to believe it, but please stop and reread the above paragraph. Anyone with an unregistered blog not associated with a publishing company would get arrested and thrown in jail. Even if your blog doesn't specifically broadcast news. Even if it's for entertainment values. Even if spreading news and entertainment are unintentional.
Bullshit.
This demonstrates once again how our jurassic politicians fail to understand the internet and underestimate its importance, just as they did with 11/8. They thought that by gagging the media - tv and papers and books - they would knock the wind out of Grillo's sails. They thought he was a lone man speaking, and a lone man would remain without the media's help. Internet and over 300.000 people showed them they were wrong. That we can do without the traditional media, and their importance is way overrated. They all got pwned big time. Now they have decided the net is a danger to them, and still deal with it the wrong way.
The morons think they can shut up the net. Ha ha, fuckers. Try it. We'll all just move our blogs and domains to foreigner countries. Many will move on themselves. I will very likely do so too, because as much as I love Italy and the home I was born in, I don't want to live in a country where murderers, bribers and criminals control the government, administer the justice and shut up the media and the net to quell any opposition.
Please, not just the Italian people on my flist - especially them, of course - but everyone else too, do what we all know how to do best and talk about this, spread the word and inform as many people as possible. This is a battle against silence and ignorance, against the manipulation of the media and the control of information first and foremost, because to work the rotten out of the system, the government and the country we first need to be able to know and discuss it. Tell you moms, tell the teenyboppers with a blog and a page on libero.it.
Spread the word.
ETA: Feel free to link to this entry as much as you want. Letting people know is why I made this post in the first place, so I really don't mind.
I will put it behind a lj-cut anyway, because the post is lengthy, but please read it anyway. It's about the internet scoring one over the media, about people finally getting fed up enough to do something about their country. About a comedian getting serious on arguments no one wants to talk of. About a honest prosecutor being dishonestly prosecuted for prosecuting a dishonest Minister of Justice. And about my government trying to gag up the net.
September the 8th was the V-Day. 'V' as 'vengeance', but mostly 'V' as 'vaffanculo' - Italian for 'fuck you'. Over 300 thousands Italians gathered in the squares of all cities to sign their approval to a popular law that requests that anyone with a criminal record must be declared unsuitable and ineligible to any public or political office. Well, duh, is most of you likely thinking, of course a criminal would be unsuitable to a public relevant office. Well, tell that to the 24 criminals sitting in our government - all investigated, put on trial and found guilty of several charges ranging from arson to bribery, complicity to homicide, theft and association with mafia groups. A comedian orchestrated all of this through his blog. A comedian, because apparently ever since politics become a joke, it's time for jokers to get serious. A comedian, Beppe Grillo, one of the few people left that publicly talk about the skeletons the government is trying to hide.
In the history of our republic it never happened that 300 thousand people would gather to put their signature for a law. Never. I don't think there's been such a big demonstration in the last thirty years or so. On September the 8th, not ONE tv channel or paper included this manifestation in their headlines. Neither did they in the previous months, while this event was planned and organized only through the net, because none of the media would talk about it. Not. A. Word. I thought something had to give, because there was no way they could ignore us all.
And they didn't. Politicians accused Beppe Grillo of lying, of slandering poor innocent people, and even more ridiculous statements I will not bother to repeat. After a couple of weeks of pure slander about Beppe Grillo, hypes of bullshit were thrown around by the media, purposefully misreading and misrepresenting the facts and outright lying at times. After that, the usual heavy, stony silence about relevant news fell once again on the media.
And now things are actually worse. Prosecutor Luigi De Magistris has been leading an inquiry on the Minister of Justice, Mr Mastella, about abuse of office, illicit financing of the parties, collaborating in fraud in relation to European and national financing. The investigation was close to an end, and the prosecutor had enough evidence to push the inquiry to the next lever and start pressing charges. Please note the use of the past tense. What did you think happened? After threats and various kinds of pressure failed, the Minister demanded for the prosecutor's immediate transfer to another district. Because prosecutor De Magistris allegedly had it in for him. The prosecutor was investigated in turn, and after months the transfer request was denied. So in turn Minister Mastella basically blackmailed the Prime Minister and all the government into helping him, and the government pressured the Chief Judges into taking the prosecutor off the case. And the Chief Judges complied.
In the early 90s, they blew up two judges to stop them from investigating on the ties between the heads of the biggest mafia families and the government. Today they don't even need to get flashy with bombs to do that.
And in all answer to Beppe Grillo's wonderful stunt on 11/8 thanks to his blog? Oh, don't think our beloved politicians are going to let it go easily. They are going to gag the net. You didn't see that one coming, mh? Let me say it again. They are going to gag the net.
Quietly, without anyone knowing - as the media of course ignored this event - a draft of law was approved by the Council of Ministers. According to this, anyone owning a blog or a website is supposed to register it with a special Association, get a publishing company headed by journalist signed on the official Register of the Order of Professional Journalists - yes, there is such a thing in Italy - get the appropriate certificates and pay the appropriate taxes. Anyone failing to do that would be charged with illegal diffusion of defamatory content, which is actually a penal offense that would result in a heavy, heavy fine and jail time.
Did you understand what I just said? It so ridiculous it's hard to believe it, but please stop and reread the above paragraph. Anyone with an unregistered blog not associated with a publishing company would get arrested and thrown in jail. Even if your blog doesn't specifically broadcast news. Even if it's for entertainment values. Even if spreading news and entertainment are unintentional.
Bullshit.
This demonstrates once again how our jurassic politicians fail to understand the internet and underestimate its importance, just as they did with 11/8. They thought that by gagging the media - tv and papers and books - they would knock the wind out of Grillo's sails. They thought he was a lone man speaking, and a lone man would remain without the media's help. Internet and over 300.000 people showed them they were wrong. That we can do without the traditional media, and their importance is way overrated. They all got pwned big time. Now they have decided the net is a danger to them, and still deal with it the wrong way.
The morons think they can shut up the net. Ha ha, fuckers. Try it. We'll all just move our blogs and domains to foreigner countries. Many will move on themselves. I will very likely do so too, because as much as I love Italy and the home I was born in, I don't want to live in a country where murderers, bribers and criminals control the government, administer the justice and shut up the media and the net to quell any opposition.
Please, not just the Italian people on my flist - especially them, of course - but everyone else too, do what we all know how to do best and talk about this, spread the word and inform as many people as possible. This is a battle against silence and ignorance, against the manipulation of the media and the control of information first and foremost, because to work the rotten out of the system, the government and the country we first need to be able to know and discuss it. Tell you moms, tell the teenyboppers with a blog and a page on libero.it.
Spread the word.
ETA: Feel free to link to this entry as much as you want. Letting people know is why I made this post in the first place, so I really don't mind.