Red Light Politics
Welcome to my short form Tumblr blog. My name is Flavia Tamara Dzodan, I am a business developer, writer, public speaker, ideas instigator, content creator, media facilitator and trend watcher living in Amsterdam.
This Tumblr is about the spaces and intersections between politics, culture, race and gender matters with some humor and pop culture thrown in the mix.
My long reads blog is Red Light Politics.
I also blog at Tiger Beatdown.
If you would like to know more about me, visit this page .
Search
The person behind this blog
I am on Twitter, you can follow me
Loading Tweet...
Find me on...
Noted Elsewhere
-
“There is no such thing as a single-issue struggle because we do not live single-issue lives.”— Audre Lorde in Sister Outsider.
-
I’d be very upset if I worked at Fage USA and had to drive every (Monday) morning to:
1 Opportunity Drive.I suppose that neighbourhood has...
-
“Prison relieves us of the responsibility of seriously engaging with the problems of our society, especially those produced by racism and,...”
-
When the Lesser Of Two Evils Isn't Enough
by Mia McKenzie
Yesterday, I wrote a post called Michelle Obama...
-
Try not to forget why they came to the United States of America, and though the specific circumstances may differ, you’ll find that hundreds of...
-
-
Taken with Instagram
-
Haarlem, Netherlands (by Epicantus)
Tag Results
18 posts tagged Italy
“The Italian government has ordered an investigation into slurs on rightwing websites against the country’s first black minister, a case that has put Italy’s racial problems back under the spotlight.”
Italy to investigate racist remarks against first black minister | World news | guardian.co.uk
You know, Europe, “the continent of human rights” and similar assorted empty rhetoric, once again showing its bare ass. More from the article:
Cecile Kyenge, an eye doctor and Congo-born Italian citizen, was named integration minister in the new government of Prime Minister Enrico Letta on Saturday. She is one of seven women in the government.
Since then, she has been the subject of taunts not only on neo-fascist websites but the butt of race-tinged remarks by a politician of the Northern League, which has been allied in the past with former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi.
Equal opportunities minister Josefa Idem ordered an investigation by the National Anti-Discrimination Office into websites that called Kyenge a “Congolese monkey”, “Zulu”, “the black anti-Italian”, and other slurs.
This isn’t just some internet thugs leaving the usual offensive racist remarks we’ve all seen pretty much everywhere. Northern League European parliamentarian Mario Borghezio made references to a “bonga bonga government” because of Kyenge’s heritage.
“I’m outraged by the normalcy that seemed to have spread to everyone like contagion. I am scandalised by the silence of Europe that has just received the Nobel Peace Prize and yet is staying silent in the face of a massacre that has the numbers of a true war. I’m becoming more convinced that European policy on immigration considers this offering of human lives to be a way to restrict the flows of people, or maybe a deterrent. But, if for these people, the voyage on the boats is still the only possibility of hope, I believe that their death at sea must be a reason for Europe to feel shamed and dishonoured.”
Vatican told to pay taxes as Italy tackles budget crisis
via The Independent:
After several years of scandal in which the Catholic Church has faced allegations of financial impropriety, paedophile priests and rumours of plots to kill the Pope, the Vatican is now facing a new €600m-a-year tax bill as Rome seeks to head off European Commission censure over controversial property tax breaks enjoyed by the Church.
As the EC heads closer to officially condemning the fiscal perks enjoyed by the Catholic Church and introduced by the Berlusconi administration, Prime Minister Mario Monti has written to the Competition Commissioner, Joaquin Almunia, saying that the Vatican will resume property tax, or Ici, payments.
Mr Almunia said in 2010 that the exemption amounted to state aid that might breach EU competition law.
Now, if every government told them to stop meddling in the usual restrictive and oppressive politics that made them infamous in most of Latin America, we might be on the path to some change.
The Far Right Link Between Norwegian Killer Breivik and Florence Gunman Casseri
via International Business Times, an excellent piece about the commonalities between all right wing fundamentalists currently operating in Europe. From the link:
Florence far-right gunman Gianluca Casseri, who shot dead two Africans Tuesday and Norwegian mass killer Anders Behring Breivik may have more in common than expected, experts on far-right movements point out.
Described as an expert on right-wing European culture, the 50-year-old alleged member of far-right Casas Pound movement was also passionate about fantasy and conspiracy books. Its literary magazine La Soglia or The Threshold included monographic issues about Dracula, the author of The Lord of the Rings J.R. Tolkien, and H.P. Lovecraft.
This long-time engagement with fantasy genre is shared by Breivik, who killed 77 people in a twin attack in Oslo. “Breivik’s manifesto shows a fascination and an obsession with the fantasy genre, especially with Tolkien and Lovecraft,” Matthew Goodwin, experts on far-right extremism, told the International Business Times UK.
“It’s part of a wider discourse. Far-right movements are obsessed with narratives that put emphasis on apocalyptic scenario, in which they portray themselves as heroes.”[…]
The Florence racist shooting also reflects “the neglected challenge of far right violence”, according to Goodwin.
“It’s interesting to notice that Florence shooting took place the same day as Belgium one, but it did not rise the same attention from the media,” he argues. Before Norway, there was a tendency among European politicians to downplay far-right violence because it does not fit in focus with Al Qaeda and the anti-Islamist narrative post 9/11.
Worth noting, the BBC took seven hours (SEVEN!) to report the killing of the Senegalese men in Italy. As the writer points out, it seems that far right violence is not perceived as a challenge that requires urgent measures.
“Far-right sympathiser Gianluca Casseri, 50, kills African migrants before shooting himself dead”
Florence gunman shoots Senegalese street vendors dead | World news | guardian.co.uk
From the link:
A lone gunman with extreme rightwing sympathies has gone on a shooting spree in Florence, killing two Senegalese street vendors and wounding three others before killing himself.
You’ve probably have all seen this already as it happened a couple of hours ago, but just in case, there’s more at the link.
I swear I can’t anymore.
My latest for Global Comment about the EU, democracy and the rule of financial corporations:
There is hunger in Europe. For the first time since World War II, this hunger and extreme poverty are not limited to pockets of exclusion in Eastern nations but running across the continent. Greece, Italy, Spain are in international media almost daily with depictions of hardships, soaring unemployment and deprivation. The European summer saw the birth of “the indignant ones”, a wave of protests sweeping these nations and to an extent, replicated across France. These “indignant ones” clashed violently with police at the peak of the Greek anti austerity protests, expressing a collective discontent that went, for the most part, ignored. Now, two months after these clashes, the European Union is still not responding with the haste that would be expected to aid its own citizens. A European Union that was once portrayed as “strength in unity” is now more fragmented and disunited than ever since its creation.
From the article:
On the eve of the new season at Milan’s La Scala, one of the ballet company’s leading lights has dramatically revealed the extent of bulimia and anorexia among ballerinas.
Breaking an unspoken rule never to discuss eating disorders among Italy’s elite dance corps, Mariafrancesca Garritano told the Observer that one in five ballerinas that she knew was anorexic and, as a result, many were now unable to have children.
There is more at the link but I must warn about the content because the article does contain a lot of graphic depictions of eating disorders and health related issues.
My upcoming trip to Italy will be disco inspired
I just finished making the reservations for my trip to Venice at the beginning of September. It’s something I do every couple of years because of the Art Biennial, since I have customers who are part of the exhibition teams and it’s a great opportunity for me to stay in touch/ network/ etc.
Now, because I know Venice quite well, I do not stay at the island itself. Instead, I stay in Mestre, a small(ish) town outside of Venice with three different local bus lines that reach the island in ten minutes. A good quality hotel costs less than one third of what a similar one would cost in the canals. Usually I stay at the Holiday Inn (points system means I get free upgrades) but this time I am unsure why but most hotels I know are fully booked. So, for the first time, I am staying at the Michelangelo (warning: 70’s Muzak on autoplay at the link). And I am mesmerized by some of the photos of the decor. It seems all I am missing is a disco ball hanging from the roof. Just look at this lobby:
And in case I miss the ‘70’s theme while having dinner, I am going to share with you the food presentation of one of my usual spots in the area, Ristorante Nadain:
Would you like some plastic beads with your oysters and ice?
This place serves some of the best food you can have while staying in this region, so it’s not like the presentation says anything about the quality, but their aesthetics seem to be trapped in an era of gold plated excess and an abundance of dichroic lighting.
After Venice I am spending a few days in Milano, the only place on Earth where I feel fully inadequate, shabby and genuinely ugly, no matter what I am wearing or how well put together I am. Also, the only place I know of where the entire city center seems to be a set for a fashion spread. Alas, I love it in spite of my obvious lack of style so they’ll have to deal with my shortcomings.
Following up on my post from yesterday about 25 African migrants who died near the Italian coast of Lampedusa, via Presseurop, reporting about Tragedy at sea and riots onshore with a facsimile of today’s edition of Italian newspaper La Stampa:
Turin-based daily La Stampa features two tragic pictures side by side on its front page: the first image shows the corpses of 25 Africans who died of asphyxiation in the unventilated hold of a boat loaded with 271 Libyan migrants which arrived in Lampedusa on 1 August. “They were prevented from escaping from the hold by their own travelling companions because there was no room on the boat”, witnesses told La Stampa. “They died like rats”.
The second picture, taken on the same day, shows the riots in Bari (Apulia region). Frustrated by delays in the processing of their asylum applications, African migrants, who have been held for seven months in a “filtration” camp, “chanted ‘papiers papiers,’ before rioting and blocking traffic. A total of 60 people including policemen and migrants were injured”. The protest, reports La Repubblica, spread to the Calabrian towns of Crotone, where “migrants emulated the riots in Bari,” and Nardò where “400 North African farm labourers went on strike for better wages”. Last year in Rosarno (also Calabria), African migrants, who complained that they were “being treated like animals by Italians,” staged violent protests.
25 Migrants Found Dead in Boat Near Italy Coast
Italy’s coast guard found twenty-five bodies in the hold of a boat coming from Libya on Monday.
The coast guard officials discovered the bodies of 25 young men after boarding the migrants’ boat less than a mile off the small Italian island of Lampedusa, which is closer to the North Africa than it is to the Italian mainland.
All the dead are believed to be Sub-Saharan Africans.
The 15-meter (50-foot) vessel carried 296 immigrants, including 36 women and 21 children, Coast Guard Commander Cosimo Nicastro said.
The causes of the 25 deaths were not clear, he added. Italian authorities are currently investigating the case.
“Some of them died from suffocation but some others were apparently beaten up by traffickers and members of the crew,” said Simona Moscarelli, an official with the International Organization for Migration whose colleagues in Lampedusa were conducting interviews with the survivors, some of which were traveling below deck with the dead.
More at the link above.
Those who do make it to Lampedusa, face dehumanizing and outright dangerous conditions at asylum seeker centers in Italy. I wrote about this a while ago at Tiger Beatdown. Sadly, it seems nothing has changed.
“Interviewed on a popular radio show, Francesco Speroni, a leading member of the Northern League, the junior partner in Berlusconi’s conservative coalition, said: “Breivik’s ideas are in defence of western civilisation.”
Ex-Berlusconi minister defends Anders Behring Breivik | World news | The Guardian
There is a reason I keep bringing up the European context of the Norway killings, especially considering Breivik was so keen on this trend of a pan European populist movement rooted in deeply xenophobic and Islamophobic ideas. Breivik is the violent, extreme manifestation of these ideas, but certainly, they are not bred in isolation. On the contrary, there is an entire set of extremist politicians feeding European Breiviks with more hatred.
Also, from the article, more Italian politicians justifying these ideas:
The Italian politician was endorsing the comments of another high-profile member of the league who had drawn fierce criticism for arguing that the killings might have been part of a plot to discredit hardline conservative thinkers. Like many in his party, Mario Borghezio, who sits in the European parliament, is an admirer of the writings of the late Italian journalist and author Oriana Fallaci, who popularised the term Eurabia to describe a future, supposedly Islamised Europe.[…]
While describing the Norwegian killer as “unbalanced”, Borghezio said: “Christians ought not to be animals to be sacrificed. We have to defend them.”
I’ll leave the chilling implications of “Christians being worth defending” (which, in case someone wants to pin some dirt on me, let me vehemently clarify, OF COURSE THEY ARE), coming from politicians who have made a career out of the dehumanization of Muslims and other minorities.
“Dozens of African migrants were left to die in the Mediterranean after a number of European military units apparently ignored their cries for help, the Guardian has learned. Two of the nine survivors claim this included a Nato ship.”
Aircraft carrier left us to die, migrants say | World news | The Guardian
I wrote last week about the appalling treatment of North African refugees in Italy and someone sent me this link that was published on The Guardian on Sunday. More from the article:
A boat carrying 72 passengers, including several women, young children and political refugees, ran into trouble in late March after leaving Tripoli for the Italian island of Lampedusa. Despite alarms being raised with the Italian coastguard and the boat making contact with a military helicopter and a warship, no rescue effort was attempted.
All but 11 of those on board died from thirst and hunger after their vessel was left to drift in open waters for 16 days. “Every morning we would wake up and find more bodies, which we would leave for 24 hours and then throw overboard,” said Abu Kurke, one of only nine survivors. “By the final days, we didn’t know ourselves … everyone was either praying, or dying.”
Read the rest at the link above.
“Doctors without Borders conducted an initial mental health assessment of the new arrivals, which pointed to the risk of widespread depression and hopelessness in response to their uncertain future. The Italian government has so far, not provided any legal resources or information about their situation or future options. The refugees do not have a clear idea about legal procedures and they now face anxiety, depression and post traumatic stress disorder as a result.”
Tiger Beatdown › Suffering in Italy: on being a woman at an asylum seeker center
My latest post about the treatment of North African refugees in Italian detention centers.
Blackface against… racism?!
via Italian basketball players to protest against racism by painting faces black guardian.co.uk
Italian basketball players and fans have been urged to paint their faces black during the next round of fixtures to show support to a player who was racially abused.
The idea was prompted by the case of Abiola Wabara, 30, who was abused and spat at while playing for Bracco Geas SS Giovanni in the A1 women’s league quarter-final win over Comense.
At the time officials took no action, but a subsequent investigation by the federation, Federbasket, resulted in the call for a day of protest across all Italy’s basketball leagues.
Among the campaign’s slogans, which all begin “I would like black skin”, are: “I would like black skin so I can be like her and shout to the world our desire for freedom;” and: “I would like black skin, or red, green, yellow. I would like to have the skin of all colours of the soul.”
Demonstrators throw women’s underwear in the air during a protest outside Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi’s residence, in Arcore, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 6, 2011. Protestors demanded Premier Silvio Berlusconi’s resignation following allegations he paid for sex with a 17-year-old girl and used his office to cover it up. via SFGate.com
