The phrase was a provocation in the best style of legal populism. But the stage was what raised the anger: the presentation of a new foundation dedicated to a victim of gender violencebeaten to death just over a year ago by her Italian ex-boyfriend. “Patriarchy no longer exists”said the Italian Minister of Education and Merit, Giuseppe Valditara. “The increase in cases of sexual violence [en Italia] are related to forms of marginality and deviation that also come in some way from the illegal immigration“he added, in a recorded message sent from his office and broadcast in the presence of the relatives of the murdered young woman.
It is the latest storm to rage at this time in the transalpine country, where so far this year there have already been almost 90 femicides (around 90% committed by Italians) and where 31% of women between 16 and 70 years old (6.7 million) have suffered some type of sexual or physical violence in their lives, according to official data. And its protagonist is, once again, a minister in Giorgia Meloni’s government and a member of Matteo Salvini’s far-right League, match at low hours lately very given to effects.
It is also the most recent chapter of the culture war that the far-right Italian Government has undertaken to ensure a new narrative on gender issues and the defense of women’s rights. So much so that it comes after, just last week, the prime ministerGiorgia Meloni, would mock in an electoral video of the use of the feminine when talking about positions or professions.
white men
“To my sister [Giulia Cecchetin] a killed her respectable white boy”complained Elena Cecchetin, sister of the murdered young woman who gives her name to the new foundation. What Valditara does is “propaganda,” he added. “I would like to tell the minister that the person who took my daughter is Italian. Violence is violence, regardless of where it comes from,” said the father, Gino, one of the main promoters of the initiative. “It would seem that ‘patriarchy‘It is a word that scares more than the term ‘war,'” he added, also requesting that the Italian Government explain what it has done to address femicides.
Unsurprisingly, the statement has also sparked an almost immediate response from the left. The minister’s words are “shameful and inappropriate”denounced Laura Boldrini, former president of the Italian Congress and today president of the Human Rights Committee of the same chamber. “Valditara, you should be ashamed: yours is just a racist instrumentalization“, commented the secretary general of +Europe, Riccardo Magi.
The problem, however, is that the Government has also known in recent years to divide conscientiously to the left and to feminism in Italia. It has been very clever, for example, Melons by publicly condemning surrogacy (and then promoting a law that aims to hinder this practice, although its real success is in doubt). Aware, Meloni, that within the Democratic Party (PD) There is no unanimous consensus, as its leader, Elly Schlein, has expressed her support, while other members of her own party have expressed a contrary position.
