"Break the silence against lies" – Article 21

Where are you? Why are you hiding? Dear friends, writers, journalists, singers, bloggers, intellectuals, philosophers, playwrights, actors, writers, producers, dancers, doctors, cooks, designers, youtubers, today we can not afford to be alone anymore. . Today, the public, all public, all those who have the opportunity to speak to a community must feel obliged to take a stand. We do not have a choice. To be silent today means to say: what is going on suits me well. Every word has a consequence, of course, but also silence has consequences, said Sartre. And silence, today, is a luxury that we can not afford. The silence, today, is unbearable

Who in these months has not yet expressed – facing those who do it with courage – is silent because he knows, as I know , that our work does not speak there is agreement. I hear or I often say, "Those who express their thoughts do it to have visibility," but it's a visibility that saves you thousands of social insults and mistrust from those who should support your work because you feel compelled to report. your affirmations. What no one has the courage to say, is that we often keep quiet so as not to cause discord, because we fear that fewer proposals come, fewer projects. But if we think so, we have already lost, because we are resigned not to stimulate the reflections and to support those who believe that the reality is reducible to slogans like "good", "radical chic", "taxi of the sea ​​"we close the ports", "a kiss", "a caress" and an emoticon in adolescence

Often we keep our mouths shut because we know that to take a position is to divide not only the audience that follows you on social networks but also and especially your books, buy tickets for your shows, come see you at the cinema or do not change channels when you see yourself on TV, but do you really believe that what happens is acceptable? How long do you think you can bear without expressing your disagreement? "

After all, with Berlusconi, everything was clearer: he was there and we were there, criticizing her had consequences, strong reactions, and a lot of people. mud artillery but there was a comm an active community, which has squeezed around who did it. Taking a stand against Berlusconi did not mean losing shares copies, consent. With Berlusconi, it was easy to know the other side of the Alps because the knight was basically the Italian character, a recognizable character of the commedia dell & arte. Today is no longer the case and in this government, it is difficult to see the seeds of something extremely dangerous. "Do your job and that's all" is the reference to the order that the player undergoes who expresses his opinion about the migrants, the actor wearing the red shirt. And the call to order is already a blackmail: win with your work, we do not accept the political comments of those whose bad is hot.

Today, there is discomfort with those who go beyond the limits of their work and their role. do what would be normal: check who governs us because, even if he is legitimized at the polls, not only does he betray his own mandate, but above all his history and his values ​​that allowed us to live decades of peace. Our democracy is a young and fragile democracy, but it is above all anti-fascist and anti-racist.

Do you think that today this government is evolving with respect for the values ​​that underpin our Constitution? Who moves and communicates in a security perimeter? Does it not seem to you that the 70 years of prosperity and peace that have come to pbad have made us permeable to xenophobic political parties? That they have made us carefree if not disinterested by watching over the acquired rights once, if we do not defend them, can be swept away by some posts on Facebook and a handful of tweets?

This government, awkwardly but obviously effective, speculating on the hardships of many, uses the attack against migrants and NGOs as a weapon of mbad distraction. There is a horror before which we can not remain silent: while the M5S and the League quarrel over the fundamental points of their agreement, they make us believe that our problem is that of migrants. And if you tell me that previous governments have done the same thing, I say: they have not gone that far, but they have certainly paved the way for all of this. And if you tell me that you voted for Lega and M5S to upset the table, because that was the only way to dismiss a ruling clbad that had failed in all respects, I tell you: be vigilant, do not delegate , open your eyes because things are bad, bad for everyone. Evil not only for the migrants or for the dissenting voices, but also for you.

St. Augustine writes: "If you take away justice, what are the other great states, if not the thieves' badociations? […] If one of these deadly gangs grows with other brigands to the point of occupying an entire area, […] to dominate the cities, here is the name of the state. . When politics loses the path of justice, it strips off its flesh leaving the bone structure of the bandit discovered. Do you know why I quote Sant & Agostino? Because this pbadage explains how it is possible that the power, even unfair, even unfair, even incapable and even criminal, is not disturbed. Do you know what the omertà in front of the mafias is justified? If you only believe in fear, you are wrong. The thought that protects him is this: I judge a boss for what he does to me. Did you mistreat me? Have you bullied someone in my family?

In the same way today, we think it is not because this government has not touched us personally that the lawsuit is just a grain of the deadly blows that this government is. inflicting on the Rule of Law – and our interests, we can dispense with taking a stand, it is a naive and irresponsible attitude that legitimizes the harmful choices and behaviors.

This is not a conflict between Matteo Salvini and me. For me, there is nothing personal, I feel very strongly the duty and the need to speak for those who do not have a voice. For the six hundred thousand immigrants present in Italy who must be regularized now, immediately, because they are removed from the state of slavery in which they find themselves. For NGOs that have started making bailouts at sea, help the European states and Italy to manage a phenomenon that can not be blocked, but only well managed because it is clearly a resource. Politicians who still insist today to support the opposite, of politics and the economy, do not understand anything and are a danger to the social stability of our country which is a multiethnic country. Ferociously multiethnic

Today, I ask you, my fellow citizens, to mobilize for the rights of all, because even if today you do not seem to be part of these "all", you are already involved. In the name of a so-called well-being, in the name of greater security, they will tell us that freedom of expression is fundamentally privileged, that talk about the rights of those who flee and find hell on earth and death in the Mediterranean slavers. Even I hear that with my criticism help Salvini in the polls: as always the fault is not those who set fire, but those who try to extinguish it. Salvini does not rise in the polls because of whom the critic, but because of the responsibility of those who keep silence and those who show shyness and fear

The mobilization that I ask you is a mobilization which concerns each of we. me, that in the court and outside I can defend my reasons from me. I ask you to mobilize to defend the rights which you will soon remember more than you. They make us believe that we do not need it, but we will soon understand that more than the arrogance of this government, more than the arrogance of Salvini, what is condemning us, c & # 39; is the silence. The freedom of expression and the struggle for rights described as "vices" by the elite against the people, which invokes rather security. But the struggle for rights is always a struggle for those who can not afford it and for those who can not even afford to ask them.

And now you will tell me: but our battles are made with our books, our songs, with our shows, with our irony. It's true, it's always been like this: but there are times when it becomes crucial to understand which side you are on and therefore it is not enough to delegate resistance to your own art. In the face of the unchallenged lies, the deceits of the liars (in their presence the jokes of Berlusconi were amateurs), in the face of the pain caused by these lies and these professional liars, we all have the duty to answer: it is not true!

The usual ancient shock: the art that participates and the one who proudly disdains the commitment. The first is considered superior to the second in the name of commitment and the second is considered superior to the first because it claims the right to purity of disengagement. Fences that collapse in front of the dead at sea and the constant lies. You must speak to your readers, to your listeners, to all who have taken care of your soul with your art and your work. Trust yourself, you have laid the foundation to be heard, do not be afraid to tell those who love you that you do not stay with it.

There will be disorientation at the beginning, you will receive criticism to break the equidistance balance, yet fragile and already cracked. But the virtuous effects that your words will have tomorrow will reward you with the misplaced reactions of hater today. The trick to delegitimize you know it, so start (we start) in mind. They will tell you: you win? You can not speak. This is how Mussolini treated Matteotti before he was killed: Are you the son of rich people? You can not handle social problems. Think about it: but are we really coming back? And above all, do we really accept all this? Do we agree to be intimidated by this criminal communication? Should we be ashamed of the fruit of our work? Accept, as they wish, what is authentic only those who have their heads down?

Writers, the attack on the book, on knowledge, on knowledge is daily. "Go to work" is told to the writer. The first step of an authoritarian drift begins with ignoring intellectual fatigue, removing the dignity of word labor. In this way, only propaganda remains. Publishers, do not you feel the earth sinking under your feet? Participate, there is no salvation in the cautious process. We must invest house by house, street by street and conquer the readers, that is, people who are able to understand the world and not to endure it with grudges: knowledge is a precious instrument of life. emancipation from personal misery. Defend him with all our energy.

Among the rescuers of Josephine, the only survivor of the sinking who once again showed the inadequacy of the Libyan Coast Guard to perform humanitarian missions, Marc Gasol, one of the strongest of basketball in the world, a rock of two meters and ten. Say a little, what would you say to those who say: Marc Gasol is rich, can not care about those who suffer? This sounds like a plausible objection, does it seem to have any meaning or are the illusions of those who are afraid today? And then, come uncovered, today Italy needs your free voices. Do not be afraid of those who, more than anything, fear dissent because they do not have the tools to manage it, if not in an authoritarian way.

And a Minister of the Republic who chases a writer on the letterhead of the ministry I make an authoritarian gesture: he uses his position to intimidate not only me, but you too. On one side, there are those who criticize, on the other hand all the government, which until now has shown no trouble to exploit. The complaint is not scary and loneliness does not scare me. But where did you finish? Remember when we said "strangle everyone" to Berlusconi who wanted to smother those who wrote about the mafia? And now, where are you?

When I criticized the policy of the center-left governments, it was said that I defamed the country, which was spreading defeatism, which exposed the camp to the enemies of democracy. In fact, activating badysis and criticism is the task (I would say the duty) of someone who says the reality; and his words go to the rescue of freedom, not the boycott. We have been reduced to suffering from the offense that taking a critical stance on this government is a favor for some powerful? At some interest? Courage!

I have thought long and hard before writing these lines, I do not think you summon me to defend myself, but I would like to understand that the time to stay behind is over. If you do not participate, it will mean that what is happening is good for you too. In this case I will not regret not having tried, but you will have to take responsibility for what will happen: either accomplices or rebels

"The history of men – wrote Vasily Grossman in Life and Fate – so it is not the struggle of the good that tries to defeat the evil.The history of the man is the struggle of the great evil who is trying to crush the little seed of humanity.But if in times like this, man keeps something human, evil is destined to succumb. " You are the little seed of humanity, without you Italy is lost. So which side are you on?