Articles by: Marina Melchionda

The final session of the “Voices on Primo Levi” conference proved to be as interesting as the two sessions that preceded it. There was a consistent flow of people and a diverse audience at the Primo Levi Center.

The final evening of the conference was divided into two sessions. The first session began at 6:30 p.m., when the public was invited to watch “Primo Levi: An Inconvenient Witness” (1997), a short documentary made for “Tempo”, produced by the Italian National Broadcasting company.

The documentary consisted of an interview with Levi, a famous Jewish writer and chemist, and revealed new aspects of his personality.

Levi was shown as a man of our times with issues, commitments, and doubts that are common to every human being.

His life did not end at Auschwitz. He went on to have a nice family, a child for whom he made toys, and a career as a chemist where he discovered the allure of new technologies.

During the interview, Levi did not hide his emotions when he recalled the moment when he bought his first computer and began to use it.

Those present in the audience seemed to be touched by his clear and often ironic testimony, which showed that, despite his sufferings in the Holocaust, he could still feel emotions. He did not die in the concentration camp. Yes, he was still a man.

Primo Levi was a man who left us with his passionate works that, from our point of view, are already considered classics.

The historic and political relevance of these works is still uncertain; this was one of the issues during the second session of the conference, “The Politics of Memory”.

The debate over Levi’s works was introduced by Natalia Indrimi, the center’s director. A panel of four prominent speakers discussed the topic: Mark Grief (American Prospect, London Review of Books), Robert Weil (W.W. Norton and co-editor of the forthcoming complete works of Primo Levi), Andrea Fiano (CPL), and Alessandro Cassin.

Topics discussed included the relationship between history and literature in the Holocaust experience, the real political and social message Levi wanted to spread through his works, and the boundary between politics, history, and literature in his works.

The participants discussed these topics from different and sometimes personal perspectives. They concluded that the significance of these works is not found in their remembrance of the past but through their contribution toward preventing similar catastrophes in the future.

Because history can only teach people who are determined to remember their past.

 

Italian homosexual police officers and soldiers are beginning a battle already fought by many of their colleagues in Europe: they want to end the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy that forbids the enrollment of people who openly manifest homosexual conduct.

Under the current policy gays and lesbians must keep their sexual preferences a secret while on the force or in the military. The “macho culture”, according to them, has for too long deterred many enrolled homosexuals from coming out after seeing reprisals of various kinds against colleagues -- from ostracism to 'punitive' transfers.

With this in mind, a group of activists has set up an association called Polis Aperta (Open Polis), whose statute will be drafted on September 26 in Bologna.

''We're coming out against creeping discrimination,'' said Nicola Cicchitti, the President of the association, while announcing the intention to organize a great number of events to bring the issue to the general public

Although Polis Aperta  only counts 200 members, spread throughout the different branches of the Italian Army (among which the Carabinieri paramilitary corps, the finance guards and the traffic force), it is already pressing for an official recognition from the Ministry of Defense.

In the meanwhile, it has received strong support by Arcigay (Italy's main lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender -LGBT - organization), which helped funding the association and is paying for the advertisement of its various events in Italy’s biggest selling newspaper, Il Corriere della Sera. One exponent of Arcigay has recently declared that ''The birth of Polis Aperta marks an important new landmark in the creation of an ever more visible LGBT community. The presence of gays and lesbians in the armed forces and police will help these institutions to address the homosexual issue in a new and positive way and lead to a significant improvement in the everyday lives of gay service people ''.

The Mario Mieli Association, another gay rights group, also approves the constitution of Polis Aperta: ''This is a novelty...that will move Italy closer to the rest of Europe and break with the absurd macho taboos which still pervade the armed forces''.

The association has actually taken the decision to openly fight for the cause when encouraged by other European groups, particularly Gaylespol of Spain, which hosted this year's annual get-together of 14 uniformed gay associations in Barcelona.

Italy is among the few democratic countries left that still impose a ban on the enrollment of homosexuals: nowadays, of the 26 NATO member countries, only 6 still apply this kind of discrimination. France, Germany and Spain already allow lesbians, gays, and bisexuals to serve. Italy is in countertrend, together with the United States of America.

But the prospects seem different in the two countries: while Italy could pretty soon be obliged to conform its legislation to the standards adopted within the European Union with respect to the protection of Human Rights, for the United States there appears to be no obligation of such a kind. 

The Pentagon's New Policy Guidelines on Homosexuals in the Military, adopted after the promulgation of Pub. L. 103-160 in 1993, under Bill Clinton’s presidency, state that “Sexual orientation will not be a bar to service unless manifested by homosexual conduct. The military will discharge members who engage in homosexual conduct, which is defined as a homosexual act, a statement that the member is homosexual or bisexual, or a marriage or attempted marriage to someone of the same gender”. Thus in the U.S. the “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy still forbids homosexuals to serve openly in the military, although 75% of Americans nowadays claim to be in favour of ending such discrimination, according to the Pew research Centre.

The cause of the expulsion of more than 11,000 policemen and militaries since the time it was approved, these rules still receive the applause of the Republican Party and of its candidate McCain: “Let’s not tamper with them”, he said.

It seems instead that they could be revised if the Democrats win: Senator Barack Obama, the Democratic Candidate from Illinois, might start to repeal the current policy right after his election, according to Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, the gay advocacy group. Solmonese affirms to be seeing “a sea of  change” in the attitudes of the Democratic candidate.

Summer holidays seem to have reminded the Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi of his old days as a singer on cruise-ships: after having reached the apices of his careers both as a businessman and as a politician, he appears to be strongly willing to show off his consistently-praised vocal talents.

His intimate friend Mario Apicella, who has become famous singing in Neapolitan after a multi-year career as a car park attendant, has in fact talked him into recording a CD of love ballads, “There’s love”, to be in the stores by Christmas. ''We haven't mentioned a single political theme in the whole CD'', the famous singer claims. “They will all be love songs linked to the Neapolitan tradition. I was also thinking about throwing some jazz in to try to make the Naples sound a bit more modern,” he adds.

He complains that Silvio should dedicate more time to developing his musical career and leave aside his duties as a politician, “The problem is that even when he’s on holiday in Sardinia he’s always working because he receives an average of 40-50 telephone calls a day”. The famous singer clearly shows his determination to put great effort towards the realization of this new project and is actually working on it in the Premier’s villa.

With Apicella at the guitar and Berlusconi at the microphone, the essential requirements for a great success are all evident. After years of occasional private concerts organized for friends and family and having sold 45.000 copies of their first album together ''Meglio Una Canzone'' (“Better a song”) produced in 2003, the two seem closer-knit than ever.

Pietro Ciucci, the newly-elected president of A.N.A.S (the Italian road-building agency),  announced on May 23rd 2008 that the works for the building of the Messina Bridge, a  3,690-metre-long bridge designed to connect Sicily to the rest of the country, would recommence.  For one reason or another the project was never implemented, but it has always been a source of great debates in the Italian Parliament between those who are favourable to its implementation and others who contest its utility.


The first to hypothesize the building of such an infrastructure was Charles the Great  who, in the IX century, expressed his desire to build a bridge over the two opposite sides of the Tyrrhenian Sea. Then, two centuries later, a number of explorations of the Strait had been organized under the auspices of Ruggero II – King of Sicily – in order to ascertain the feasibility of such a project. But no financings were given to its implementation; so it was quickly shelved.


The project received new attention only in 1969 when A.N.A.S. organized an “International concourse of ideas” for the realization of a road and a railway that would connect Sicily to the rest of the Italian territory.  The creation of the Strait of Messina Joint Stock Company in 1981 finally showed the concrete intention of the Italian government to realize what was conceived as a fundamental infrastructure for the economic renaissance of Sicily.

This perception is still felt today for a number of reasons: first of all, the building of the project is meant to be a source of employment for more than 13.000 people; second, the project is conceived to be a great booster of local tourism, since it would facilitate the access to the island for tourists coming from the mainland. The same thing is true for Sicilian workers whose workplace is situated outside of the region: they would benefit from an infrastructure able to handle 4,500 cars an hour and 200 trains a day, which would substitute the slow ferry services existing nowadays. Last, but not least, the bridge would transform the Tyrrhenian Sea into an important trade route for the transportation of goods from Africa and the Middle East to the European Union. This especially from 2010 on, when the countries of the Northern and the Southern side of the Mediterranean Sea will be all involved in a Free Trade Area as part of a project aiming to deepen the economic and social links between them (The Euro-Mediterranean Partnership).


Berlusconi, the new Italian Premier, has always adhered to these considerations since he himself pushed for the realization of the Bridge starting in his first mandate in 1994. During his first short-lasting government (he was in charge until 1996) and during the legislature he held from 2001 until 2006, the Left wing of Parliament has always opposed - the building of the Bridge.


Based on a number of studies performed by several Italian environmental NGOs, the Opposition stated that the Bridge would actually damage the region’s tourism sector, since its impact on the marine flora and fauna would be devastating. Moreover, concerns on a possible Mafia involvement in the implementation of the project were accompanied by another deep contestation: since its cost would be superior to 6.5 billion euro, they insisted that this sum could  be better used to develop the industrial sector, giving Sicilian people greater job opportunities then they would have through the bridge’s construction since, once completed, 13.000 people employed for this purpose would be left without a job.


During Berlusconi’s mandates the total expenditures needed for studies and research concerning the Bridge  reached a value of 600 million euro (if summed with the money previously spent). The end of his mandate in 2006 brought Prodi’s coalition to power.  The then  transportation minister Alessandro Bianchi, rejected the multi-billion-euro project, calling it ''the most useless and damaging project in Italy in the last 100 years''.


Berlusconi’s re-election seems to finally give him the chance to implement the project: Pietro Ciucci has stated that thanks to the Prime Minister’s determination and the financings devolved by the government, the construction of the Bridge could be over by 2016. If the centre-right coalition held by Berlusconi manages to stay in power until the deadline in 2013, no protests by the opposition or part of the civil society would be, at this point, able to stop construction and prohibit the completion of the biggest infrastructure Italy has financed in the last century.