Women Fighting back against Berlusconi: Italian women take to the streets

Sophie Arie su The Guardian, 18 febbraio 2011

Valeria Fedeli knows about organising street protests. She is the deputy leader of one of Italy’s largest unions, the Filcem-Cgil. Yet in January, when she and others decided to call the country’s women on to the streets to demand respect, she was not sure they would come. “Things had got so bad,” she says. “We could feel how annoyed, how indignant, people were. But there had never been a national day organised by women in Italy.”

Acting on “intuition”, Fedeli joined two film directors, a female politician from the left and one from the right, a nun who works with trafficked women, and a rightwing newspaper editor to put out a call to action via the internet. They received an “avalanche” of support, she says, and last Sunday an estimated one million people, mainly women, filled the squares of Italy. “We realised we had touched something deep,” says Fedeli. “People were just waiting for someone to lead them.”

The massive protest against sexism – seemingly endorsed and promoted by a prime minister accused of paying for sex with an underage prostitute and abusing his office – was a watershed in a country that for years has condoned the antics of Silvio Berlusconi, as well as the Benny Hill-style use of women’s bodies on Italian TV.

So why did the revolution (and this does really feel like a cultural revolution to a lot of Italians) take so long? First, the problem had been around for a long time and people had got used to living with it. The trigger that allowed these pent-up frustrations to flow was Rubygate, the affair that culminated this week in Berlusconi being sent for trial on vice charges.

As well as unveiling allegedly illegal sex, the investigation uncovered evidence of what many had suspected for years – that women who were pretty, dressed like dolls and were disponibili (willing to have sex with powerful men) could make millions and land jobs in positions of authority while most hard-working Italian women were struggling to make ends meet. Italy has the euro region’s largest public debt (at 116% of GDP) and unemployment is at 8%. Parliament is about to vote on €11bn (£9.26bn) of spending cuts.

As well as allegations from Karima el-Mahroug (also known as Ruby Rubacuori), the woman at the centre of the case, the investigation also concluded that Nicole Minetti, Berlusconi’s former dental hygienist whom the prime minister backed as a prospective candidate for his party in regional elections last year, was one of the key organisers of the much reported “bunga-bunga” sex parties held at his Milan home.

A string of women have told the investigation, led by three female judges in Milan, of the large sums they received for spending time with the prime minister. “People voted for Berlusconi because he gave the impression that his personal success would bring success to all,” says Fedeli. “But now it’s really clear that has not happened.”

In the past, women were the hardcore of Berlusconi voters. “He was a seductive leader,” says Flavia Perina, editor of the Secolo d’Italia, the official newspaper of the rightwing Futuro e Libertà party. “But now people have understood that the gallantry was hollow. He has said too many things against women.”

The Italian left had been trying to use Berlusconi’s sexism against him for years but had failed to mobilise the masses. “What seems to have made this work is the very fact that this was not a political protest. It was about defending the dignity of women,” Fedeli says.

Some in the media and arts have tried to draw attention to the issue since details of Berlusconi’s private life and his practice of appointing pretty young girls to good jobs began to emerge. Lorella Zanardo shocked Italians with a documentary called Il Corpo delle Donne, which forced people to recognise that the TV they had become used to – full of scantily clad women – had become pornographic.

“Thirty years of this kind of television gave the impression that it is normal,” she says. At the same time, film directors Francesca and Cristina Comencini wrote a play and took it round the country. And Perina’s newspaper campaigned against the promotion of a TV show girl to become an MEP until the plan was withdrawn. But all these efforts had no identifiable centre or leader, and were under-reported by Berlusconi’s media or dismissed as the rantings of a leftist intellectual elite.

Zanardo has now left her job to dedicate herself to campaigning to educate schoolchildren on the image of women in the media. The internet has also provided a way to challenge the brainwashing by TV. Zanardo blames the problem on Italy’s ageing population and says two generations have grown up watching TV with only one role model for women – the dollybird. Her film has been watched by 3.5 million people online.

Now that a large part of the female population has shown that its tolerance has run out, Berlusconi’s chances of staying in power seem slimmer. He is set to appear in court on 6 April, and at the same time his government’s budget cuts will begin to bite. But it remains to be seen if the call for greater equality will lead to more than a change of government. Changing Italian attitudes to women may be much harder.

• This article was amended on 18 February 2011. The original said that Nicole Minetti is now a prospective candidate for Berlusconi’s party in regional elections next month. This has been corrected.

---