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Italian Police Seize Blog Over 'Kill Berlusconi' Satire
Giorgio Maone writes "Italian Police just seized the Savona e Ponente Blog because the 60-year-old journalist Valeria Rossi posted a satirical article titled 'I want to kill Berlusconi,' writing that 'you can't feel guilty of wishing him death, because he's not human: he's an alien, with incredible psychic powers.' Otherwise, how could such a clown, with multiple pending trials for corruption, tax offenses, abuse of power and even child prostitution, convince the majority of the other politicians and a consistent slice of Italian people to keep him as their prime minister for almost 20 years now? Here's a mirror of the incriminating text (Italian)." And here's a translation to English.
Did you know it is illegal to say: "I wish President Obama was killed by mortar fire on the White House. It could be set up across the park and use the flag on said White House to provide a rough wind measurement."
Not everybody has the same sense of humor ... especially politicians and those who's job it is to protect them.
I keep reading about this clown, the demonstrations against him etc, but it all seems to boil down to one thing - the lack of a credible alternative. As long as there isn't one, he's going to be in power. This simple fact seems to have escaped the Italian voting public for years now. Is it really hard to find someone in Italy who's not a crook and who wants to be president?
The man is no doubt a wizard in the arts of illusion, but what I'm more concerned about is the global Police State we're living in.
Could it be some cherished, carefully guarded tradition? I remember few quite similar, in spirit, Roman Emperors... or (ducks) Popes ;p
One that hath name thou can not otter
It's one of those pieces that can be read with equal plausibility as an incitement to violence or as a joke. The idea of killing the prime minister is mentioned not once, but several times in obsessive fashion. What, you mean you can't write a piece expressing exasperation with Berlusconi and the Italian parliament without making those "jokes"?
I see this a lot in politics these days: educated, intelligent journalists lashing out and saying anyone who doesn't agree with their political opinions must not be a member of the human race. And here's one who thinks that it's OK to call for deaths just because she's frustrated. America has the same thing, Sarah Palin's calls for violence incited her followers and real people died.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
He's not eligible to be prime minister because he was born in Kenya.
What keeps him in power so long? You mean apart from owning the press, subverting due process and being beloved by the police?
The funny thing is that put that way; he sounds just like most of our beloved leaders.
"Oops, I always forget the purpose of competition is to divide people into winners and losers." - Hobbes
Kinda what I was thinking. Especially a text which doesn't have any smiley or anything, and, as far as my piss-poor Italian allows, can read just as well as a schizophrenic's hate tirade. I mean, much as I would like to believe that a text going on about how someone isn't human and can hypnotize the masses is obviously a parody, you could say the same about the contrail conspiracy theory and yet some dolts out there believe it in all earnest.
The thing is, some people _do_ go nuts now and then and start believing all sorts of highly illogical stuff right before they go and shoot someone. A text whose basic and repeated gist seems to be "I never was for killing another human, but I want to kill the head of the government, and it's ok to kill him because he's a mind-controling alien" would probably get one investigated in the USA or most other countries.
I kind of have sympathy for him, and see how being run by a douchebag using his media monopoly to keep himself in power would drive someone to despair. But FFS there are better ways to go about it without sounding like a delusional rant about wanting to kill him. Or at least, you know, a couple of winking smileys or something.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Given the violent episodes in recent and not so recent history of italy (for instance brigate rosse) some humor is so tasteless to be borderline criminal. One can be critical of berlusconi without having to resort to that. For a good example one can watch the endless stream of satire against him going on on his own tv channels (yes it happens! that sells a lot of ad so he doesn't not stop it).
The people who speak the truth are treated like criminals and the criminals are free and run the country. Tunisia, Egypt, Italy?
Lesson #1: Never, ever, get into anything related to bashing politicians. It's a free way to disaster.
I'd go as far as to say "Never voice your political opinions", except maybe with your family and close friends.
To an outside observer, it seems that Berlusconi has stayed in politics for one primary reason - to make sure that he can keep changing laws every time there's an attempt to prosecute him for some misdeed. With that tactic, he's rendered the judiciary largely irrelevant. He owns a vast media empire, and hasn't been forced to keep his media holdings at arm's length while in office, so he's used that to prop up his political empire. The Italian Parliament doesn't seem to be able to deal with the issue. The disconnect between those in power and a good chunk of the population is very high, according to some recent news reports.
Given his personal behavior, you have to wonder just how corrupt his government actually is, and who may have been in a position to blackmail him for favors over the last twenty years. If he'd managed to avoid sexual misconduct that seemed deplorable to his core supporters, he wouldn't be in trouble now.
If Italy was in another part of the world, there would probably be a lot of questions about how democratic it actually is.
It goes a little wider than that.
He is an embarrassment to
And probably a lot of other groups.
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
Just call him "Master".
You know, that's actually a pretty good idea! The flag being used to gauge wind speed I mean, not the killing part... I never would have thought of that.
Obviously you're not a golfer.
Comparing Belusconi to Mussolini? What an absolute hidious insult to Mussolini.
"Sarah Palin's calls for violence incited her followers and real people died."
When?
It certainly wasn't the Giffords shooting. Jared Lee Loughner is a guy whose two favorite books were the Communist Manifesto and Mein Kampf. He liked using drugs, was a religion hating atheist, was a registered Independent who usually didn't even vote, and according to his friends, would well up at anger at the very sight of George W. Bush.
Truly, your prototypical Palin supporter.
I know it was politically useful for Palin haters to pin Loughner on her, but that doesn't change the fact that this guy was just a paranoid, grade A random nut.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
My thoughts, somewhat... maybe the esprit de la révolution has jumped the Mediterranean.
"Say no more"
I am willing to bet that the second post in the comments section of that blog were what really worried some people. That phrase can have very different meanings, given the context of the blog post.
Berlusconi has better taste in women than Bill Clinton.....or Obama.
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
I'm a little surprised that he managed to last longer than Bertie Ahern
[Foundation Series Spoiler Follows]
Italy is to Earth what Trantor was to the Galaxy in the Foundation Serioes -- understand the historical center that is Italy and you can understand and solve the problems of the rest of the planet.
All the corruption, lies, money, power, politics, rich/poor, north/south divides and bullshit that is everywhere in the world, in Italy it's all there, but magnified in a kind of tragi-comedy on stage.
e.g. in the West, is media ownership concentrated in a few people? Sure it is -- look at Murdoch and co. Does Murdoch have undue influence over our political leaders, sure he does -- but it's all a bit subtle, a quick visit to 10 Downing Street here, some money to congressional campaigns there.
In Italy however, media concentration and political power are all conveniently tied up in a single individual -- no need for subtlety!
Michelle Obama is definitely on the gorgeous side. Are Berlusconi's women any better?
Unless I missed a link, the story is low on the details that matter most to geeks. How did the Italian police seize a .com domain. The site is "http://www.savonaeponente.com/" not "http://www.savonaeponente.it". I can understand the FBI or the CIA doing the same for a US-registered domain, but was some sort of inter-government coordination at work here? Could, for example, the secret police of ${authoritarian_state} seize facebook.com (and not just block it locally) because it's fanning the flames of protests against ${hated_leader_for_life}?
Perhaps, the translation wasn't so good... but to me, it looked more like a death threat than satire. Does anyone know anything about the author? Just because the theory he espouses is crazy, doesn't mean he is not serious about it. Look at all the crazier stuff this journalist found:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2001/apr/07/society
Italy is different, they like sex and are not ashamed of it,
Tolerate alternative lifestyles, eg LBGT
Have some of the most passable/beautiful TS outside asia, and go to confession.
Burlisconi has few problems, at his age most Italians envy him, as in the US its only the PC liberals who hate success and fun,
and at 74 who can grudge him that.
Ever been to Italy, it is one of the most dis-organized and wonderful places on the planet.
And governing it is like hurding cats, Obama only has to deal with sheeple
Consider Clinton, a paragon, of lying.
How naieve and stupid can you Yanks get?
it spread to egypt
what country in the middle east should feel the sweep of historic revolution next? algeria? jordan? yemen?
no, that other backwards country
italy
seriously, what the FUCK is wrong with you italian people? why do you tolerate this joke?
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
how could such a clown, with multiple pending trials for corruption, tax offenses, abuse of power and even child prostitution, convince the majority of the other politicians and a consistent slice of Italian people to keep him as their prime minister for almost 20 years now?
By using the brute squad to terrorize the slightest dissent.
Larger protests - may be picking up steam?
http://www.boingboing.net/2011/02/13/a-bad-day-for-sultan.html
If I had said it, I would have meant it. It sounds less like a joke and more like good policy to kill such a horrible person.
Quoting from the text:
"Oggi, però, mi accordo di desiderare, dal profondo del cuore, la morte di Silvio Berlusconi .
Non solo: ***mi sento proprio disposta ad andarlo a far fuori personalmente.***"
The asterisked part translates to "I am ready to go kill him myself".
Now granted, the rest of the blog post is obviously satyrical and even thinking this person actually wants to go kill the dude (whom I intensely dislike, by the way) is insane, but the fact is, she did violate the law by stating this. It's still ridiculous that the blog was seized when any search for "kill berlusconi" will reveal that if someone did off the man half of italy would welcome his death and dance on his grave, but you can't technically fault the police for their actions.
Still and all, the only thing seizing the blog will accomplish is to make the attempt at censorship more widely known via your friend the Streisand effect.
In America we have a constitutionally protected right to say, "Kill president ...........NO CARRIER*&^%&^%
I don't know much about the conditions in Italy, I hardly speak any Italian, but in some other countries people get elected, not because they are the best for the job, or even slightly good, but just because they are somewhat better than the alternatives.
Free, as in your money being freed from the confines of your account.
Now that the war is over, Mussolini's dead
He wants to get to Heaven with a crown upon his head
The Lord says no, he's got to stay below
All dressed up, and nowhere to go.
While a normal citizen doesn't have a security force dedicated to their safety, the laws regarding threatening to kill them are the same. In particular it is illegal to threaten to kill someone or to tell someone else to kill them.
So if I threaten to kill you, that is illegal. I can go to jail just for that. I don't have to take any actual action, just to make a threat against your life.
However it has to be an actual threat, or a command to someone else, not just a joke or a statement of opinion. If you beat me at a video game and I lightheartedly say "Sometimes I want to kill you," that is a joke, and is protected speech.
"Otherwise, how could such a clown, with multiple pending trials for corruption, tax offenses, abuse of power and even child prostitution, convince the majority of the other politicians and a consistent slice of Italian people to keep him as their prime minister for almost 20 years now?"
Highlighted the answer for you.
Regards;
"you can't feel guilty of wishing him death, because he's not human: he's an alien"
Satire or not, that's a pretty sad worldview right there.
I'm just saying.
He who laughs last, thinks slowest.
This is interesting. What you are saying is very similar to a Mussolini's phrase:
"Governing Italians isn't difficult, it's just pointless."
I partly agree with this, but you can fully endorse it if you endorse the idea that there is a final scope in life and anything we do AND you know what it is.
I do not endorse any of those.
What keeps him in power so long?
Sollozzo: Bene, Don Corleone. I need a man who has powerful friends. I need a million dollars in cash. I need, Don Corleone, all of those politicians that you carry around in your pocket, like so many nickels and dimes .
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
Didn't you mean "hirding cats"?
And exactly how does it help satire anyway? It seems to me like one could make a satire on the theme of Berlusconi being a mind-controlling alien without repeated and obsessive returns to how that makes it ok to kill him. Remove the incitations to killing him from it, and you still have the same satire. Well, and still not particularly funny, but adding some violent rhetoric doesn't make it any funnier, it just makes it distasteful.
And frankly, I don't know if Palin in particular and one particular killing are linked, but the tone of political mud-slinging in the USA is not something most of us outside the USA admire. Drawing crosshairs on maps and opponents homes and all the hate rhetoric is something that adds... what? Why don't those guys and gal just say what their party will do for the voter, instead of how their opponents are traitors and need to be shot?
And frankly, even Loughner, since you mention him, seems like a poster child for a right wingnut. Complete with stuff like not having to take "federalist" laws, ranting about the return to a gold standard, and such touching woowoo CT views as that the government mind-controls the people via neuro-linguistic programming. Yes, he was crazy and as deranged as to hold a mortal grudge over not getting the answer he wanted to a nonsense irrelevant question. But are you sure that it's ok to keep telling such nutcases that a segment of the population are traitors and need to be shot? Because it's not clear to me at all.
By sheer virtue of having a large population, there are 2.2 million schizophrenics in the USA. (Note that I'm not picking on the USA for that. All countries have them and a 0.81% prevalence rate isn't particularly high.) Add retards, Lyme disease victims, etc, and you just have a few millions who aren't particularly good at judging stuff. Exactly what is gained by hammering into their heads that some people are traitors and need to be shot and drawing crosshairs on maps? It seems to me like it's only a matter of time until someone whose line between reality and fantasy is blurred anyway, acts upon that information.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Good for the Italian electorate! Just because a bunch of weaseley liberals accuse him of all sorts of things does not mean he is guilty of anything except offending liberals. It's nice to see that ordinary Italians have enough sense to distinguish liberal lies.
she exposed personal interest way up the ladders of power in the building of a coal powered station in which major local politicians have taken bribes for