A few sections are still not reachable, they will very soon, in the next days.
CALENDAR
World Vegetarian Week
World October 1--7
It should be every day, but of course, this is to make the general public opinion aware, more than supporting
who already is vegetarian.
World March for Peace and Nonviolence
NZ / World, Oct. 2009 / Jan. 2010
on Gandhi's birthday, this march for peace was started last October,
and will cross the whole world until January, ending in the Andes.
Demonstration for Press Freedom
P.za del Popolo, Roma (I-EU) October 3 - 16:00
one man is forcing his control over virtually the whole information system in Italy. Come and join the rally,
as many as you can, before it is too late!
"La bellezza e l'inferno"
RAI3 TV channel (I-EU) November 11 - 21:10
Don't miss this, two hours with the writer Roberto Saviano.
World Summit on Food Security
FAO Headquarter (I-EU) November 16--18
The most important problem in the World: hunger.
Demonstration: NoBDay
P.za della Repubblica, Roma (I-EU) December 5 - 14:00
Further information: do click on the icon. No excuses not to come and join!
UN Climate Change Conference
Bella Center, København (DK-EU) December 7--18
The other most important problem in the World!
BLOG
Oct. / Dec. 2009
THIS MONTH' s THEME:
Someone still speaks out
Today, the media dictatorship is becoming
a substitute to military dictatorship.
The big economic groups are using the media
and decide who can speak,
who the good guy is
and who the bad guy is.
Danny Glover
Some voices of courage
This month I feel the urge to mention a few women and men, and say «thank you» to them.
Women and men that stay true to their values and inner truths, and don't let the squalor
and violence around, change and destroy them.
They may be offended, oppressed, mobbed, isolated, sued, imprisoned, beaten, tortured and still,
there they are, standing out and speaking out.
Their strength is an inner force. The fire of knowledge, compassion, indignation and wiseness.
It keeps burning inside, and will die out only when, one unforeseeable day, an angel will blow it out,
they won't be here anymore and we will realize how much we miss them.
So the message is: do listen to them while they are here, now, and, most important, support them!
Nothing kills them more (symbolically and literally) than isolation.
An isolated man or woman is a dead man or woman. No one dies in a civil society.
In the end, the question is more about all of us, than about the single person or his oppressors.
Sooo many!
One of the photos I took at the huge demonstration for Press Freedom in Rome (see the calendar to the left here).
My goodness, never seen people so packed before.
It was impossible to move around even in the huge central square in Rome (Piazza del Popolo), and all the
streets around were also packed with people.
A quality demonstration, with lots of interesting speakers, and, for once, many different people from an array of several
associations, movements, parties, all together, in perfect harmony.
I am a very independent individual, who never looses himself in the masses, and I do love demonstrations at the very same
time. Love to be together with other people manifesting similar opinions about fundamental rights and issues, and when it is
done nonviolently, with a positive spirit, joy and critic sense, well, that's liberating, and the kind of freedom I love.
Saints and sinners
See...today is Saint Luca's day, so what better day for resuming this highly irregular blog?
St. Luca was one of the Evangelists, as you all know, and protector of healers and artists, and last but not the least,
he is also invoked to cure impotence.
Have no idea if it has ever worked or not (and don't worry about me at all), but the object of this month's blog is another
kind of impotence, the one of so many citizens in the World feeling higher and higher discomfort about the (miserable) state
of so many democracies. When they even exist, as, not to be forgotten, there are a few dictatorships left.
It is clear, I have been urged to write about this by the actual situation here in Italy, which is so serious, you wouldn't
believe.
Today's Italy is not even the best example of a modern media-dictatorship, as in Danny Glover's words.
Its condition is so peculiar, it is in fact unique in the World and in History even, as we have never seen
something like this before: a mad man, sexually addicted, escaping from his criminal past, and from Justice,
and doing this by mean of becoming a Prime Minister, taking control over most of the country, harassing anyone,
individual or intellectual or institution, that tries to counterbalance him, and owning most of the media and
a wide popular consent at the same time.
I am sure if you put McLuhan, Chomsky, Adorno, Einstein and Freud together, they would still not being able
to understand what is going on here.
And still, and still, even in the most barbarian situations, there are always a few people standing up and speaking out.
No matter if in mediatic dictatorships or bloody dictatorships.
I will in the next days thank some of the brave men and women defying oppression or passive indifference, and, yes,
speaking out.
When the problem is not the questions
There are lots of things Silvio Berlusconi hates: judges, communists, beards, garlic, sweating hands, tall people, women,
the Constitution.
But most of all, he can't stand journalists. They have the bad habit of asking questions.
Only those who keep silent and let he ramble for 30 minutes without interrupting are good guys. Funny enough they all work
for him, in the newspapers and TV channels he owns.
All others are "either prostitutes or leftists" as he once said.
He shouldn't worry that much, they all know they would be finished if they dared asking the wrong question. In fact,
when Berlusconi is not satisfied with some of the uneducated interviewers, he just needs to take a trip to Bulgaria and make
a rant about them.
Short time after, they will be fired, no mercy style.
It happened to Santoro, Biagi, Montanelli, just to mention some of the best Italian journalists, who got in troubles
because of annoying him.
When some of his huge sex scandals arose, the newspaper laRepubblica asked him just ten innocent questions.
Simple questions about his supposed relationship to a younger than 18yrs old girl, Noemi Letizia, an actress wannabe.
The one calling him "papi".
Berlusconi never answered those questions, or gave in stead a lot of contradictory, and frankly ridiculous, explanations of
where on Earth he knew that girl from.
laRepubblica is not giving up.
Here it is a page
telling what this is all about, on the sex scandals side.
Not to mention of course all many others serious crimes he has been linked to in the course of time
(guesting a mafia boss in his villa for two years, rumors of being involved in drug traffics, belonging to the secret and
subversive masonry lodge P2, starting his empire with huge dubious capitals, paying kickbacks, creating off-shore companies
with the goal of dodging taxes, corrupting judges, nepotism, saving himself by mean of ad personam laws, violating
international laws and fundamental rights, blatant lies and finally his uncountable gaffes and sexist, racist and trivial
boutades).
Saviano please do save us
There is a man in Italy that can't live like anyone else.
He has to be protected by the Police all day long, can rarely move around, and not without a complete protection by his
shielder.
What has he done to deserve that?
Well, he has written and published a book: "Gomorra" telling the truth about the Casalesi camorra clan,
one of the most powerful and brutal mafias in southern Italy, near Napoli.
His name is Roberto Saviano,
a good picture of him following:
A philosopher, journalist and writer and one of the most limpid intellectuals in today's Italy, one of the few left actually.
Most others seem to have vanished, or at least they keep silent.
He recently made a petition, asking the Prime Minister directly, not to push through some very questionable laws.
The petition, in a very short time, got signed by 500,000 people!
To see this man of great value threatened of life and practically imprisoned in his home really saddens and outrages me.
NOVEMBER 2009
Persecuted words in the World
Last month I mentioned the south-Italian writer Roberto Saviano, a person I truly value. He writes about his
local reality, but he is also fully conscious and committed about the rest of the world.
In that big, big World he is unfortunately not the only one to be persecuted. It is a very widespread issue, indeed.
Salman Rushdie is one of the most known persecuted writers.
You might also have heard of the detained Chinese writer Liu Xiaobo. [jailing people for their dissent
is one of the most cruel form of repression, and totally unacceptable to me].
Or Orhan Pamuk, Irakli Kakabadze, Maziar Bahari, and so many others.
On their site you will find the appalling
statistics
of the known cases of persecution, the World's writers are facing.
You will get familiar with a nearly unending list of writers who don't want to give up their Freedom of Speech,
a universal fundamental right, and one of the most precious.
To round up, I would like to remind of
Harold Pinter, who died last Christmas Eve and, together with his wife
Antonia, known to be helping oppressed writers.
Finally, the meritorious work of
ICORN (International Cities of Refuge Network),
one of the most important initiatives to materially and morally support freedom of expression and its embodiments.
Singers get in troubles too
Yes, it seems like everyone who wants to truly express himself, be it writing or
playing songs, is not welcome some places.
Emotional reality, as well as artistic creativity and freedom, are the
most threatening to regimes that maintain their power by mean of control and
mystification. They need citizens that behave and work like robots, marching in
straight lines, and never being affected by deviated lateral thinking, or
disturbing speculative thoughts.
Those needs are particularly evident in China. The combination of an
oppressive, nearly total, control and the traditional respect and reliability
Asian people have to their institutions, makes any form for critics and social
activism very difficult and risky. Still, even there, some people manage to do
it, with big doses of courage.
When thinking about music in particular, there is unexpected underground
activity going on. For those who can read Chinese (I definitely can't), there is
this resource site:
yanjun.org ,
that is the name of a very active and knowledgeable musician colleague. [update: can't find the resource page anymore on Yan Jun's site, but you can look at
this interesting interview
from 2011]
I would like to mention one of them here: the 38yrs old songwriter
Zhou Yunpeng[this seems to be the somehow correct name, as you can also find Zhao Yun-Peng, or Zhou Funpeng,
everybody seem to spell Chinese as they please].
He has been blind since he was 9, then learned to play guitar, and started
writing poetry.
I must say that I don't know how much he is tolerated or controlled in
China, it seems he is managing well, being an independent producer and a
wandering artist.
I like his lyrics, he has the courage of being so real and direct,
something rare these days when, as you know, most lyrics just don't say anything
at all.
He does, he speaks out on all kinds of social problems and injustice. And
his music is interesting too, mixing Chinese tones with kind of 70ties songs,
especially folksongs. I never like comparing too much, and he's got a very
personal style, which is what makes him interesting.
Here an example of a song I like [please, don't turn your volume too high,
as there are some weird feedbacks and spikes, and mobile phones >:(, at the
beginning]: live ~ Zhou Yun-Peng
Another song with lyrics and an audio recording:
"Jangle for the Jobless",
from China Digital Times.
Hunger
This is the scandal of all times and of our times in particular, so there are
never words hard enough to describe and condemn it.
One billion people, many of them children, are starving and dying right here on
this Earth, and right now. Every few seconds a child dies of hunger, somewhere.
How can we accept that? There is no justification even possible for this
situation. And not many are doing something about it. Not even mention the world
leaders, who will not take the time to visit the FAO summit. The result is, all
promises have been unattended, and the number of hungry people is growing, not
decreasing.
Before you ask: "Right, but what can we do, what is the solution?", the solution
does exist:
We ought to acknowledge the absolute priority of this issue.
Nations should be set aside (too many dictators, inept leaders, and puppet-democracies around),
and a very proficient collaboration among the World's institutions and the local farmers
should be enforced.
Drop or limit the giant projects, and concentrate on infinite small projects right on
the local fields. With the simplest technologies possible, natural and organic methods for growing food,
renewable energies. Sustainability as the main frame for all what is done.
Plant fruit trees everywhere. Fruit can provide both the calories and the vitamins and minerals
needed for at least the basic health of the hungry populations. And at the same time provide shade,
geological stability, protection against floods, soil fertility, beauty. All what the populations need.
Then, starting from that, all the rest can be built upon.
But at least, the FAO's Director-General Jacques Diouf, is trying what he can to
create some attention on the summit, he is going to
hunger-strike for one day
before the summit, and sleep on a mattress on the floor in Rome's FAO headquarter.
Please, you can, at the very least, sign the
1billionhungry petition,
introduced by Jacques Diouf.
Aung San Suu Kyi
It is saddening the simple realizing that when I dedicated my monthly
blog to her
["What is going on"],
it was in October 2007. It seemed something was finally happening
regarding that shaming and brutal repression, but it didn't.
I definitely haven't forgotten her in the meanwhile, and the whole Burma
population as well.
Was just waiting for Barak Obama to remember his position on this matter, the
one he had before being elected, and to step out of his quietness after the
election.
Finally it came, a clear statement to Burma's junta, urging them to release Aung
San Suu Kyi.
Of course, we all know one thing is official statements, and the other, what
really counts, the diplomatic work that goes on behind the scenes.
For decades Americans and Burmese leaders didn't even share the same room once,
they refused to meet. Now it has happened, a significant news then, in the line
of Obama's politic of dialog with everyone, still maintaining sanctions though.
This time, I don't want to delve into the reasons why this so important issue
continues to be widely neglected, just wanted to, once more, urge the World's
leaders to finally resolve it.
DECEMBER 2009
Another huge march
Last Saturday I was at the announced
NoBDay,
the demonstration asking for Berlusconi's resignation.
Of course we are not going to obtain what we wish, Mr. B. can't quit, as he
needs to stay in power to stop the judges from jailing him.
That is the reason why he popped up in the political scene in 1993, to save his
butt and his enterprises, that were on the verge of going bankrupt. There were
even more compelling reasons, regarding the Mafia and its need to find a new
reference, after the collapse of the whole Italian political system, following
the 'mani pulite' operation ('clean hands'), when an uncountable number of
politicians and entrepreneurs were arrested, jailed and condemned for
corruption. But this is still a partly obscure story, still under investigation,
so I will leave it for a while.
Even if the media can 'annihilate' a demonstration simply ignoring it or
spreading false data about its participants (the Police stated the ridiculous
number of 90,000 people), the demonstration was an incredible success, for
various reasons.
First.
It was a completely new phenomenon, as for the first time it wasn't
arranged by political parties but by common people communicating on the net. I
must say they have been amazing in arranging all this. Kudos to everyone
involved.
Second.
I walked through a good part of the long, long, nearly unending stream
of people marching, and I talked also with a lot of them, and there were so many
different people, from all social classes and ages and political standpoints.
Again, like in the previous big demonstration, for Press Freedom, all united.
While the parties in the center-left side of the parliament can't ever unite,
the people voting them can, and has been asking for unity for ages. Will they
ever listen?
Besides, there were loads of young people in particular, and it was
long ago I saw so many in a political demonstration, a sign they trust more some
people on Internet's Social Networks than the traditional parties (and I must
add that the Democratic Party didn't officially promote this demo, the usual
lack of courage and not knowing the score).
Third.
Despite the clear expression of frustration and rage for having such a
lousy political situation in Italy, it all went perfectly pacific, and with a
burst of colors, creativity, humor, choruses, dances and music. It was really a
pleasure to be there. The speeches were also very interesting, finally a bit of
truth was told.
One photo I took of the infinite mass of people marching. By the way, they were certainly not 90,000,
rather at least 300,000. Do consider this is S.Giovanni, the biggest church in Rome,
and the biggest square too, and this is only a tiny slice of it:
Copenfiasco
I didn't blog in the last days, because too busy, but also because I wanted to follow and cover the
Copenhagen Climate Change Summit (see calendar)
Well... forget about it, simply. It was a lead balloon from start to
finish. What a delusion. Had actually not so many expectations to be honest, but
I didn't expect such a total flop either.
I said to myself: "Right, the Danes can have so many defects, but they are
still outstanding when organizing, and managing meetings, and facing
environmental challenges in particular!".
How wrong I was. I forgot there is a hopeless right-wing government in
charge, and their failure is really complete, beyond any negative expectation.
Right, they can't be held responsible for how the irresponsible national
states behave, or don't behave. For a failed industrial revolution, devouring
materials and energy, and producing wastes and polluting gases, for wrong
lifestyles, and for the need of emerging countries and economies, China and
India in particular, to follow and expand the same unsustainable path we
followed, as industrialized countries.
On the other side, these countries are making big efforts to adopt better and more sustainable technologies,
and African countries for ex. have all rights not to accept agreements that are only
blaming them, without demanding the same for the rich countries. We should also
remember that a rise of 2 Celsius degrees in the West, can mean 3-4 degrees in
Africa, so their life is much more at risk.
Still, it is evident the preparation of the summit and the strategies
adopted were completely wrong. Shame on the arrangers that wasted such an
historic chance for themselves and for the whole world.
And Obama? He certainly hasn't lived up to his potentials in the last
months. He is still a miracle in the international politics, but he needs to
acknowledge the failures as soon as possible. His popularity is precipitating
already, and that can be catastrophic. Time for a pitiless self-analysis, and
for rolling his sleeves up, and pulling his socks up too, and do something about
it.
Anyway, some still try to see the glass a bit full, rather than completely
empty, so I will also report different evaluation of the results of the summit.
Right, I did blog already during the last months, but I had not officially re-opened my site and blog, as I wasn't really ready for that, and all my site needed a thorough revision.
I have been working very hard, and very close now to be finished with all this revamping of the site.
I will send my "LucaNews" to all of you I know with my invitation to this site.
Greetings also to all the new readers that happened to find this site, and hopefully will like it
and faithfully stay with us.
That's all for now, I leave you to your Christmas life.
I will probably not further write before the beginning of January, as you have already so much to do and to celebrate,
there is already so much to read here, and you will hopefully sign up at my forum down here,
with your own nice name and picture of yourself.
I will use my spare time to finish polishing this site, and opening the last sections that are still missing.
Be prepared to lots of new content, and, finally, you will be able to listen to all my music!
So, as I use to say:
“Happy Christmas and a Merry New Year!”
to everybody.
My best wishes for a wonderful new Year
and a new Decade too!
See you soon.... :)
An important update
The Chinese former professor
Liu Xiaobo
, I mentioned on November the 2nd, has been
sentenced to 11 years in jail
. Just to stress how serious my appeal for the safety of persecuted international intellectuals was.
He has not done anything criminal at all, just claiming universal rights for the Chinese people,
especially via a
Charter 08 document
, inspired by the 1977 Czechoslovakian charter 77.
This is called 'subversion' in Chinese, it seems.
I am not blaming China only of course, it is a very widespread habit, and
trick, to call all what is intellectual dissent for "subversive", even in our
democracies.
Another event that is important to mention, is
what is going on in Iran
.
In the good coverage by the Guardian, another of the dissidents I mentioned the
same day as Liu Xiaobo, is the filmmaker
Maziar Bahari
, tortured and jailed for more than 100 days just for reporting on the unrest,
that is the same I am doing here...
It's too early to cultivate even the slightest hopes, but from what I can
sense, it will be very difficult to stop the protests in Iran this time. I am
afraid there could be a horrible bloodshed (there are already 15 dead so far),
but the fact is, civilization in Iran is too strong and rooted, you can't
enslave such a human potential for too long. This might well be the beginning of
the end for the fundamentalist regime, let's hope it.
Any case, my strongest support to any individual or collective in the
World, that still speak out.
I will write again in the next year, on Thursday the 14th of January, so
that you have some time to party, read this month's blog, sign up at the Forum,
and look around the new site.