A Gilded Cage of Beauty and Fashion - Italy's Women revolt

Between Mary and Magdalena

Usually the Italian women are treated as equals in terms of pay, social status, economic might, education and literacy. Usually everything is fine for Italy's women; that is, if you are inclined to believe the author of the 2012 modified Wikipedia article. 

Silvio Berlusconi knows otherwise. The political landscape in Italy is still male dominated, whether right, left or somewhere in the middle anti-women attitudes prevail. Italian women may have burned their bras in the 1970s, forcing a change in their legal status; however, the de facto post-emancipation everyday reality has nothing to do with the equality guaranteed on paper. Prime example, the ex-prime minister, charged with child prostitution, is infamous for his cavalier attitude towards women's issues. After sex scandals and crude jokes, the media celebrates the prowess of their 76-year-old macho when announcing his engagement to a women 49 years his junior. While most Italian women have long since stopped laughing, the media continues its parade of nude housewives and pretty faces who talk about beauty, fashion and sex. Important female issues, like the UN report on violence against women in Italy, are rarely given any valuable TV-time. But it sells, and the media is saturated with female nudity, orgasmic moans, talk show hostesses in revealing, skintight outfits. And Berlusconi, the media mogul who owns three private TV channels, fosters and supports the commercialization of the female image. The daily parade of show girls may not be an accurate representation of gender in Italy; yet, it begs the question how the exaggerated emphasis on physical beauty affects society as a whole. When the attractiveness becomes a prerequisite for success, the female body suddenly becomes the most valued capital. What significance does the Italian woman have in a grander social context? 

If you are inclined to look beyond Wikipedia and dig deeper, the 2010 Gender Gap report reveals, Italy ranks 74th in terms of women's rights. Even in developing nations like Columbia and Peru, women have a better standing in society. Among the “western” and “secularized” nations Italy’s women endure the political, social, domestic and religious injustice. According the latest UN report on feminicide the voice of most women who suffer domestic violence is not heard. It is estimated that 90% of domestic cases in Italy are not even reported. Fear and shame, keep them quiet prisoners of abusive husbands and boyfriends. Up until 15 years ago the term domestic rape did not exist in Italian law, feminicide was treated as a crime of passion and the perpetrators were acquitted. The journalist and Italy correspondent Octavia Brugger, said in an interview with 3sat Sternstunden der Philsosophie, most laws were considered a relative entity, it was something that changes according to will. “If you have a good lawyer, you will never spend a day in prison”. 

The eight “good boys” who raped a 15-year old in Castro Montalto got off scot-free, because the Juvenile Court of Rome suspended the trial. The boys get counseling and the victim is traumatized and dropped out of school.

One local said “these guys are good boys, they don’t need to rape rather it was this girl that the same day, before of the party, had sex with another boy….”  Someone else commented “if I were 17 years old, I would line up to get with her….the girl is not serious. It is her fault.”  Even the mayor of the city weighed in, implying that native-born Italians are genetically incapable of rape, although for the immigrant population it is another story altogether. “Rape exists only when committed by Romanians” he said, and then added “the only animals in our region are the Romanian immigrants. They’ve got rape in their blood.”[1]

 

The UN reports violence against women in Italy is on the rise, but the alarm bells are not ringing loud enough. Traditionally, women are underestimated and shoved aside in Italian society and both omnipresence of the Catholic Church and the long shadow of the mafia contributed to the female image. Inequality and discrimination at home, in public and in the media are part of the everyday life for Italian women. 

Last year alone 120 women were murdered by former or current husbands or boyfriends and the public remains strangely silent. Italians have notoriously been skeptical about their government but for Ms. Brugger, it is the shadowy mafia origins of modern Italy that still influence the political and social thinking. The predominantly conservative and patriarchal society may have the legal framework to protect its women, but fails to adequately punish the perpetrators. To what extend do traditional stereotypes and institutions influence the modern state, the government and the judicial system?

Thus is the paradoxical nature of the Italian society: while the media encourages the objectification of women the moralizers condemn those who take advantage of it. It’s the fashion industry and the media that liberated women from their corseted prisons and billowing hoop-skirts. She is no longer veiled and hidden beneath layers of fabric. Her body is visible but still the mystical object that is sometimes revved sometimes distained, treated with contempt and admiration; it makes you blush in shame or lust. Instead of appealing to the rational mind of the 21^st century man, that could withstand baser the instinctual and quite animalistic reaction, Catholicism blames the lax morals of the scantily clad women. The church doesn’t blame the rapists, it blames the victims. And the Italian courts seem to concur. While Mary’s rapist may languish in prison, Magdalena’s case is different. 

In November 2008 a Romanian prostitute was kidnapped, robbed and raped by a 31-year old. The courts sent him to prison, seven years. He appealed the sentence and the Court of Appeals in Rome decided to reduce his sentence because street workers “work on the street, renounce their physical and moral integrity”, therefore she is not as protected by the law as the housewife, the teacher, the mother, the saint. Furthermore, a 2010 court decision created another precedent; legally the rapist is not considered a rapist as long he doesn’t pay the street worker beforehand. In Italian law, female stereotypes propagated by and through the media prevail, there are good women, the domestic, attractive and home centered wife, and bad women, the aggressive harpy, the manipulating siren and the lusty courtesan, and when in doubt laws apply to those who uphold morality.

While foreigners are regularly stunned by the sheer number of pornographic channels in Italy, society as a whole has started going backwards, glorifying the old days where a woman’s body was treated as an interchangeable object to satisfy a man’s needs or a vessel required for reproduction purposes. 

25th of each month is orange day

Violence against women is on the rise, but remains largely invisible. Estimates say 90 % of all abuse cases are not reported, because often the perpetrators are acquitted and the victims are not taken seriously. Up until 15 years ago an abusive husband had the right to rape his wife. So they endure, partly because they have children, partly because it is still a social stigma, and partly because they have nowhere to go, or simply because there are legal forms of discrimination. Italian women have begun to fight back, to publically demand their constitutional rights be respected and enforced, especially the right to choose, what happens with her body. In 1978 with the introduction of law 194 abortion was legalized within the first 90 days of the pregnancy. The so-called consultori in public hospitals were now obliged to provide information and assistance about emergency contraception and abortion. Now, 20 years later many public hospitals have downsized, while private hospitals, run by the church, have added more beds and gained public funding. All around Italy up to 90 % of the doctors, genealogists, nurses or even pharmacists morally object to abortion and refuse to aid in terminating pregnancies. To this day, abortion is a public stigma, not only in southern Italy. Even though women’s rights organizations lobby against the social taboo, there is little objective information available to women.

What does it say about a 21st century, western and secularized civilisation that treats the "other" half  of its population sometimes with reverence, and sometimes with disdain? Where is the constitutional guarantee to protect and defend also the female half of the population? How about putting foreward a more radical thought, women are also people?


 

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[1] http://blogs.law.columbia.edu/genderandsexualitylawblog/2009/11/05/another-step-backwards-for-women%E2%80%99s-rights-in-italy/

Women denied rights in Italy
http://strugglesinitaly.wordpress.com/equality/abortion-in-italy-women-denied-rights-in-italy/
Kathrine Franke: "Antother step backwards for women's rights in Italy"
http://blogs.law.columbia.edu/genderandsexualitylawblog/2009/11/05/another-step-backwards-for-women%E2%80%99s-rights-in-italy/
UN special rapporteur on feminicide and violence against women 
http://wideplusnetwork.wordpress.com/news/un-special-rapporteur-on-feminicide-and-violence-against-women-in-italy/
NY-Times Women Take on Sexist Image in Italian Media
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/18/arts/18iht-women.html?_r=0
Women's Movement Italy
http://libcom.org/library/19-womens-movement-italy