Huddled Masses and the Dolce Vita

In my home country, interest in moving to Italy is accelerating like a Lamborghini in the GT World Challenge.

They all tell me it has something to do with a jack-o’-lantern who incited an insurrection while president. Who wipes his rear with the constitution and claims, “I can stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn't lose voters”.

It has something to do with the election to congress of a bobblehead who’s barely qualified to join the PTA, who poses with a gun in a holster on her thigh. Who claims she’s “tired of this separation of church and state junk” and that Jefferson’s letter about it is “a stinking letter”.

It has something to do with the nightmarish realization that the people removing protections for women know women’s rights are central to democracy. And know control of women’s bodies is central to authoritarianism.

I wonder, would Thomas Jefferson have fled to Italy? (France, actually, in his case).

Would Susan B. Anthony have packed up and moved overseas?

Or would they have stayed and fought for their democracy?

No shade for either choice. Those who have choices are privileged.

But hold on Nellie Bly.

Is the Italian government a paragon of democracy?

Is it slip-sliding toward autocracy?

Are gender bias and reduction of women’s rights a problem in Italy as well?

Answers: No. Yes. Yes.

Something curious happens for expats from my country (or immigrants—since there are issues with the term expats). They don’t (for the most part) pay attention to Italy’s government and social issues in the same way they do in the U.S.

Maybe the bliss of a spritz at sunset from a rooftop bar over Piazza Navona (I don’t deny the bliss) is just so damn good that examining Italy’s woes is unbearable in contrast?

Or maybe, for those who don’t speak Italian, their absorption of the news is curtailed, or they don’t feel attached to what the government does/becomes in their adopted country, the same way they do in the country of their birth.

Or maybe all of us are exhausted, and scared, and desperate to believe there’s a Shangri-La ready and willing to embrace us.

Who is leaning into that image even harder these days?

The sunny spritz in the piazza. The sound of the locals speaking (no, practically singing) their absurdly gorgeous language.

The purr of a fountain nearby. Droplets of water sliding down a chiseled marble thigh.

Pigeons squeaking with delight as they bathe in the basin.

My God, are Italian pigeons happier?

Do I see unicorns whirling around cupola?

These moments become fiercely real for visitors to Italy.

And they are momentary.

Yet, we’re grasping at them like a 13th century pilgrim reaching for Veronica’s veil because we are frightened—traumatized by the turn our country is taking.

We want to believe in a place where anger doesn’t come flinging at us because of our gender, our skin color, our religion.

We want to exist in a place where everyone cherishes life and each other.

We have become huddled masses yearning to breathe free.

This puts a lot of pressure on Italy to live up to the dolce vita.

Some expats/immigrants will assure you it does. Some will assure you it doesn’t. My take on that, coming up in the next post.