The clashes in Turin reignite the political and cultural clash: the reading that attributes a repressive plan to the State is under scrutiny, while the government focuses on preventive arrests to counter the violence in the demonstrations. In the background the comparison with the Seventies and the theme of the “grey area” that justifies the extremists.
I admit it: I had missed Concita De Gregorio’s article on the clashes in Turin. A colleague pointed it out to me and so I went to browse Repubblica. It was an instructive read, because in just a few lines the former director of L’Unità condensed all the communism of the so-called radical chic, even managing to resurrect the strategy of tension and compare the guerrilla war under the Mole to the events in Minneapolis.
A delirium of banality, but above all a clear reversal of roles, where the responsibility for what happened at the protest march for the eviction of a community center is overturned. The fault no longer lies with those who trigger the violence, but with those who fail to avoid it. «Who benefits, who benefits if a policeman is attacked? To the cause of the demonstrators or to the right-wing government? The question is obviously rhetorical because the teacher with the red pen already has the answer. «Without bothering big history or making comparisons, for goodness sake, between the years of terrorism, deviated services, kidnappings and massacres. Everything is very different, of course. But the principle of the strategy of tension was the same: to raise the level of the conflict artfully to justify the repression. Have we learned nothing since the Seventies or, on the contrary, have we learned very well?”
The thesis is simple: the State knows who the violent people were who attacked the officer. Digos knows it, the services know it, the Police Headquarters knows it. They’ve even known it since before the attack (boom!). For Concita, our agents have colossal archives of protesters registered over the decades and are therefore able to recognize them from a tattoo on their wrist and a cheekbone. “The violent people, the forces of the State, know them well: they expect them, they expect them.” Why don’t they stop them? De Gregorio asks. Here too the question is rhetorical, because the Repubblica fan has the answer ready in her pocket: because the right-wing government has its own advantages. Conclusion: democracy is fragile, watch out for the fascists coming.
It’s a shame that, in the conspiracy delirium, while glimpsing the long arm of repression, the pen of the Gedi group doesn’t ask itself why the police couldn’t stop the violent ones first. If, instead of evoking alleged strategies of tension and making bizarre comparisons to Minneapolis, he had read the articles dedicated to the decree that the government has laboriously tried to pass, he would have found the answer to his question.
Today preventive stops are not possible. And for this reason the executive wants to introduce a temporary provision of 12 hours: to stop those who usually participate in marches to unleash violence against the police. Although a similar measure exists in many other countries, such as Denmark and Sweden, here Concita and her companions speak of an authoritarian turn and accuse Palazzo Chigi of wanting to give carte blanche to the police. I don’t want to make historical comparisons, but in the 1970s we had protesters taking to the streets with weapons. It started with clashes in which young people wearing balaclavas threw cobblestones and signal poles at the police and ended with the symbolic photo of that season: a young man with a P38 shooting at officer Antonio Custra.
In those years the executive passed the Royal law, which prevented taking to the streets in a misrepresented manner, allowed police arrests and punished those found in possession of hammers and wrenches during demonstrations. Even then the left spoke of an authoritarian turn. Even then, people wondered who the violence was for, denouncing dark plots. Then, with delay, it was understood that behind those who took to the streets armed with P38s there were only the bad teachers, the upper class who, according to the Attorney General of Turin, Lucia Musti, looks kindly on the violent demonstrators. Investigators call it the gray area, but in reality it is a red area, made up of those who pretend not to see and not understand. Luciano Violante, someone who understands terrorism and communism, said that those who participate in certain demonstrations are either not intelligent or are complicit. The third way that radical chics like does not exist.
