Angry about the inclusion of TV stars, a Big Brother participant and a former Miss Italia contestant in the recent list of candidates for the ruling centre-right Popolo della Liberta (PdL) party submitted by her husband for June’s European elections, Veronica Lario, wife of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, attacked the idea in an email to press agency ANSA. Describing the idea as “shameful trash, all in the name of power”, Lario highlighted in her email how the choice was “against women” and women’s rights.
“Women today are and can be beautiful and the fact that there are beautiful women in politics is neither an advantage nor a disadvantage. But what emerges today through the curves and feminine beauty is the lack of the retention of power that offends the credibility of all this and goes against women especially those who have been in the front line defending their rights,” Lario stated citing as examples Margaret Thatcher, the former British Prime Minister, Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, the late Nilde Iotti, president of the Italian Chamber of Deputies from 1979 to 1992, and Stefania Prestigiacomo, current Minister for the Environment.
Commenting from Warsaw, the Prime Minister said Lario was manipulated by the Left, that spread unfounded reports, then added his party wants to renew the political class with “people who are cultivated and well prepared”, unlike the “malodorous and badly dressed people who represent certain parties in Parliament”, he concluded.
This is where I’d like to stop and ponder for a while: I totally agree with what Lario stated in her message, but, it must be said, she is not the first nor the last to make such a point, while I found the definition Berlusconi gave about the opposition MPs - “malodorous and badly dressed people” - as dementedly stupid.
Surely from the programmes broadcast by his channels and from the people he chose as candidates for his party, you can easily guess that Berlusconi prefers young, perfumed and possibly undressed bodies to dressed ones, but I find interesting how he resorted to the sort of accuse rich kids reserve to poorer ones in school, which is ridiculously immature. But then what can you expect from Berlusconi? We are talking about a man who’s made more gaffes and decrees to save his arse than laws to rescue Italian families from the crisis.
When I was a teenager the epitome of coolness was wearing a Best Company sweatshirt and a Naj-Oleari bag. In the eyes of those kids who owned and wore such items, those who didn’t have them were just unfashionable and unworthy of even talking to them, it didn't matter if they didn't wear such things as they refused to conform to the rule or, worse, because their parents couldn’t afford the stuff. Berlusconi’s words made me wonder what makes a politician “cool” nowadays: is it a degree achieved without any recommendations or a designer bag like those ones sported by Mara Carfagna, a former topless model and television variety show presenter sentimentally involved with Berlusconi and fielded by the “Emperor” himself as a candidate for his centre-right alliance in last year’s national elections and then nominated Minister for Equal Opportunities when the alliance won? Maybe for Berlusconi designer clothes are much better than having a brain, but I doubt an Armani suit or a D&G bag can help you taking the proper political decisions if you don't have a bloody clue about politics.
Clothes can empower and politicians can undoubtedly launch new styles, but clothes shouldn’t really be making the man or the woman sitting in the Parliament. Intelligence, knowledge, passion, commitment to a cause, judgement, responsibility and the understanding and adoption of social values are what counts for a politician and not vanity, narcissism, the ability to lie, cheat, steal, look good and give blowjobs. Maybe somebody should remind this to Berlusconi.
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