Pandemic and expensive energy: more than a road map towards normality, a minefield
“Turn down the heat? How to wear the mask ". The method is proven: is there a serious problem that you don't know how to solve? And then we blame the citizens and their irresponsible behavior. The important thing is to follow the mainstream track and draw for each topic the clear dividing line between good and evil, good and bad, the politically correct and the censurable.
There is a fine thread that links the debate on the pandemic to that on energy resources with the related difficulties in supplying them and, finally, to the more recent one on the conflict in Ukraine. The common trait that characterizes the discussion is an incredible provincialism, as well as a sort of intellectual narcissism in which the columnist is more important than the opinions and the facts themselves. The umbilical vision prevails over the analysis and the rearguard battles over the critical approach to issues. It is not possible to go beyond the perimeter of our narrow national horizon. A striking example is the extreme difficulty in getting out of the quicksand of the emergency that has characterized the last two years. In fact, while the rest of the world is freeing itself or has already freed itself of the pandemic chains, for us the abandonment of the Green Pass is a very slow and cumbersome operation since we are imprisoned in an ideological cage that makes us hostages of this obsessive contemplation of contagion curves.
Not surprisingly, Walter Ricciardi, director of the Ministry of Health, is already putting his hands forward: there is a risk of a summer wave if we relax the restrictions too soon. This was echoed by the minister himself who, during a question time in the Chamber of Deputies, praised the green certification which, according to him, avoided generalized closures. " This is the truth, out of all propaganda ", commented Speranza, who also received the compliments of Draghi for the "extraordinary work" done. In short, between bold declarations and blatant self-praise, the government is increasingly entrenched and shows itself even further away from the real problems of the people, bent by indiscriminate increases and terrified by the bombs that explode a few kilometers from the European borders. While the world is experiencing tragic upheavals, in Rome we are discussing the basic Green Pass , super or reinforced to go out to eat pizza or drink an aperitif. Only for us the road to freedom is paved with good intentions and the long-awaited road map has turned out to be the equivalent of a minefield where the unexpected is always around the corner. It has the appearance of a roulette where the house always wins.
And there are even those who complain that the outbreak of the war has diverted attention from health issues. All this gives the sign of how the transition towards a semblance of normality is experienced even with a certain melancholy. The memory fetishism of which Antonio Tabucchi spoke in “Sosenga Pereira” comes to mind. " Stop going to the past, try to go to the future " was the advice of Dr. Cardoso to the protagonist of the novel.
To this party of nostalgics Gian Antonio Stella must certainly be enrolled ex officio who, from the columns of the Corriere , has even come to regret the austerity of 1973 caused by an oil crisis that led to the need to reduce energy consumption. Stella recalled the cities in the dark, the Italians on bicycles, the president Leone who moved from the Quirinale in a horse-drawn carriage. Yet, that lesson was not received because, according to the editorialist of the Milanese newspaper, after the storm, citizens have resumed consuming, wasting, using water in an excessive manner. According to him, it was a missed opportunity and those weeks of "squeeze" did not help.
Yet even today there are those who try to put themselves at the service of the nation like the actor Alessandro Gassman, already at the forefront of the pandemic battle, who announced that he had reduced the temperature of his thermostat by two degrees. But, on the other hand, it was Josep Borrell, high representative of the European Union for foreign affairs and security policy, who explained that " turning down the heat is like wearing a mask ". The method is proven: is there a serious problem that you don't know how to solve? And then we blame the citizens and their irresponsible behavior. It doesn't matter to the champions of national rhetoric that the Frittole model, the medieval city in which Troisi and Benigni found themselves catapulted into their light-hearted journey into the past, is rather grotesque. The important thing is to follow the mainstream track and draw for each topic the clear line between good and evil, good and bad, the politically correct and the reprehensible.
Therefore, it is not surprising that this river of impressive emptiness is also spreading in the context of the war narrative that favors the creativity of our intellectuals with heroic tales and valiant deeds born comfortably in the living room of their own home. Yet the Ukrainian affair is damn serious but only we have been able to turn it into a kind of serial soap opera with this incessant chatter from morning to night, with experts on the front line ready to argue with other experts, guests who are not experts but video, entertainment programs transformed into reportage from the front, news broadcasts increasingly in search of sensationalism which give rise to a boring, unproductive and mostly asphyxiating if not suffocating debate. Material that probably would have inspired Tom Wolfe's pen. It is our little ancient world that prefers to bask in its vicious self-referentialism and futile display of small-screen theories. It is Italy of 2022 very similar to the Frittole of the fourteenth century. Indeed, almost a thousand-and-five . But still medieval in thought and action.
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This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Atlantico Quotidiano at the URL https://www.atlanticoquotidiano.it/quotidiano/pandemia-e-caro-energia-piu-che-una-road-map-verso-la-normalita-un-campo-minato/ on Sat, 19 Mar 2022 03:49:00 +0000.