Roberto Saviano comments and explains the images that emerged from Gioventù Meloniana, the Fanpage.it investigation into the true face of Gioventù Nazionale, the youth movement of the Brothers of Italy: “On the one hand there is a right that believes it is showing its liberal transformation. On the other, the same party that wants to maintain its neo-fascist vocation.”
“It’s as if they managed to fool everyone, and take the levers of power without having to really transform themselves“. Roberto Saviano comments on one of the passages of Gioventù Meloniana, the investigation by Fanpage.it on the youth movement of the Brothers of Italy, Gioventù Nazionale, where the future ruling class of the party is formed. The reference is to one of the various moments in where young militants sing “the songs of the fascist militia, ‘Mussolini’s gladiators’, there are the slogans of the neo-fascism of the sixties and seventies”.
During the investigation Fanpage.it also participated in some far-right rock concerts, organized in the Gn headquarters: “It was supposed to be music, and in reality it is music, but it is fascist propaganda. In a place that is not a rave of suburbs, but one of the Fratelli d’Italia offices where the Duce is praised and there is neo-fascist propaganda music, there are also FdI deputies: Perissa, Trancassini, Procaccini (MEP, ed.)”.
This shows that the practice is “take a young right-winger, and in such a context he becomes extreme. It is exactly the opposite of what the mass parties of the past did: for example, they gathered the most radical positions in the youth sections to bring them towards democracy, or to train them in other horizons. Here there is a desire to fan the flames of extremism, because with anger it attracts more people, it spreads fear which the Brothers of Italy then capitalizes on in votes”. It is not an attempt to form “a new right. Here it is pure neo-fascism“.
Procaccini (FdI) denies having made the gladiatorial salute: “We were close and they took my elbow”
The two faces of the right of the Brothers of Italy
We see many cases of “gladiatorial salute”, deputies who greet each other by holding each other’s forearm: “A gesture that would simply sound extravagant or ridiculous, but in this context instead has a precise evocation. It is the greeting that has always practiced the extreme right”. During the concerts the organizers do not want there to be photos or videos “because the militants shout and proclaim ‘Europe, nation, revolution’. It is a very old slogan, since the 1960s it has been used by the neo-fascist right. As if here, away from political strategy, could truly be what they are. And they don’t want to leave a trace of this.”
In short, the investigation shows the two faces of the right that governs the country today: “On the one hand there is a right that believes it is showing its own liberal transformation, on the other the same party that wants preserve its neo-fascist vocation. As if it were a real practice capable of maintaining consensus, instilling fear, and above all maintaining the root of one’s identity. In fact, in public events they give indications: ‘No Roman greetings, please guys'”.
There is no doubt that the circle into which Fanpage has infiltrated is in line with the rest of the party: “Arianna Meloni will go directly to thank their activities. What we see so far is consistent with the party line , and every manager knows it.”
There are also passages in which Flaminia Pace, a young GN militant and public face of the movement for the entire Northern Rome area (also close to a candidacy in the next municipal elections in Rome), states during an evening “if I am raped by a Nigerian I’m having an abortion.” Saviano comments: “No one should be judged on words said over a beer. But here one emerges vision that they declare and practice, but they want it not to be shown in other spaces – talk shows, financial places, diplomatic spaces – because there, for now (but I fear it won’t be for long), these tones would be considered unlistenable, and their political formation immediately recognized as illegitimate. And then in those places they change their face.”
Black terrorism and Sieg heil
The young people of Gioventù Nazionale during their retreats also speak with admiration of the NAR, Revolutionary Armed Nuclei, a neo-fascist terrorist group: “This is interesting, because neo-fascism and black terrorism have not necessarily dialogued over the years. We are talking about a group that has killed judges, shot at policemen, carried out robberies and massacres, practiced constant violence the mythologization of the Nar, ‘well they were brave comrades, we must be heirs’. This is said by individuals who are part of the party that governs this country.”
In the moments when they are freest, and think that there are no cameras or prying ears, the young people of Meloni’s party launch into fascist chants and shout Sieg heil: “It is a Nazi motto, used as a greeting on public occasions. It means ‘ salute to victory’, to the victory of the Reich. These young FdI militants use the Sieg heil which led to Auschwitz, to the hanging of deserters, to the elimination of the so-called ‘lives not worth living’, that is, any person considered disabled. It led to the arrest of homosexuals, to the extermination of the Roma people. There is this sinister evocation here, and they are aware of it when they say ‘we are comrades, not poor bastards’: my dears, you are really poor idiots. Like anyone who uses to proclaim Sieg heil”.
The risk for democracy
Fanpage’s work “demonstrates how necessary investigation is, that is, entering into things, finding where power is lying. And this right, the far right in power, is disturbing” precisely because it considers “its own DNA in continuity with the fascism”, and therefore “he treats anyone he criticizes as enemies to be eliminated, individuals to target. Obviously for now the tools are those of delegitimization, of mud, of taking away energy and space”.
“Perhaps”, concludes Saviano, “we still have time to understand that this right did not win due to human qualities – disastrous – or economic visions – terrible – but due to the demerit of all the others, incapable of uniting and having a vision”. And above all, “we should all be anxious, because progressively they are manipulating democracy, they are compromising it, generating what they want: an illiberal democracy, in perfect coherence with Giorgia Meloni’s master, Viktor Orban. We are certain of one thing: the same fear that brought them to government will make them fall.”
