Il Corpo Delle Donne - Women's Bodies

Ever since my summer in Berlin four years ago, I've been a loyal reader of Der Spiegel, which I mainly read online thanks to their news alerts which remind me to return ever again to this great publication. By the way, the controversial Julian Assange agrees with me on this one, as he picked Der Spiegel (along with the New York Times, another one of my must-reads) to be one of only 5 publications that he leaked the diplomatic cables to.

A couple of weeks ago, an article on the Spiegel web site caught my eye: Neither Saints Nor Whores: Italian Women Battle for Middle Ground. The title is self-explanatory, but the gist of the articles is that Italian women, caught in between the machismo of the Italian culture and the iron fist of the Catholic Church, have been quietly fighting for the right to be what they really are: complex creatures in all shades and colors that cannot be easily pinned down as either saints or prostitutes.

The statistics are rather shocking: 

DER SPIEGEL:  In the [World Economic Forum's] 2010 Global Gender Gap Report, Italy ranks 74th among 134 countries, below Colombia and Venezuela. In no other European country do so few women work outside the home (only 44 percent), and those that do earn half as much as their male counterparts. They spend 21 hours a week doing domestic chores, longer than any other European woman. Only five percent of Italian men have ever operated a washing machine. Young female academics, not seeing a future for themselves in Italy, are abandoning the country and embarking on careers in the United States or trying to undo their country's reputation as part of Berlin's growing Italian Diaspora.

"Only five percent of Italian men have EVER operated a washing machine!!!" That statistic alone needs no further commentary...

But the most interesting part of the article comes here:

DER SPIEGEL: After living in Munich and Paris, Lorella Zanardo returned to Italy and was shocked when she saw the roles being played by women in public: women in clothing ads for Benetton almost pornographically sticking cucumbers into their mouths, or on television, where they are velinas, giggling hostesses or letterines, that is, girls who carry letters, lottery tickets or football results through the studio.

Zanardo quickly learned that even turning off the TV didn't do any good. So, for three months, she recorded everything that Canale 5, Rete 4 and the state-owned RAI channels had to offer in terms of entertainment programming. She edited the material together to make a documentary film with a spirited narration. Three million Italians have already seen the film, "Il Corpo delle donne" ("Women's Bodies"), which is now available online in several languages. It is practically a horror film, an attack on the Berlusconi system using his own weapons: images. Foreigners who have seen the film, Zanardo says, always ask the same question: "Why do you put up with this. Why don't you fight back?"

Il Corpo Delle Donne is in Italian, but the images need no translation, especially the grotesque end scenes in the butcher shop-like set. The documentary now has its own Facebook page and has been viewed across the world. Most of the comments on the YouTube channel (again, in Italian) come from Italian women who are realizing how the glut of objectifying images on mass media is molding the perception of women by Italian men from an early age.

And now, the coup de grace of my post: A long time ago, at one of my cousins' wedding in Romania, I had an interesting conversation with an elderly Italian man who patiently explained to me the value-add of marrying Romanian women: they're great cooks, they do housework, they are beautiful, and above all, if they want out of Romania, they have no choice! 

And so, it is with sadness in my heart that I end today's post with two conclusions: 

1. Even in the "industrialized" world, there are still pockets where to be born a woman is to be born with a handicap.

2. Lack of economic opportunity can push smart, educated and ambitious women to circumstances where they become indentured in return for, literally, a few household appliances.