For a handful of votes

Saying definitively no, for precautionary reasons, to the idea of granting Italian citizenship to immigrants’ children, born in Italy, is like trying to stop the inevitable. It is a difficult, and useless, “no”, especially if it is pronounced by the most tenacious and obstinate defenders of the constitutional reform which, since a few years, has established that the children of Italian emigrants, who left our country a long time ago, may automatically become Italian citizens. And these people have never paid taxes, have been never called up for military service, when it was compulsory and, in most of the cases, they do not even speak our language. On the contrary, the children of immigrant families go to Italian schools, have Italian friends, support Italian football teams, speak, sometimes with many difficulties, Italian and, most importantly, will spend in Italy their future. Such a “no” is a refusal that clashes with history and, therefore, will be executed by time. However, because for a country the time necessary to implement a reform is important, in this case too, it is essential to understand the reasons lying behind a refusal that seems totally absurd. According to the illuminating words expressed by MP Federico Bricolo, the leader of the Northern League parliamentary group, immigrants’ children should not obtain Italian citizenship because this would in future allow their parents to vote. He does not use racist or xenophobic words, bit his allusions are clear. He depicts a threatening future for Italy. And this is why his message is new. Since Bricolo is perfectly aware that the simple denial of the equality of rights on the basis of ethnical reasons would be politically counter-productive, he decides to use a rhetoric that is typical of contemporary neo-populism. In order to obtain the “irrational” consensus of that part of Italians who are economically and culturally weaker, Bricolo’s rhetoric focuses on the subliminal use of fear related to the intrusive presence of immigrants in our country. This social space cannot be ignored by immigrants’ friends, it is time for them to raise their voice.