Comparative essay: "Italy and the world"

What do people think of Italy?

Forming an opinion implies a point of view. Speaking of a Country, everything depends on whether you live or not live in it. Certainly the opinion of a person who lives outside will be quite different from the one of someone who experiences everyday what means living there: the foreign person would point out what the Country is famous for; on the other side, the other person would point out all of the possible defects. Now, it would be interesting to point out the differences between different opinions about Italy, starting from people from around the world’s opinion.

It is proper to start from the picture on the right, representing a kind of brainstorming Italy - shaped. As one can see, it contains some key words that stand for what comes to people’s minds when speaking of Italy. Words are coloured both in red and green, showing that there are both good and bad things. However, looking further, one can notice that there are a lot of downsides: starting from Northern Italy, there are troubles, fussing and fighting, ridiculous politicians, stupidity (speaking of which, follows the “Grande Fratello”, a very known TV program that Italian people either love or hate – there’s no between). Going to the South, the situation only gets worse with pollution, ignorance, illiteracy, mafia and ending with the combination beaches – bitches. Even green words, supposed to be “positive”, show their own downsides: "Good weather – it says – when it snows you can’t move from home”, or also references to taxes, people who talk too much, politics, problems again, camorra, lies and so on. Now an Italian person can understand – just from a brainstorming – that people out there don’t have a good opinion of Italy: indeed, Italy’s problems are so terrible that everyone knows about it.

The video entitled “The World in 2 Minutes: Italy” goes a bit further, but confirms anyway the opinion one gets from the picture. Basically Italian people are seen as unintelligent people, a bunch of puppets in the hands of a master, which is the Italian Government, in its turn formed by ridiculous people – what’s more, seeing the politicians and people mocking each other beats everything. Also, Italians appear to be inconscious of what happens and conscious people seem not to care about problems and to avoid them rather than solving them or just trying to – which is even worse. On the other hand, Italians are really attached to the tradition (from food to feast days) and to their families, they're extremely irrational, a bit too much excited and caring about football.

So far, as one can deduce, people around the world don’t have a good opinion of Italy, but mainly because of politics, which is where every other problem starts. Speaking of which, a few days ago Mr. Matteo Renzi was elected PM: this piece of news obviously attracted the attention from all over the world, since Renzi is the fourth PM Italy’s got in three years. Newspapers from all over the world, such as The Guardian or the New York Times, focused on his speech in front of the upper chamber (Senate), quoting Italian journalists' and politicians' opinions about it. Indeed, Renzi promised to make some radical changes, but his opponents said his speech lacks details and he hasn’t gone further. He mainly said what people already knows and therefore sort of took a photograph: Italy is full of problems that need to be solved quickly. “These are the numbers of a crisis – he said about disoccupation – They are the numbers of a collapse”, while Italian newspapers have been talking about it for months and months. So, Renzi appears to be a person that talks too much and actually doesn’t do anything / much – that is, from what we have seen so far, the main stereotype of Italian people. Even pictures used in the articles don’t portray him in a good way: he seems not to be a very serious person, and people whispering right in front of him suggest that he’s plotting something, which isn’t good at all.

As Italian, I can say that all of this is more or less the same idea I have of Italy – which makes me not really proud of living here. But actually I wished foreign people's opinion was different, because Italy isn’t all like this. Anyway, this tells me that Italy’s problems are really terrible since they’re known and felt all around the world, besides the fact that people around the world are way more intelligent than the average Italian is, that they can understand what the situation is like, even if they live somewhere else.

Glossary

Backing: n. (1) support given to a person, cause, or enterprise; (2) a body of supporters; (3) something that forms, protects, supports, or strengthens the back of something; (4) a scenic cloth or flat placed behind a window, door, etc, in a set to mask the offstage space; (5) Brit musical accompaniment, esp for a pop singer; (6) an anticlockwise change in wind direction.

Bicameralism: adj. (of a legislature) consisting of two chambers.

Blasé: adj. (1) indifferent to something because of familiarity or surfeit; (2) lacking enthusiasm; bored.

Boost: n. (1) encouragement, improvement, or help: a boost to morale; (2) an upward thrust or push; (3) an increase or rise; (4) the amount by which the induction pressure of a supercharged internal-combustion engine exceeds that of the ambient pressure.

Coalition government: cabinet of a parliamentary government in which several political parties cooperate, reducing the dominance of any one party within that coalition.

Credit crunch: reduction of loans (or credit) or sudden tightening of conditions required to obtain a loan from the banks.

Enterprise: n. (1) a project or undertaking, esp one that requires boldness or effort; (2) participation in such projects; (3) readiness to embark on new ventures; boldness and energy; (4) initiative in business; (5) (as modifier): the enterprise culture; (6) a business unit; a company or firm.

Lawmaker: n. person who writes and passes laws.

Leadership: n. (1) the position or function of a leader; (2) the period during which a person occupies the position of leader: during her leadership very little was achieved; (3) the ability to lead; (4) (as modifier): leadership qualities; (5) the leaders as a group of a party, union, etc: the union leadership is now very reactionary.

Lower house (Chamber of deputies): n. one of the two houses of a bicameral legislature: usually the larger and more representative house. Also called: lower chamber.

To overhaul: vb. (1) to examine carefully for faults, necessary repairs, etc; (2) to make repairs or adjustments to (a car, machine, etc); (3) to overtake.

Tax wedge: difference between what it costs a company to employ a worker and what the worker takes home.

Tenure: n. (1) the possession or holding of an office or position; (2) the length of time an office, position, etc, lasts; term; (3) chiefly US Canadian the improved security status of a person after having been in the employ of the same company or institution for a specified period; (4) the right to permanent employment until retirement, esp for teachers, lecturers, etc; (5) the holding or occupying of property, esp realty, in return for services rendered, etc; (6) the duration of such holding or occupation.

To amend: vb. (1) to improve; change for the better; (2) to remove faults from; correct; (3) to alter or revise (legislation, a constitution, etc) by formal procedure.

Upper house (Senate): one of the two houses of a bicameral legislature.