Source 1: Italian colonialism and crimes of war
The Lion of the Desert and Fascist legacy
The Lion of the Desert is a movie realised in 1981 by the Syrian-American director Moustapha Akkad. It tells the life of the Senussite Lybian Resistance leader Omar Al-Mukhtar, who fought against the Italian Army during all the decade of the 1920s, until he was imprisoned and sentenced to death (at an illegal trial) in 1931. Among the big cast of the movie, Anthony Quinn (Al-Mukhtar), Oliver Reed (Gral. Rodolfo Graziani), Rod Steiger (Benito Mussolini) and Irene Papas (the Lybian woman Mabrouka).
The movie was forbidden in Italy because in 1982 it was considered “offensive for the honour of the Italian Army” by a Giulio Andreotti Government’s representative, belonging to the Liberal Party.
The movie has never been distributed in Italy, and a public projection was blocked by the police in 1987. The following year it was shown in a semi-offical way at some festival, while the promise to broadcast it on public tv was never kept.
In 2009, after the visit of Lybian leader Muhammar Gheddafi (who arrived in Italy showing a picture of Al-Mukhtar on his chest) the private national Tv platform Sky broadcast it for many days, putting an end on an almost 30 years history of censorship.
Image: Omar Al-Mukhtar
Fascist Legacy is a documentary film, which was produced by BBC in 1989, about Italian war crimes during World War II. It is divided into two parts, basically focusing on the occupations of the Balkans and Northern Africa. Italian public television RAI bought a copy of the film but for years it was never shown to an Italian audience. The reason must be sought in the historical lack of a public debate on Italian responsibilities in the occupied lands, and an almost total absence of analysis of Italian colonialism in general, a subject very unlikely to be found even in history school programs.
Some public discussion came out in the last ten years, after the Parliament issued “il Giorno del Ricordo” (the Day of Remembrance), for the Italian-speaking minority who lived in former Yugoslavia, and which had been killed or forced to leave from those lands after World War II. The self-pitying which this day had been constructed on had finally to face the opposite story about the responsibilities of the fascist ruling over slavic-speaking populations who lived inside the Kingdom of Italy after the Great War, and in the Yugoslavian lands which had been occupied during World War II.
After two Italian film-makers were jailed in the 1950s for depicting the Italian invasion of Greece, the Italian public and media were forced into ‘forgetting’ what had really happened. And this made it easier for some people to write an opposite version of the invasion. In 2004 only the Italian private channel La7 has shown large excerpts of "Fascist Legacy". Showings of the documentary were also organized in Italy by groups with an antifascist orientation and members of the Slovenian-talking minority in Italy.
Image: Marshall Pietro Badoglio during Ethiopian Campaign
Source 2: Spain and King Juan Carlos documentary
French state television has broadcast a documentary about Spain’s former monarch that the Spanish public network TVE has so far refused to air.
Yo, Juan Carlos I, rey de España (or, I, Juan Carlos I, King of Spain) was broadcast during primetime on France 3.
Directed by Miguel Courtois, who also co-wrote the script with Laurence Debray, author of a biography of the Spanish ruler, the film reviews the last 40 years of Spain’s history through the eyes of Juan Carlos.
The French press has described the documentary, filmed over several months in 2014, as “an intimate and moving portrait of a personality with an exceptional destiny” and as a “brilliant” piece of work.
Yetthe Spanish broadcaster feels that the production is of little interest to anyone, that it is taken out of context, and that it is no longer relevant.
“It’s about a king who is no longer king”, said a station spokesperson. “It is anchored in the past.” The source added that despite its French premiere, there are no plans to air the piece in Spain.
The deal between the French production company Cinétévé and TVE (The Spanish National TV – company) – which contributed archive footage – was brokered under RTVE chief Leopoldo González-Echenique. But he was replaced in September 2014 by a new president, José Antonio Sánchez, and relations cooled off.
Cinétévé handed over the finished production to TVE months ago, but there are no indications that a Spanish voiceover has even been added.
“We have a treasure, which is this interview with the king just a few months before his abdication, and that we want to share with Spanish audiences,” said filmaker Miguel Courtois at a recent press screening of the film. “This is absurd. In the end, Spaniards will have to travel to France to watch it, just like in Franco’s time”.
Image: Juan Carlos I, King of Spain from 1975 to 2014
Source 3: Internetcensorship in nowadays Hungary
image: Protest against internet tax in Poland and Hungary
Access to the internet in Hungary continues to expand, despite government policies and judicial decisions over the past few years that have threatened to impose restrictions on access and online content. In late October 2014, the Orban administration issued a proposal to tax internet service providers (ISPs) per gigabyte (GB) of data transferred. Many assumed that ISPs would pass on this fee to consumers, which could potentially inhibit or discourage users from accessing more data-heavy websites and applications. Following significant protests, the government withdrew the proposal, but signaled that it intended to revisit the issue later in 2015.
In the past, the government has refrained from blocking online content, other than illegal gambling websites, despite persistent calls to ban the far-right website Kuruc.info, a site that frequently features xenophobic, anti-Semitic, and other hate speech content. This year, a court issued an order to delete, or make “inaccessible,” an article on the website denying the Holocaust. Since the website is hosted on servers in the United States and the court could not force the deletion of the content, the court subsequently decided that the article should be blocked within Hungary.
Since 2010, the conservative Hungarian Civic Union (Fidesz) and its ally, the Christian Democratic People’s Party (KDNP) have executed a major overhaul of Hungarian legislation, including new laws regulating the media (including online media outlets and news portals) and new civil and penal codes, causing significant concern among civil liberties advocates and the international community more broadly. The established regulatory authority, the National Media and Infocommunications Authority (NMHH) and its decision-making body, the Media Council, were created to oversee the mass communications industry, with the power to penalize or suspend outlets that violate stipulations of the media regulations. In April 2011, the national assembly adopted a new constitution, the Fundamental Law of Hungary, which includes a provision concerning the supervision of the mass communications industry and the media as a whole. The parliament also created the National Agency for Data Protection, whose independence has been called into question due to the political appointment process of the agency’s leadership.
Immediately after the 2010 media laws were passed, Hungary came under fierce criticism from the international community, as the laws were deemed incompatible with the values of the European Union. Despite the modifications to the media laws in May 2012 based on the ruling of the Hungarian Constitutional Court in December 2011, members of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and the Council of Europe have argued that the laws remain unsatisfactory, and that unclear provisions and the significant power given to the NMHH continue to threaten media freedom. In January 2013, the Council of Europe welcomed the results of the dialogue with the Hungarian government about media regulation,while domestic nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) expressed their continued concerns to the Secretary General of the Council of Europe.
Source 4: Street-art and censorship
An amazing wall by the worldwide famous street-painter Blu in Los Angeles (USA), and an even more amazing move by MOCA (the Museum of contemporary Art) which decided to erase it within 24 hours.
The painting showed a large group of coffins, like the ones of soldiers’ bodies sent back home from war situations, covered up by big notes of one dollar, instead of the national flag.
Was the mural too politically charged for other members of the MOCA team?
If a blanket anti-war (or anti-death industry?) statement is too controversial for MOCA, what can we look forward to this spring?
Apparently MOCA has provided a response (which took significantly longer to formulate than it took to buff the wall):
“MOCA commissioned Blu, one of the world’s most outstanding street artists to create a work for the north wall of The Geffen Contemporary at MOCA. The Geffen Contemporary building is located on a special, historic site. Directly in front the north wall is the Go For Broke monument, whichcommemorates the heroic roles of Japanese American soldiers, who served in Europe and the Pacific during World War II, and opposite the wall is the LA Veterans’ Affairs Hospital. The museum’s director explained to Blu that in this context, where MOCA is a guest among this historic Japanese American community, the work was inappropriate. MOCA has invited Blu to return to Los Angeles to paint another mural.”
To me, this is a terrible explanation. The concept that street art and graffiti must be 'appropriate', to the point of not making political statements, is absurd and contrary to the history of the medium. In this context, I doubt the 'Art on the Streets' show will be appropriate to its title.
Blu's reaction:
1. Moca asks me to paint a mural
2. I go to L.A. to paint the piece and I almost finish it
3. The Moca director decides to erase the wall
4. On the next day the mural is erased by Moca workers
5. Journalists are still not sure if this can be called censorship so they start asking my opinion about that
Image: Blue’s painting on MOCA’s wall
Source 5: Social conflict and freedom of expression
A big movement of protest has been spreading in a north-west Italian valley (Val di Susa) since more than 20 years, against the building of a high-speed railway, which will connect Lyon with Turin, called TAV (Treno ad Alta Velocità, High-speed train), especially because of a big and deep tunnel that, following the main project, was to be built in the middle of the Susa Valley.
Image: A manifestation of NOTAV movement in Susa (Turin)
The protesters, called No-Tav, showed during the years many ways of fight: manifestations, public speeches, internet documents (in which they claim the uselessness of the gallery and of the tracks, questioning the large quantity of money that will be spent to do it, and the big environmental problems that making a hole in that mountain may cause), but also direct actions and sabotages against instruments, working machines, fences, in a valley which has become a sort of military zone, but also a national (and international) symbol of the political fights against environmental exploitation, and for a more democratic use of public resources. Many protesters already faced trials and jail (two of them, Edoardo Massari and Maria Soledad Rosas, in the beginning of the protest, also committed suicide while imprisoned). One of the most famous cases was that against a popular writer and journalist, Erri De Luca, who was charged, and had to face a trial, because he expressed solidarity with the protesters saying that “he agrees with them” and that “the TAV must be sabotaged”. The accusations against him were based on a law issued during the fascist period, and still partly working. The trial finally ended with a complete acquittal of the writer.
Here follows his speech, during the trial:
Erri De Luca, speech in the Turin Courtroom, Oct. 19, 2015
I would be present here in this courtroom even if I were not the writer indicted for incitement.
Beyond my insignificant personal case, I consider the indictment here in question an experiment, an attempt to silence contrary words.
So I consider this courtroom an outpost overlooking the immediate present of our country. I work as a writer, and I consider myself the victim of a will to censorship.
I am indicted for an article in the criminal code that dates back to 1930 and that dark period of Italian history. I consider that article passed again by the subsequent drafting of the Constitution of the Italian Republic.
I am in this courtroom to know if that text is still in force and prevailing or if the court shall have the power to suspend and invalidate Article 21 of the Constitution.
I prevented my lawyers from arguing for the unconstitutionality of my charge. If successful, he would have stopped this process and transferred these proceedings to the halls of a Constitutional Court overloaded with work, where a ruling would take years. If admitted, the application would have bypassed this courtroom and wasted this precious moment.
We believe that what is constitutional has to be decided here, in public places such as this, as well as in a police station, in a classroom, in a prison, in a hospital, at work, on the borders crossed by asylum seekers.
What is constitutional is measured at the ground floor of our society.
Extenuating circumstances are inapplicable to my case. If what I said is a crime, I repeat it and I keep saying it.
I am indicted for having used the word “sabotage,” a word I consider noble and democratic.
Noble because it was pronounced and practiced by valiant figures like Gandhi and Mandela, with huge political results.
Democratic because its origins are in the labor movement and its struggles: striking to sabotage production.
I defend the legitimate use of the word “sabotage” in its most effective and wide meaning. I am willing to be criminally convicted for its use, but I will not be convicted as a means of censorship or to restrict free speech in Italy.
I said: “Shears are useful.” For what? How could one sabotage a colossal and harmful project with only shears? There were no other items of insidious hardware mentioned in my phone conversation [with a journalist].
Therefore, you are incriminating verbal support of a symbolic action. But I won’t get into my lawyers’ field of expertise.
I conclude by re-affirming my belief that the so-called high-speed railway line in the Susa Valley should be hindered, obstructed and impeded, then sabotaged in self-defense for the health of the soil, air and water of a threatened community.
My words are still contrary. I await to hear whether this is a criminal offense.
Image: The writer Erri De Luca
Source 6: France and the war of Algeria (1954-1962): censored movies
The war for Algerian Independence largely influenced French society and its freedom of expression, because of the sensitive subjects of army, war, nationalism and colonialism. Some movies which portraited this post-colonial war, or the issue of pacifism in general, were hit by censorship in different ways.
Image: Soldiers in the war of Algeria, 1958
We chose three, each of them with a specific source.
Tu ne tueras point, by Claud Autant-Lara (1961) sourcetranslation (Source 6a)
La battaglia di Algeri, by Gillo Pontecorvo (1965) sourcetranslation (Source6b)
Le petit soldat, by Jean-Luc Godard (1960) sourcetranslation (Source 6c)
Source 6A: «Thou shalt not kill» (1961), the censored movie
by Claude Autant-Lar
by Jacky Tronel | Thursday, November 1st 2012
Adler is a young seminarian from Germany whose pacifist beliefs are despised by his comrades, enroled like him. At the time of the liberation of Paris he executes a Resistance fighter. To escape this nightmare, he enters a cloister. But, in order to cover himself, his sergeant, who has ordered his execution, urges the head of the convent to commit Adler to free himself.
In the jailhouse he finds himself in the same cell of Jean-François Cordier, a Catholic conscientious objector who, in spite of the war, obstinately refuses to use any weapon. During the trial, Cordier declares himself an atheist conscientious objector, not anymore a religious one. Adler, for having killed and obeyed, will be acquitted, while Cordier, for having refused to kill and disobeyed, will be condemned to one year of prison, tacitly renewable.
A director’s torment with censorship
Filmed in Yugoslavia, mainly from Italian capital, by a French team, the movie by Claude Autant-Lara, in the French language, is nonetheless a Liechtensteino-Yugoslavian coproduction, with major financial support from Lichtenstein.
«We should cheer Autant-Lara for his bravery and his uprightness. After some years, with the desire of filming a project called The objector, the son of Louise Lara, driven out from the theatre Comedie Francaise because of pacifism during war time, succeeded against all odds to realize this vibrant praise of what is to him the supreme courage: the refusal to bear arms and kill his brothers, even under orders from above. Finding no producer, he put into the company every penny he had, went around in Yugoslavia and tried, in the very meanwhile of the Algerian war, to urge the same claim (for pacifism) that his mother had stated publicly in 1914-18. He didn’t succeed. The censorship which controlled the film productions did not allow the showing of the movie until 1963, one year after the Evian agreement that ended the Algerian war. His film seems to have been very annoying for the censors, since they managed to get the showing placed in the offseason, and this prevented ‘Thou shalt not kill’ from reaching a wide audience and provoking a healthy debate on the issue of the objection. His movie could still provoke, since no Tv channel wanted to broadcast it. Facing the problem with a great honesty and clarity, it would be a great starting point for a discussion about the “Folders of the Screen”. We can hope that one day ‘Thou shalt not kill’ will have the same reputation as the song ‘The deserter’ by Boris Vian.» (Text by Guy Bellinger, Guide des films de Jean Tulard, Robert Laffont, Paris, édition 2005.)