On authoritarian drift and attacks on Communist Front (Italy)

In recent months, we have witnessed the rise of a worrying reactionary wave sweeping our country. This trend is fueled by racist, backward, and poisonous propaganda, crafted specifically by right-wing political forces and co-opted by the center-left, as in the case of Vannacci's heavy media exposure to undermine the government. The polarization around individual news stories, exploited to reinforce anti-immigrant rhetoric and build a genuine climate of hatred, is anything but a coincidence: it is funded with millions of euros through campaigns on social media and across mainstream media outlets, to build this precise climate in the country and shift the window of what is expressible to the right, allowing the government to continue operating on fear. We saw this clearly in the case of Abderrahim Fakir: faced with a man crying for help in the throes of a crisis, first beaten and pepper-sprayed, then crushed under the iron heel of the state, the racist and crude right-wing propaganda showed the worst, dehumanizing the victim and justifying the actions of the police.

There are those who, then, move from words to action. This poisonous climate is dangerous because, on the one hand, it legitimises, in the eyes of a segment of the population, the enactment of veritable "special laws" that curtail democratic freedoms and open the door to the subversion of the "rule of law" itself; on the other, it galvanizes the most backward and reactionary segments of the country, justifying, in the eyes of part of the public, actions that until recently would have been openly condemned, if not opposed, as occurred in the despicable attack on an immigrant in San Benedetto del Tronto by a member of the Futuro Nazionale party.

A very serious incident, which the government media is ignoring to create further controversy, is the attack our own organizations recently suffered in Parma. Over the past few nights, our provincial headquarters has been the target of two separate acts of intimidation by hooded individuals, with the aim of setting it on fire. This occurred following a shameful public defamation campaign supported by the local right, after our organizations were among the leaders of the mobilization in solidarity with Abderrahim Fakir's family and in denouncing what happened. The Communist Front and the FGC condemn these despicable actions and call on workers and the public to be vigilant and mobilize against any attempt to intimidate those fighting to overthrow a system that is now in decay .

This climate is being scientifically fueled by the government and right-wing political forces, who, unable to provide solutions to the real problems of workers and the people, are trying to polarize the debate on specific news stories to increase consensus and strengthen themselves in view of the next election. This is their political responsibility, and they must assume it. At the same time, they are diverting attention from our country's increasingly dangerous involvement in imperialist war: just hours ago, Tajani announced that the government had already "reserved" €14.9 billion from SAFE (the first "pillar" of the ReArm Europe plan) to continue on the path of rearmament. This debt will be recovered through even more aggressive cuts to social spending (healthcare, wages, pensions, etc.). All this while the cost of living becomes increasingly unsustainable, as is happening with the cost of fuel, which in some cities has reached €2.73 per liter.

The reaction and authoritarian drift that our country is experiencing is the product of imperialist war and the irreconcilable contradictions this system produces. "The old world is dying, the new one is slow to appear: in this chiaroscuro monsters are born," said Gramsci almost 100 years ago. In order to carry out the warmongering and death plans of the true masters of this country, the government needs to "pacify" the social conflict internally, even preemptively, with laws that attempt to nip in the bud potential outbreaks of class struggle. It is within this framework that the security decrees that continue to be issued should be read, which have nothing to do with the artificial theme of "security" hysterically raised by right-wing political forces, but aim to repress dissent and limit the right to strike and demonstrate. The construction of the “public enemy”, be it immigrants, the so-called “maranza”, the “left” or the communists, serves to muddy the waters and is useful to industrialists and bankers to continue making billions in profits as well as to respond to the demands of a petty bourgeoisie that is increasingly in crisis.

We are not witnessing a return to fascism, despite individual far-right groups and organizations attempting to exploit certain issues, such as the anti-immigrant crusade, to gain consensus and political leverage. In the context of imperialist war, what we are witnessing is the true nature of so-called "liberal democracy," within which governments have no qualms about disavowing the much-vaunted values ​​of "freedom," "justice," and "equality" in the name of "national interest," which amounts to nothing more than allowing the true masters of this country to continue enriching themselves at the expense of the majority. We saw this with the complicity in the Palestinian genocide, where " international law is only valid up to a certain point " if the interests of defense companies or monopolies are affected; we see it continually in the legitimization of war and the warmongering propaganda that is poisoning peoples in every corner of the globe.

We must be aware that the answer to this reactionary spiral is not unity with the center-left or with the "broad camp" in the name of a generic anti-fascism. This is not only because those who advocate this proposal today have already governed on behalf of the same masters with disastrous results, but because in practice they propose themselves as an "alternative" for administering the same system of death and exploitation that is leading us toward the abyss of general and widespread war. These are the same people who verbally oppose rearmament, yet who simultaneously fail to question Italy's membership in NATO or who advocate for a European army, thus strengthening the formation of a European imperialist pole that would certainly fuel the same rearmament policies. Those who today present themselves as candidates for an administration "with a human face" of capitalism are primarily responsible for having handed the country over to the right and to reactionary forces, causing enormous harm to workers and the people.

To stop reaction, repression, and war, we need to build and strengthen a truly independent and modern alternative: the Communist Party. There is a large segment of this country that refuses to be fooled by the government's propaganda and deceptions: the same segment that inspired the great mobilizations for Palestine, denouncing our country's complicity in the genocide, and that in recent days has condemned the state assassination of Abderrahim and the attempt to divide workers among themselves, taking to the streets and making their voices heard. To these people, we want to say: there is an alternative to this system now at the end of the line, and we can build it with the contribution of each of us. To do so, we must organize ourselves, fight from the workplace to the working-class neighborhoods to undermine reactionary forces and build a system that puts our contemporary needs and our lives first.

There is no victory, there is no conquest, without a great communist party.