By joining a very rapid collection of signatures, 201 Italian cultural operators, including journalists, writers, entrepreneurs involved in patronage, students, teachers, musicians, but also press offices and communication operators, as well as subscribers of cultural associations, ask the President of the Republic, guarantor of constitutional rights, and to the Minister of Culture to put a stop to that phenomenon that increasingly seems to assume the characteristics of pressing discrimination against Russian culture.
A collection of signatures born from the pressure of increasingly serious events such as the story that involved the scholar Paolo Nori and the Bicocca University, the request for the demolition of the statue of Dostoevsky in Florence, the social campaign against the Russian writer in Italy Nicolai Lilin, while the voices of wisdom of some Italian theaters or the Paris Opera remain mostly isolated, asking for distinction and serenity of judgment.
Course on Dostoevsky canceled at Bicocca, the rector: “We are inclusive, I don’t know who sent the email to Professor Nori. The Russians? Let’s also include the Ukrainians “
chiara baldi
Behind each signature there are hundreds of them silent or silenced by the promoters to avoid jeopardizing upcoming public events on important stages, given the irrational climate of these days, which sees only very few courageous voices out of the chorus. There are 201 signatures, like 201 are the years that separate us from the birth of Fedor Dostoevskij (1821), the Russian writer who became the involuntary symbol of this situation, as so many intellectuals rightly pointed out, including Claudio Magris today.
«Given and reiterated that the invasion of Ukraine by Putin’s Russia is to be condemned without any ambiguity – the letter begins – we believe that no war can ever justify a parallel cultural war, which involves intellectual isolation between nations. The repeated and increasingly frequent bans on Russian artists and intellectuals, up to the suspicion of our compatriots who are experts in Russian culture and language, are thus causing perplexity and concern in recent days. A true “cancel culture” operation is underway, as dangerous as it is unjustified. Because, contrary to the logic of weapons, that of art and culture has always been an instrument of dialogue, of openness, a bridge to peace that is more than ever necessary today “.
«We therefore consider dangerous and inappropriate – he continues – any form of retaliation and censorship that affects those Russian artists in Italy and Europe who have never become the active propaganda tools of the Putinian regime. Their presence in Italian and European institutions can in fact only encourage initiatives in favor of peace, which are so necessary today as never before. Against any black list, any form of discrimination implemented on the simple basis of belonging to a country, we therefore ask that a correct exchange relationship be maintained with Russian culture, which is already largely deployed against Putin’s policy, albeit in restricted limits granted to freedom of expression in a liberticidal regime “.