Garlasco’s is certainly not the first case of black news that inflames our country, yet it has such particular characteristics that it seemed out of the pen of a thriller writer. A culprit first acquitted, then condemned “beyond any reasonable doubt”, an expression that, in this context, already sounds like a contradiction. Then, after years, a new investigation that reopens and that could rewrite everything. An investigation whose solidity remains uncertain, between Supertestimoni which is not clear whether they are credible or mythomaniacs.

The voids and the imagination

The chaos that followed has inevitably rekindled the “media circus” and the public debate, in a vortex of false news, improbable theses and imaginative reconstructions. In a sea of ​​contradictory information it becomes almost impossible to distinguish the truth from false, the data from speculation, reality from fantasy.

And this is precisely the secret of Garlasco’s “success”: the more the information is fragmentary, the more we human beings begin to fill the voids with the imagination, generating narratives that exist only in our heads. The problem is that, in cases like this, it is highly unlikely to get to an absolute truth and this sends us into crisis. Doubt wears us down. We need certainties and, if they don’t exist, we build them alone. It is a defense mechanism, almost vital.

Entertainment and spectacularization

The Garlasco case has also put the fragility of our judicial system bare, which should protect citizens and condemn only on the basis of solid and verifiable evidence. Here, however, there are doubts about it and even some magistrates admit it. And this is scary, because it reminds us that anyone could become the victim of an injustice, lose years of life, career, reputation and family, even without having committed any crime. At the same time, a culprit could get away with it or even gain visibility, becoming a sort of celebrity. It is unacceptable, of course, but we must also deal with an uncomfortable truth: justice, the real one, does not exist. It certainly does not exist on this earth and perhaps even elsewhere. The world is deeply unfair. We, as a society, can only tend to justice, do not possess it.

Garlasco also brings to light the profound limits of the media system. The media, which should offer clarity and information, are increasingly slaves to spectacularization and clicks. Today information is often disguised entertainment, and we must take note of it. In a world in which we are submerged by content, we inevitably end up attracted by the simplest, immediate, sometimes sensationalistic ones.

The media processes

One thing, however, is certain: whoever is the real culprit of Garlasco, in this story people have been involved who have nothing to do with it and who have seen their lives distinctly turned, regardless of how history will end. This should alarize us and push us to put limits, to reflect, because it is in the interest of everyone. Instead they prevail morbid curiosity and mirror without brakes, which destroy everything they encounter. Because, if it is true that in war the first victim is the truth, even in media processes the truth does not pass it too well.