Among the most discussed topics in recent days is the publication of the chats in which Valeria Fonte and Carlotta Vagnoli – currently under investigation for defamation and stalking – exchanged messages of various kinds with various other public figures, often violent and bordering on legality. Selvaggia Lucarelli, who is among the interested people and who has been speaking out against performative activism and feminist influencers for some time now, wrote an article on the matter, reporting excerpts of the conversations.

These revelations, for many, were disconcerting. In fact, we are talking about influencers who have personified the feminist fight against violence, and many other social causes, always around the theme of non-violence, respect for rights and so on, but who use violent and squad-based language in their messages, on the same issues and people that they strenuously defend in public. The hypocrisy of their poses explodes from the messages: people who have filled their Instagram profiles with posts in honor of Michela Murgia, making her a religious icon, and in private write the worst things about her; people who after having judged from the top of their moral pulpit anyone who made half a mistake who plan the media destruction of those they hate.

The possible violation of privacy is not the main point

Given the notoriety of the protagonists, who have hundreds of thousands of followers and are often at the center of major cultural events – as well as authors for important publishers – the case has become enormous: the spotlight is shining on a world that has cloaked itself in moral purity and then turns out to be rotten. Many have focused on the possible incorrectness of Lucarelli’s action: many comments appear to have been selected on purpose, not being relevant to the speech (for example the death wish to the President of the Republic), or even, in one case, taken out of context (an anti-Semitic phrase attributed to one of the members, who however was actually quoting someone else). There is also talk of public pillorying, as well as violation of privacy.

In reality, the chats are not private, because, once the preliminary investigation is completed, they can be consulted: Lucarelli legitimately requested and obtained access to the documents and reported to the public what he found. But, in any case, whatever the reproaches that may be leveled at Lucarelli, she is by no means the center of the issue. The center is the messages, the actions of these little bosses with too much power. It is worrying that many people consider the diffusion of messages – I repeat, no longer private – to be more serious than their content, and, above all, what implications and roots it has. Let’s just think about the fact that Vagnoli writes, verbatim: “Cancel culture is the most powerful weapon that feminism has had in the last ten years”. You, who have always maintained that cancel culture does not exist, are an invention of the right to delegitimize the battles of civilization.

Everyone distances themselves suddenly

In this regard, the reaction of feminist organizations and those active in the cultural field in general is interesting. There was a collective distancing from many entities, even with the cancellation of invitations to scheduled events. The tone is that of someone who is saddened by having trusted the wrong people, outraged by having been betrayed by an alleged supporter of the cause, worried about the negative repercussions that the affair may have on it. In short, everyone seems to fall for it, completely unaware of these behaviors until now.

Yet, the ways of feminist influencers have always been these. Aggression, ridicule of other people’s opinions, media squadism, delegitimization of opponents, violent language, have always been the order of the day on Vagnoli and Fonte’s profiles. How come no one ever noticed? Why did these people, until yesterday, appear everywhere, praised as heroines of the feminist struggle? Why didn’t they feel distanced from moderate, democratic feminist realities, against verbal violence?

As long as violence targets men, no one bats an eye

I put forward a hypothesis: everything was fine, there was no question of violence, as long as there was talk of killing men. Of being misandric, of wanting to register them, of excluding them from public spaces, and even of organizing public persecutions for the alleged molesters. Nobody ever said anything. But now Michela Murgia, some other important name, has been mentioned, and it turns out that these people are aggressive, dangerous, with power in their hands that they shouldn’t have. In fact, it also seems that only today has anyone realized that these are people who do not have the slightest competence to talk about gender violence and other social issues. Yesterday, evidently, they were all psychologists.

Nobody said anything. Indeed, those who, like me and a few others, have tried to publicly denounce these attitudes, to point out the contradictions, the hypocrisies, the damage that can result from this, have been censored, attacked en masse, even defamed. We have played the part of the bad guys, those who are against feminism, who defend rapists, who want to hinder women’s rights. They, however, have always been defended and protected. I don’t remember messages of support from feminist associations; perhaps because they were the first to sabotage me.

The problem is much broader than this single story

In fact, it is clear that these three people are being used as scapegoats for not addressing the issue of social feminism, which is predominantly of this type. These three heads will be cut off and the public will be made to believe that they have killed the monster of aggression and arrogance, bringing the movement back to its original purity. In the meantime, the reserves are already ready to take the field: there are many other influencers and ‘activism’ pages that use the same language and the same ways. It is not about these three, but about an entire system completely focused on the spread of hatred, divisions, polarizations, hoaxes, and on the strategy of victimhood as a trump card to never be in the wrong.