What is the real issue of the Christian Raimo affair
Several Italian artists and writers have signed the petition in support of Christian Raimo, a writer and teacher who risks suspension without pay because, according to the Lazio Region School Office, he has adopted an attitude that does not comply with the disciplinary regulations, damaging the image of the ministry through his statements. This disciplinary procedure comes following an initial warning that the writer had received, through the censorship sanction, which is a sort of warning not to repeat the same behaviors, under penalty of a more serious sanction (which in fact has arrived).
Since this government has been in office, we have witnessed situations of this type several times (for example when Meloni sued Canfora); Raimo’s supporters, in fact, assert that the freedom of expression of ideas is at stake, because those who criticize members of the government are silenced. On various occasions Valditara has spoken and exercised influence in areas in which he would not have had the right to do so, and the general climate of repression is undeniable, also considering other measures, such as those concerning RAI, and the recent security decree, which contains quite a few truly disturbing passages.
The left was hasty and incorrect
However, the reading that has been made of the Raimo affair by the left-wing world is very disappointing; indeed, it would be better to say that no reading was made of it, nor was any reflection drawn from it. The Manifesto limited itself to stating that “those who criticize Valditara risk being fired”, with evident intellectual dishonesty, because the phrase makes one believe one thing for another; those who signed in support of Raimo essentially repeated the same thing in different ways: the government censors opponents, legitimate criticism is prevented and freedom of expression trampled upon. Since I have the bad habit of treating everyone with the same yardstick and of dissecting issues to be sure of interpreting them with a minimum of criteria, I feel the need to point out some glaring shortcomings in the reconstruction of the story. First of all, Raimo is an employee of the Ministry of Education, as are all teachers; as such, he must comply with a disciplinary regulation, which states that the teacher cannot publicly damage the image of the ministry he works for, neither on social networks nor on other public occasions.
This was not invented by Valditara, nor does it derive from the current government: it is something known, or should be known, by every teacher, who the moment he agrees to do that job knows that from then on he will be a representative of the ministry and will not be able to no longer doing and saying what he wants in all circumstances. Let’s say that, as a rule, it is not often that we are sanctioned for this reason, and in Italy we are quite used to fierce criticism and strong or abusive words, which we have often heard even from the mouths of representatives of the institutions. This is also why the news surprises many (also revealing that some people don’t even know the rules of their profession); and to exclude that the aforementioned political climate played a certain role would perhaps be a little naive.
Regulations that have always existed
The issue presents several interesting implications, which perhaps it would not be useless to discuss: for example the fact that a teacher – or a public employee in general – is considered a representative of the administration for which he works even when he is outside the time and place of work. Raimo in fact stated that he made those statements as a citizen, not as a teacher; but that’s not how it works, and therefore, on paper, this potential limit to freedom of expression is always there. But if this state of affairs is considered unjust (legitimately, I would say), it must be recognized that it does not depend on the present government, and that it is part of a much broader vision of the public employee, which has reasons and which, if anything, should be put under discussion; in short, we cannot pretend that this disciplinary warning is absurd, astonishing and unpredictable.
This is even more so if we observe the contents and methods of the criticism directed at the minister. Of course, it is difficult (and potentially arbitrary) to define what is harmful to the image of a ministry, and for the most part Raimo’s criticisms are specific and concern the contents, the methods, in short, the merit of the issue. However, there have actually been some sanctionable releases: the sentence that has been commented on so much, in which Raimo compares the minister to the Death Star from Star Wars, although it contains a very obvious metaphor (and how it is possible to interpret it as a real invitation to kill the minister is incomprehensible to me), is inappropriate towards a representative of the institutions. In short, saying that a minister should be eliminated (politically) is problematic for a teacher. Even more so is calmly stating on television that in class children should be told that neo-Nazis should be beaten: perhaps the phrase is ironic and hyperbolic, but it remains something that you cannot afford to say publicly if you are a teacher. In addition to this, we also remember having defined the minister as a “filthy” and a “sloth”, which could easily be considered an insult to the institutions. And these are things that – I repeat – Raimo should know and that do not depend on this government.
The authoritarian drift cannot be fought in a dishonest way
What we find in this government is, as mentioned, a general tendency towards repression which rightly alarms many citizens, and which therefore also leads us to evaluate Raimo’s case by inserting it into this very unpleasant and undemocratic political context. In the school context, then, the concern is particularly high, also considering the spirit that lingers in the new indications for civic education. It is therefore very right that we remember the imbalance of power between a teacher – albeit a well-known public figure – and the minister, and that we warn politicians and citizens against the risks of repressive tendencies. But – and now I sound like a broken record – whoever takes on this task cannot then in turn provide partial and biased reconstructions, and should also ask themselves whether this appeal to freedom above all else would also be valid in the opposite case: after all, when it happened that someone offended the President of the Republic, we were all indignant at the lack of respect for the institutions. It’s a question that I would like the left to be able to answer unanimously, through a healthy and honest debate.