Why Italy's Florentines Are So So Stupid

This essay is dedicated to my beloved Sarah who has been an unfailing infuence in the creation of it...

Before beginning, my dear reader, I wish to defne my idea of what stupid

is: anyone or anything that is ignorant more than three times, in turn, has
to be considered stupid.

The most stupid thing I have ever heard muttered by a human being was
this utterance: “We Florentines invented everything. Everything ever
invented after us has just been a copy of what we had already created.” This
atrocious affrmation was verbalized to me by a 60-year-old Florentine
woman, who never went to high school, who was a factory worker, who
later became the mistress of the wealthy proprietor of the manufacturing
plant where she labored, who later became his wife, who spent her
marriage in bitter despair because her husband had still more “factory
workers” to care for, and who had spent her days buying expensive
Ferragamo shoes and Gucci handbags, traveling with her husband all over
the world when he was available, and collecting used jewelry as a “hobby”
to pass her time away. Her Lady Rolex once had belonged to her husband's
friend's wife who had died prematurely—naturally, it fetched an incredibly
good price!

These piteous, barren women pathetically roam, like peacocks, within the
confnes of Florence (Firenze), Italy. They are part of a fad of snotty snobs
who permeate Florentine society, and who can be seen walking in the
streets of Firenze with their noses high to the sky, and their lips drooping
from plastic surgeries, dropping on down to their chins. Is this Dante's
Hell? Is this what he had in mind? I once thought Dante Alighieri had in
mind Via Baracca when he wrote the Inferno. (WARNING: Do not accept an
invitation to dine with a Florentine family. They will dish out for you
thawed, uncooked fsh sticks drenched in tartar sauce and served with
Fanta in bohemian crystal wine goblets.)

And what a hell the Florentines have created for themselves! What
geniuses they are! These half-wits have not the slightest idea about how
they might fnd their way to survival. They vaunt the splendor of the
Renaissance, but are impotent in knowing how to regenerate themselves!
They are drugged to the hilt with licit and illicit drugs, and spend half the
day looking at themselves in their mirrors. But why are they so
thickheaded? Let me explain.

Piero Rocchini, an Italian psychiatrist, has coined the phrase, “The

Syndrome of the Mediterranean Woman.” His basic argument is that many
Italian mothers produce castrated male children, who, later when grown
up, lack any sense of responsibility. “The Mediterranean mother satisfes all
the child's desires and takes away all responsibility with the goal of
attaching her son, always, to her. The mother represents unconditional
love, and unfortunately, in Italian society the father fgure is frequently
missing. The father should represent reality, society, rules, and severity.
The Italian mother says to the son: Nothing is too much for you. This
creates persons with an infantile optimism, persons who feel like
Superman, untouchable,” says Dr Rocchini.

Therefore, it stands to reason that Italian boys and young men dream more
of becoming famous football players or motorcycle drivers or Formula 1
racers than they wish to earn a degree from some Italian university. Most
Italian males I know would prefer a sleek automobile rather than to study at
the university level—if they even ever arrive there. 57% of the Italians hold
a high school diploma. Fifty percent of the Italian students starting
university studies, never fnish their courses. As far as the Florentines are
concerned, why should they study when they are told all day long that they
created everything, and all further inventions came from the geniuses of the
Renaissance? Stupid? Yes, indeed! Very, very stupid!

If only the Florentines were still creating these “stupid sons!” That would
certainly be a vast improvement. They are not. But why? I can think of
three good rational motives that explain the barrenness of Florentine
mothers. The frst is economics. Children cost to have, to upkeep, and to be
prepared to face the rigors of adult life. Yet the really wealthy Florentines,
who can afford to have domestic assistance from individuals they hire from
the Philippines, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh, or wherever, must suffer the
often psychological dilemmas caused their children by their parents'
familial absences made by these well-to-do mothers and fathers gallivanting
around the world in their private jets and yachts—luxury items they mostly
rent because they are not rich enough to purchase them. Perhaps it is
better that Florentines do not have children? (Still another WARNING: It is
not only that Florentines do not have the funding to correct the structural
abnormalities, the crumblings, in their museums, churches, and schools,
they also do not have the fnancial resources to perform the necessary
inspections of these artifacts! So, bring along a hard hat if you come to
Firenze to visit the provincial-minded city and dialogue with the medieval-
minded morons who live there.)

The second explanation is more frontal, more insidious. Italy has one of the
highest C-Section birth rates (Cesarean deliveries) in Europe. 38 percent of
nativities are carried out through C-Section procedures. Only Cyprus and
Third World countries register higher C-Section births. A pregnant woman
in Italy goes to give birth with a tremendous fear hanging over her head.
Heavily-sedated pregnant women about to give birth, have their natural
birth contractions interrupted causing a recourse to the C-Section. Oh,
Italian gynecologists (OB/GYN specialists) how many C-Sections do you
have to perform to buy a Mercedes-Benz? Still more stupids?

The third cause is that many Florentine women are not anatomically
outftted with what would enable them to endure a natural childbirth
without assistance from drugs and the dreaded C-Section delivery.

My dear reader, have I given you the impression that Florentines are on the
way out? That they are disappearing. That the so-called “Cradle of the
Renaissance” is nothing but a stricken fraud? I personally hold that view.
And just to give you another touché, I ask you please to get your hands on
David Leavitt's Florence: A Delicate Case in which he makes reference to the
hows and whys Firenze is a mecca for people—coming from all over the
world—with the intention of committing suicide! Voilà! Thanks, David.
Yes, Florence is a haven where you can kill yourself! It has the perfect
atmosphere to do so—especially in November and December. Really, the
Florentine mascot should be an eighty-fve-year-old woman, made-up with
psychedelic lipstick, bright red cheek rouge, and a cigarette dangling out of
her mouth. If only these Florentines were living in the Past—at least.
Instead, they are prisoners of a Past that does not belong to them any
longer. Poor things.

I wish that all Florentines would be banned into the depths of an eternal
Hell where they are all burnt to a crisp—for one and only one reason: They
have substituted Beauty with Design selling out to the moguls of Wall
Street and dog-eat-dog capitalism content, like little piglets, to wallow in
the Pigsty of hedonism, greed, and corruption that ft them so well.

The future of Florence will be in the hands of the Rumanians, Albanese,

Chinese, Kosovans, Filipinos, Sri Lankans, Bangladeshis, Peruvians,
Moroccans, and Senegalese. These individuals are now, for the most part,
uneducated and in a state of Florentine culture shock. Many of them left
their countries because of religious or political oppression and/or fed to
save their lives. They are immigrants, refugees, or those who have
committed what racist Florentines consider the worst sin: they have come
to Italy to seek a better life for themselves.

I consider myself lucky because I live in Calenzano—about seven

kilometers from Florence—so I do not have to hobnob, to suffer, day in and
day out, with the pettiness and snobbery of the snooty people in Firenze.
People in Calenzano are kind and friendly. Come and visit with us!

Authored by Anthony St. John

22 June MMXVIII
Calenzano, Italy
Twitter: @thewordwarrior

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