On election day, Giorgia Meloni appeared to have found a way to flout the rules requiring candidates to stop campaigning. The Italian far-right leader posted a video of herself on social media holding two melons in front of her chest as she winked at the camera and said: “September 25 [voting day], I have said everything”. Meloni in Italian means melons, and is also slang for breasts.
For those who found the clip distasteful, the sexualized image was further indication that Meloni would not be carrying the feminist torch as prime minister. Others were surprised by the sudden shift in style from the head of the Brothers of Italy, who had made wife and mother central to his campaign, but nevertheless acknowledged it was a smart way to show voters that he knows how to laugh, even. if the humor came from a more masculine culture.
A spokesman for Meloni, who is forming a government after a coalition led by Brothers of Italy, a neo-fascist grassroots party, won the election, told the Guardian that the melons were simply a play on the Meloni surname and that the narrative that the 45-year-old was “a woman against women” was “disgusting” and “out of touch”.
Melons aside, part of Meloni’s appeal to her voters is that she is a strong woman and the only one to have brought an Italian party to power while standing up to the powerful men, namely her coalition allies – Matteo Salvini, leader of the far-right League and Silvio Berlusconi, the three-time prime minister who leads Forza Italia.
Meloni doesn’t describe herself as a feminist, but says she’s against “pink quotas” and that roles should be taken on merit, not gender. She illustrates this point by stating that hers is the only party that contains multiple women in leadership positions.
“Not only could we have the first female prime minister, but we also have a large number of women who were elected to parliament,” said Lavinia Mennuni, an adviser to the Brothers of Italy in Rome who was elected senator in her constituency after fending off competition from rivals such as Emma Bonino, the left-wing leader who was among the feminists who fought to legalize abortion in Italy in the 1970s.
“But frankly, it’s not about whether Meloni is a woman or not, she’s just a very good leader, someone who is determined and consistent. We need to stop attaching feminist labels to everything.”
Giorgia Serughetti, a sociologist at the University of Milan-Bicocca who writes on women’s issues, said Meloni’s right-wing victory was not about “celebrating women” but about a person who “made it”.
“She has no language in terms of women’s battles and no desire to become a role model,” Serughetti said.
Giorgia Meloni in December 2018. Photo: NurPhoto/Getty Images
Monica Cirinnà, a center-left Democratic Party (PD) politician who became a symbol for Italy’s LGBTQ+ community after drafting a law that led to the approval of civil unions in 2016. She said that s ‘had to “earn the lead” and that Meloni had earned his role.
There was an outcry in August after PD leader Enrico Letta selected Cirinnà as a senatorial candidate, but in one constituency she was likely to lose. Cirinnà was also furious but decided to run after being cheered on by her supporters, despite knowing she would lose.
“He put me in a losing constituency, he basically said he no longer had power for the party,” Cirinnà said. “Let’s say I wanted nicer people; I’m tough and I don’t give in easily.”
While the PD placed women in ministerial roles when it was in government, Cirinnà criticized the party, saying that elected women were always “chosen by men” and that women who “speak freely” like her “irritate” them.
Cirinnà argues that voters recognize and welcome women who have the freedom to speak freely and pursue their political path, which is attractive to Meloni’s followers, even if it exalts a sexist culture.
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Luisa Rizzitelli, a women’s rights and LGBTQ+ activist, was also offered the chance to run as a PD senator, but turned it down after realizing it would be in a constituency she would surely lose.
“It was just about the image [of having a woman in the running],” she said. “The really big problem with the left is that they just put women in ‘second-tier’ positions instead of putting us in leadership roles that would really empower us.”
Rizzitelli said Meloni’s melons video was a sly way for her to present humor while also expressing masculine values. “The brothers in Italy have understood very well that women can be good in this sense: if Meloni had had feminist values, they would never have allowed him to go this far.”
Yet the lack of those values is guaranteed to turn back the clock on women’s rights, say Meloni’s detractors.
While Meloni has said he has no plans to abolish Italy’s abortion law, he does intend to limit abortions, such as offering financial support to women to carry a pregnancy to term rather than choose terminate the pregnancy.
Meloni’s agenda is also unlikely to favor giving women special treatment in the workplace.
“We will certainly go backwards in women’s rights because Meloni does not renounce his far-right culture, which has always maintained that women should behave in a certain way and that they should only to allow a certain freedom”, said Cirinnà. .
“Regarding [mandatory] pink quotas [in corporate boards] – I would like us to pass this measure as well, but until it becomes normal to see women in positions of power in Italy, pink quotas are needed”.