It is a rainy Saturday afternoon in Milan, in the north of Italy, in May 2015. I am in a square near the city centre, and I see some people preparing banners and fliers. Some of them are wearing an orange vest, others are carrying bags of books and printed material, and a pair of them are holding professional camer- as. They give the impression that they know each other and are used to working together. A small group of women welcome people as they arrive in the square and show them where to stand. In about half an hour, the square is full with around five hundred people of all ages, curiously not clumped together, rather all evenly dispersed by standing a couple of meters apart. They are all still and silent, and the majority are reading a book. It is something I had already seen before in You Tube videos and read about in newspaper articles, but this is the first time I had seen this type of protest in person. I felt it was both powerful but worrying at the same time, because the hundreds of people conferred a solemn atmosphere on the square and the gathering reminiscent of a military parade. Even when a secular and anti-fascist group in a corner of the square started provoking them by singing and playing music, the protesters remained silent. There was a sharp contrast between them: those in the square remaining still and silent, amidst the bustling Saturday afternoon in the Milan surrounding them. I am trying to explore a phenomenon that is increasingly visible in Europe: anti-gender protest movements. When I observe this protest, different parts of the square are marked out by banners with the name of the group, Sentinelle in Piedi (Standing Watchman, in Italian). They are performing a veglia (virgil), during which they will stand still for one hour to protests legislation in favour of LGBTQI rights. One of the women takes a megaphone and starts to give a speech . She is in her thirties and I recognize her as Raffaella Frullone, someone whose blog posts and Internet articles I have read as part of my research on anti-gender movements. She started by saying:
Evolvi, G. (2020). Anti-Gender Movements in Europe: Unusual Religions and Unconventional Media. Barcelona : Blanquerna Observatory of Media, Religion, and Culture..
Anti-Gender Movements in Europe: Unusual Religions and Unconventional Media
Giulia Evolvi
2020
Abstract
It is a rainy Saturday afternoon in Milan, in the north of Italy, in May 2015. I am in a square near the city centre, and I see some people preparing banners and fliers. Some of them are wearing an orange vest, others are carrying bags of books and printed material, and a pair of them are holding professional camer- as. They give the impression that they know each other and are used to working together. A small group of women welcome people as they arrive in the square and show them where to stand. In about half an hour, the square is full with around five hundred people of all ages, curiously not clumped together, rather all evenly dispersed by standing a couple of meters apart. They are all still and silent, and the majority are reading a book. It is something I had already seen before in You Tube videos and read about in newspaper articles, but this is the first time I had seen this type of protest in person. I felt it was both powerful but worrying at the same time, because the hundreds of people conferred a solemn atmosphere on the square and the gathering reminiscent of a military parade. Even when a secular and anti-fascist group in a corner of the square started provoking them by singing and playing music, the protesters remained silent. There was a sharp contrast between them: those in the square remaining still and silent, amidst the bustling Saturday afternoon in the Milan surrounding them. I am trying to explore a phenomenon that is increasingly visible in Europe: anti-gender protest movements. When I observe this protest, different parts of the square are marked out by banners with the name of the group, Sentinelle in Piedi (Standing Watchman, in Italian). They are performing a veglia (virgil), during which they will stand still for one hour to protests legislation in favour of LGBTQI rights. One of the women takes a megaphone and starts to give a speech . She is in her thirties and I recognize her as Raffaella Frullone, someone whose blog posts and Internet articles I have read as part of my research on anti-gender movements. She started by saying:I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
