Rendiamo Visibile il nostro "NO" alla guerra!

[This is the main text from the small poster in a shop window. You can see the poster in the bottom right hand corner of this picture: 2003-02-24_17.33.jpg ]

Raccogliendo gli appelli di molte organizzazioni umanitarie a sostenere la pace con ogni mezzo, invitiamo tutti ad aderire all'iniziativa nazionale "PACE DA TUTTI I BALCONI"

I media amplificano i messaggi di guerra con l'obiettivo di renderci assuefatti all'orrore, amplifichiamo i messaggi di pace noi, con i nostri mezzi popolari e con la forza dei nostri valori. Esponiamo da subito la Bandiere della Pace ai balconi delle nostre case e lasciamola ben visibile finche' non sara' definitivamente scongiurata la minaccia di un conflitto armato.

[Clarion translation:]

Make our "NO" to war visible!

Responding to the appeals of many humanitarian organizations to maintain peace by all means we invite everybody to support the national initiative "PEACE FROM EVERY BALCONY"

The media are magnifying war messages, with the object of making us accustomed to horror. We magnify messages of peace with our popular measure and with the strength of our values. We advocate immediately putting the Peace Banners in the balconies of our houses and leaving them there until the menace of an armed conflict is definitely averted.

Report from Lecce

Stephen Hewitt

Lecce (18°10'E, 40°22'N) , 9 March 2003: Everywhere I have been in Italy in the last few months, I have seen these banners: in Bologna, in Abruzzo, driving past Bari, in Lecce and other towns in Puglia. They are for sale in shops in the city centre here in Lecce. You can't say every house has one - some streets don't have any - but you can't walk very far without being able to see one. One thing is sure, the number of people advocating peace in this way far exceeds the number displaying support for war: I have yet to see a single banner saying "GUERRA".

Comment

But perhaps one of the most significant aspects of this initiative, which is only hinted at in the text above, is that it is an initiative which is independent of the mass media. The media have no chance to suppress, and less chance to distort, the message of individuals displaying symbols in their own houses, because the media are not required for the propagation of the message. This surely represents a way forward and an example for initiatives in other countries too.

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