Roberto Saviano on media persecution and personal responsibility

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi will ask parliament for a vote of confidence today. This comes after months of mud-slinging matches in the media, which have mutated into instruments for smear campaigns, character assassination and defamation, Roberto Saviano writes in the left-liberal daily La Repubblica: "How can we break this vicious circle which is not just dangerous for the individuals involved but for democracy as a whole? The antidote lies with us, the readers, viewers and citizens, as long as we preserve our independent thinking and regain our powers of judgement. The antidote is to refuse to listen to and spread all the chatter ... in the knowledge that we are being exploited, ... our mouths are being used as megaphones for thoughts that are not our own; to refuse ... to spend our time on gossip websites that are paid to lie and deny legitimacy in a joking tone, using information to damage people. For these are the methods of the old communist regimes, of the tyrants in socialist countries who have portrayed dissidents as troublemakers, thieves, layabouts and good-for-nothings who act on base motives and stand up in opposition only out of self-interest."

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