John Foster / 21 Jul 2023
The Inhuman Condition
Surviving Artificial Intelligence
You’ve seen it before. It’s a title that screams marketing department, with all the requisite keywords required to stand out at an airport bookstore:(...)
Fascism
Maxime Sattonnay / 20 Jul 2023
Making Spain Far-Right Again
The Verónica Fumanal Interview
It's all about the truth. Veteran Spanish political consultant Verónica Fumanal spoke with The Battleground about the impact of the 2023 election campaign on the country's press.(...)
Basilio Korman / 17 Jun 2023
Only Loyal to Himself
Silvio Berlusconi and L’Etat Pour Moi
There’s an old Doonesbury comic strip about a group of rich people attending a seminar to overcome their guilt about being rich.(...)
The Battleground / 22 May 2023
Giorgia Meloni, Serial Racist Part II
The ChatGPT Sessions
The apple never falls far from the tree. Particularly when it comes to post-fascist parties.(...)
Joel Schalit / 21 Apr 2023
Liberation Day Today
Remembering WWII in Italy
In the lead-up to every Liberation Day on 25 April, adverts commemorating the event appear on most of the municipal billboards of my Torino neighbourhood.(...)
John Foster / 31 Mar 2023
Italy After Neoliberalism
Mussolini’s Grandchildren, by David Broder
Giorgia Meloni’s election win in September 2022 was a watershed moment in history. Coming from Italy’s postfascist right, Meloni’s Fratelli d’Italia (FdI) was the first party to overcome the antifascist nostrums that had been integral to European politics since 1945.(...)
Charlie Bertsch / 29 Mar 2023
Planned Community From Hell
H2: The Occupation Lab
H2: The Occupation Lab, the documentary film by Idit Avrahami and Noam Sheizaf, is a powerful indictment of Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories since capturing Hebron in 1967's Six-Day War.(...)
Charlie Bertsch / 23 Mar 2023
All About the Heimat
Music as Politics in 1980s Germany
Teenagers were milling about. Bright colours shot off the portable mirror ball. The DJ stepped up to his console to cue the first track.(...)
The Battleground / 17 Mar 2023
Giorgia Meloni, Serial Racist
The ChatGPT Sessions, Volume 1
By community standards, his trip was a failure. Italian Jews protested Netanyahu's visit, and the community's leader, Noemi Di Segni, excoriated him for the settler pogrom in Hawara and for undermining Israeli democracy.(...)