L’Idiot International

This short post is a tribute to one of the few free newspapers of the modern era, but above all a defence of a way of doing things that has all but disappeared.

L’Idiot was an astonishing editorial team, made up of free thinkers, regarded as extremists only because they were united by a shared revulsion towards the dominant system. It made room for articles by anarcho-communists, by national-fascist authors, and even by loose cannons like Eduard Limonov.

The only unwritten rule was that whoever thinks differently is not an enemy, but someone with whom you share a sense of community within difference. The ideological opponent became a friend with whom to have a beer and a chat, in a spirit of lightness.

The way of L’Idiot is what is missing today, and it is also the reason for its disappearance. Prudish moralisers in the mould of Simone De Beauvoir hated its refusal to “toe the line”. To the true idiots, free thought is a nuisance: you have to wear a uniform and blend into a flock of a single colour. Today, anyone who shows a glimmer of intellectual freedom is set upon by the horde of the undead, whose only aim is to silence and discredit them.

Cascina Bellaria wants to be a living space that celebrates what we have in common, even amid legitimate differences, where lightness prevails. A sort of homage to the spirit of Idiot International.

m.m.