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The Complicated Politics of Italian Transhumanism Part 2
Last October we published an essay by Stefano Vaj, a leader of the Italian Transhumanist Association, responding to charges that he had ties to the Italian far right, and was himself a fascist. The seven members of the rival Italian Transhumanist Network have written the following indictment to document their charges.
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COMMENTS
Posted by Giulio Prisco on 02/10 at 03:40 AM
I trust the authors of this article will forgive me for not taking their rant seriously.
I will take them more seriously if they start dedicating more time to promoting transhumanism in Italy. But not if they continue to focus exclusively on their worn-out hate campaign against one person.
In the meantime, the AIT publishes books, cultural magazines, appears on national media, manages vibrant and popular discussion fora, and continues its work to make Italians aware and supportive of our transhumanist vision.
I cani abbaiano, e la carovana passa.
Posted by estropico on 02/10 at 06:13 AM
Dear Giulio, I wish you were right and this was just about one person! But as we say in the article, Vaj is only the tip of the "sovrumanist" iceberg. Your association has decided not only to welcome a number of "neofascist transhumanists" (if that's not an oxymoron) but also to give them continuous exposure in its publications. Now, that's not the transhumanism *I* want to promote - in Italy or anywhere else! If any of the points raised in the article are not correct, please feel free to point them out - we'd be happy to make corrections if needed. Otherwise, your refusal to take our accusations seriously can only make me think that you find it difficult to explain how and why a bona fide transhumanist and man of the Left like yourself could possibly find a modus vivendi with the "sovrumanists".
And just to clarify, on the subject of promoting transhumanism: my website (estropico.org) has been doing exactly that for years, starting from the first Italian translation of the Transhumanist Declaration and FAQ; its blog (estropico.blogspot.com) is, as far as I can tell, the most read, Italian-language, openly transhumanist site on the web; Network H+ (transumanisti.org), is gearing up to initiatives both on-line and in the "real world".
Posted by Giulio Prisco on 02/10 at 01:44 PM
Dear Fabio,
I am, of course, well aware of the fact that your website estropico is a key transhumanist reference in our language.
By "the authors of the article" I am actually referring to the person whose name appears in the url of this article (which is http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/stile20100209/).
This gentleman, as you know, has never written anything about transhumanism, and seems only interested in his personal hate campaign against a person who, on the contrary, has done and continues to do a lot to promote our transhumanist vision in Italy, Europe and the world.
Posted by David De Biasi on 02/10 at 04:05 PM
Giulio says: "the AIT publishes books, cultural magazines, appears on national media, manages vibrant and popular discussion fora, and continues its work to make Italians aware and supportive of our transhumanist vision".
Is that your solid alibi? V.I.P. Very Intelligent People!
For your information, we also have a popular discussion forum and we work to spread the transhumanist values.
Posted by Stefano Vaj on 02/10 at 08:51 PM
As one can see, conspiracy nuts are not a an exclusively American breed, and there we find again the disgruntled preachers of the "red-brown-islamic-overhumanist threat hiding in technoprogressive and transhumanist ranks".
What I had to say on the subject is already contained in the article referred to in the introduction to the post above. The growing participation of some of the best-known Italian intellectuals (in most cases commonly considered as undisputed left-wingers) to the planned issues of Divenire, AIT's magazine, is eloquent enough on the seriousness of the allegations.
I will only add that while I obviously have no responsibility whatsoever for what a few alleged fans of mine may be or say, I can only approve and support the invitation contained in the rant above to check directly my writings, and form your own opinion.
As already mentioned elsewhere, I am also available to provide privately anybody caring to know more on the subject with documented details on the interesting backgrounds of the couple of individuals involved in this unrelenting but ultimately very repetitive campaign, always just short of what could be prosecuted in Italy as criminal defamation.
Posted by Loretta on 02/10 at 09:46 PM
Join the Peoples' Front of Judea now!
Posted by Giuseppe Regalzi on 02/11 at 04:30 AM
Actually, as it is clearly stated on top of this page, the authors of the article are not a "couple of individuals" but the seven founding members of the Italian Transhumanist Network. They all stand by what is written here.
Posted by estropico on 02/11 at 05:05 AM
I'd like to point out how neither Giulio nor Stefano seem particularly keen to point out anything that might be factually wrong in the above article...
Stefano Vaj resorts to name-calling and refers to his article on IEET which is strong on opinion, but, unlike our own article, rather short on facts corroborated by independent links. He mentions the presence of left-wingers on AIT publications, but we never claimed that the whole of AIT is a neofascist organisation - see the very first lines of our article. He then tries to push the discussion off-line, asking to be contacted privately - why should we do that? What's wrong with this or any other public forum?
Finally: Stefano says that our "campaign" is "always just short of what could be prosecuted in Italy as criminal defamation." Bingo! In order to defame him we'd have to say something that is not actually correct...
Posted by Stefano Vaj on 02/11 at 12:18 PM
Yes, as any amateur psychopoliceman should understand, I am not particularly keen to contend that "I did not molest child X on the 18th of October because on such date I had a flu", since this is the hoped for reaction of those who count on it to raise subsequently the question of whether I did it on some other date, or of what I would have done had I been perfectly healthy on such occasion. And so on.
I remain nevertheless available to discuss your and my respective views on global warming, embryo stem cell therapies, your funny flavour of western-christian supremacism, intelligent design, socialism, IVF prohibitionism, the WMDs allegedly stockpiled by Saddam Hussein, welfare, diversity, globalisation, social medicine, basic income guarantee, popular sovereignties, the use of drugs for social control purposes, imperialism, the idea of your friends to forbid the muslim cult in Europe under threat of deportation or their support to the electoral campaigns of neofascist politicians, you name it.
Then, we can count the transhumanists and technoprogressives who share my actual ideas, and those who share yours (if they exist at all).
Posted by Francesco Boco on 02/11 at 01:59 PM
I must thank the author of the article for these words:
"Boco is gaining a recognized role, in Italy, as a 'transhumanist' intellectual and ideologue"
Well, as far as I can see, no one ever asked me to write "the official line" of AIT, so you can be sure that actually I'm not an ideologue. I write in total freedom what I think, and I usually respect different opinions. Of course, here in Italy like there in USA, police of political correctness is always ready to speak about what doesn't comprehend.
You should read my articles before attacking my point of view, and then you should speak on the matter of what I write. I quote Marinetti, Junger, Spengler etc. and you can't deny also these can be part of a transhumanist way of thinking.
As for the Italia Sociale site, if you can read italian language you should easily get that this is not a "national socialist" site, but a "social national" site, which is a deeply different thing.
About the Waffen SS I think is an historical fact that this was the first true European army of the modern era. This is not an ideological point of view, but simply a fact. You can be against an European army but in any way you look at the Waffen SS, then this was the first one.
Clearly, I do not reject anything of what I wrote, I like what Stefano Vaj writes and I think Giorgio Locchi was one of the most important italian thinkers of the last 30 years.
Seems that in a matter where moralism and conformism are simply an obstacle, you're still thinking about personal points of view while someone else is studying a new kind of philosophy.
Posted by Stefano Vaj on 02/11 at 02:40 PM
@Giuseppe Regalzi
'Actually, as it is clearly stated on top of this page, the authors of the article are not a "couple of individuals" but the seven founding members of the Italian Transhumanist Network. They all stand by what is written here. '
Weren't the NTI members... eight? But wait, the eighth must be the one who has just privately informed me that he did not accept responsibility for the garbage above, thus refusing to sign it.
Perhaps "some founding members" would have been more appropriate, but hey, accuracy is not the forte of whoever prepared the dossier above anyway. 
I am OTOH surprised that you do "stand by" it, given that I was repeatedly given for months now the opportunity to express my opinions on your own blog, where I have never been dealt with (nor do I believe I have ever behaved) as an "infiltrator" of one kind or another...
Posted by Giuseppe Regalzi on 02/11 at 03:51 PM
Stefano, the founding members of the Network are seven, not eight. You are probably mistaking an ordinary member - not a very brave one, apparently, since he has not yet notified us of his dissociation - for a founder.
"I am OTOH surprised that you do 'stand by' it, given that I was repeatedly given for months now the opportunity to express my opinions on your own blog, where I have never been dealt with (nor do I believe I have ever behaved) as an "infiltrator' of one kind or another..."
Well, we never said you tried to infiltrate my blog... And the fact that you have been allowed to post your comments there does indeed prove that "we're staunch supporters of freedom of speech and expression", and that the problem has never been with your person nor even - in a sense - with your ideas, but only with your role within AIT.
Posted by estropico on 02/11 at 04:09 PM
Dear Stefano, I can understand why you're so keen to change the subject, but your tactic is transparent. Throwing anything and everything at your critics in the hope that something might stick and distract the readers will not change the reality of what's in the above article. Anyone can now follow the link to the openly neofascist publisher you have chosen for your Biopolitica, just to mention one, and make up their own mind about you and your peculiar version of transhumanism. In the same way they can follow the links to my online activities and judge by themselves if what you say about me makes any sense or is just spin. Here they are, conveniently google-translated for the non-Italian speakers:
http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?hl=en&sl=it&tl=en&u=http://estropico.org
http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?u=http://estropico.blogspot.com/&sl=it&tl=en&hl;=&ie=UTF-8
and here are the original, Italian-language versions:
http://www.estropico.org
http://www.estropico.blogspot.com
Cheers,
Fabio
Posted by tecnoumanista on 02/11 at 04:16 PM
>Stefano Vaj wrote:
>Weren't the NTI members... eight? But wait, the eighth must be the
>one who has just privately informed me that he did not accept
>responsibility for the garbage above, thus refusing to sign it.
Actually, no. You're making a mistake. The blogs/websites, members of the Network, are constantly growing, and they're now 12, while the founders were originally 5.
We decided to sign as "the founding members.." just to avoid that members who have joined the network later were involved in this dispute. Nonetheless, two of the new members firmly showed their willingness to sign the article, so we decided to 'upgrade' them to the founding member status.
>Perhaps "some founding members" would have been more
>appropriate
Again, you're wrong, as it's exactly the opposite: thank to you, we have now two more founding members
Posted by estropico on 02/11 at 05:42 PM
For Loretta: Yes, I am painfully aware of the Pythonesque undertones...
Posted by tecnoumanista on 02/11 at 06:15 PM
>Francesco Boco wrote:
>As for the Italia Sociale site, if you can read italian language you
>should easily get that this is not a "national socialist" site, but a
>"social national" site, which is a deeply different thing.
Not really. The name is 'Italia Sociale. Il periodico del Socialismo Nazionale' - 'socialismo' is substantive, and 'nazionale' is adjective - so the correct translation is precisely 'Italia Sociale. The Periodical of National Socialism' (and not 'Social National-ism').
>About the Waffen SS I think is an historical fact that this was the
>first true European army of the modern era. This is not an
>ideological point of view, but simply a fact.
I don't know if it was "the first true European army", but anyway, as in that article you're suggesting to take the waffen SS as a "model" for a future European army, then you're not simply reporting a fact, but you're proposing exactly your ideological point of view.
>Clearly, I do not reject anything of what I wrote, I like what
>Stefano Vaj writes and I think Giorgio Locchi was one of the
>most important italian thinkers of the last 30 years.
I greatly appreciate the intellectual honesty you're showing here.
Posted by MG on 02/11 at 11:09 PM
Come on, Albertario, some Italians speak English and we knows where you come from and what your political leanings are.
Not to mention your friend Tecnoumanista, who I hear admitted in the WTA public list he had actively campaigned for the election of Alessandra Mussolini, Benito's grand-daughter, who left National Alliance, the Italian neofascist party because it was not extremist and anti-Semitic enough anymore.
Or have you become all of a sudden a good socialist? Pardon me if, speaking of infiltrators, I would doubt your sincerity, but I'm certain this statement from your side would make interesting reading for your Italian contacts of very different persuasions. I'm even afraid they wouldn't be too happy. But never mind, come out of the closet, don't be shy about your own political ideas, don't let us in the dark any further.
To make a long story short: are you asking Stefano Vaj to renounce bigotry, capitalism, white supremacy, class / gender / cultural chauvinism, intolerance, christian fundamentalism, oppression of proletarians, western imperialism, corporate interests, anti-darwinism, individual egoism, "pro-life", death penalty, xenophoby, militarism, social conservatism, etc. etc. etc.?
Of course not. He has *always* raised his voice in transhumanist channels and other places against all that, AFAIK. Alas, the same can't be said for some of his critics. Quite the contrary, in fact.
Posted by David De Biasi on 02/12 at 07:19 AM
@Mafalda Grandi (alias MG): Do you have any proof of your charges or you just spreading rumors?
What about your nazi-maoist magazine, Rinascita?
Posted by MG on 02/12 at 10:27 AM
Why don't you let your boss clarify his views on the subjects I mentioned? Vaj repeatedly did, including in this Web site, and most people would consider them very relevant to decide who is a fascist and who is not, don't you think?
But he better keep in mind that I still keep at hand a full archive of my exchanges with him in his mailing list, and it will be my pleasure to point out how recent his "conversion" would be.
As to "my magazine Rinascita", it is a daily newspaper and I do not own it, but I remark that its editor-in-chief is Ugo Gaudenzi, the former editor-in-chief of L'Umanità, the daily newspaper of the Socialist Democratic Party, the heirs of one of the oldest socialist parties in the world (1892) who refused to support Stalinism in 1948 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_Democratic_Socialist_Party). Amongst its leaders, Saragat, subsequently president of the Italian Republic, and the sons of Matteotti, the member of parliament murdered by fascists in 1924.
Even today, Rinascita opposes privatisations, western imperialism, dismantling of welfare, cultural colonisation, globalism, exploitment of the working classes and of third world countries, interferences of the church in Italian affairs. More than enough to make them fascists in the eyes of "leftwing" agents provocateurs who are notoriously fed and encouraged by the disinformation depts of the intelligence circles that are so close to the heart of your boss' ideological leaders. What else is new? The only difference is that who echoed this really authoritative stuff in the article above surely did it for free, because nobody would pay them anything, invisible as they are on the Italian scene.
Posted by tecnoumanista on 02/12 at 10:29 AM
>MG wrote:
>Come on, Albertario, some Italians speak English and we knows
>where you come from and what your political leanings are.
>Not to mention your friend Tecnoumanista, who I
>hear admitted in the WTA public list he had actively campaigned for
>the election of Alessandra Mussolini, Benito's grand-daughter, who
>left National Alliance, the Italian neofascist party because it was
>not extremist and anti-Semitic enough anymore.
Well, if that's the case, why would I have contributed to the article we are now commenting? On the contrary, I would have been the biggest fan of Stefano Vaj, and I would have published articles and books through his same publishers (L'Uomo Libero, SocietàEditrice Barbarossa, etc - see http://www.axt.org.uk/antisem/countries/italy/italy.htm ).
But let's face it, this is MG - Mafalda Grandi, I suppose (if that's your real name) - Vaj's 'assistant', registrant for the domain where his Biopolitica is published online, and a specialist in doing the 'dirty work' on demand. As you're trying to do in this post.
As far as your important 'revelation' concerning me - everyone can check in the wta-talk archives ( http://www.transhumanism.org/mailman/private/wta-talk/2009-October/027489.html ) -, I just replied to Riccardo Campa, who some monthhs ago 'disclosed' that I _voted_ for Alessandra Mussolini in the 1993 Naples mayoral election (as about _an half_ of Neapolitan voters did), saying that yes, I voted for her: I was young (18 years old), then i grew up and changed idea. Currently, since about 17 years, my political views can be clearly described as liberal, social democrat and progressist (and on that occasion I reminded Campa that in the past he publicly and repeatedly said that my political views were very similar to his). Please note that, as 1993 mayoral elections came just after "Mani Pulite" ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mani_pulite ), all four parties in government in 1992 disappeared, so the forced choice (not only in Naples, but also in Rome and in other italian main cities) was between a post-fascist and a post-communist candidate.
Mafalda, as you falsely said that I "had _actively campaigned_ for the election of Alessandra Mussolini", I challenge you to prove your claim (as we did in our article regarding Vaj, you, and the other sovrumanists, about much more relevant - deep and current - connections with the far-right). Otherwise, perhaps you could write one more of your comical articles on Rinascita (the neo-Fascist one), but these half-baked attempts at mud-slinging are not worthy of appearing on IEET.org.
On the other hand, interestingly you also said that Alessandra Mussolini "left National Alliance, the Italian neofascist party because it was not extremist and anti-Semitic enough anymore". That is true, except that Alleanza Nazionale wasn't a "neofascist party", but a conservative party ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Alliance_(Italy) ). In fact, when its leader Gianfranco Fini (currently President of the Italian Chamber of Deputies) visited Israel in 2003, he justifiably labeled the racial laws issued by the fascist regime as "infamous", referred to the Italian Social Republic as belonging to the most shameful pages of the past, and considered fascism part of an era of "absolute evil". As a result (and 10 years after I voted for her in Naples mayoral election), Alessandra Mussolini decided to left the party and to form Social Alternative (Alternativa Sociale). Then, in 2005, Tricolor Flame Social Movement (Movimento Sociale Fiamma Tricolore), the other neo-fascist party, joined Mussolini's Alternativa Sociale. The same tricolor Flame Social Movement that _currently_ suggest Vaj's Biopolitica in his reading list ( http://www.fiammagiano.altervista.org/libri.htm ) and the same Tricolor Flame Social Movement you _recently_ praise in your article on the neo-fascist Rinascita ( http://www.webcitation.org/5leAdjAxU ).
Moreover, not surprisingly, Adriano Scianca - prominent AIT member and now even considered an important italian transhumanist thinker thanks to his regular presence in the AIT journal Divenire - in these same years published an article ( http://www.italiasociale.org/AlzoZero/almirante_tel_aviv.htm ) on 'Italia Sociale The Periodical of National Socialism'- where else? - harshly criticizing the refusal of fascism made by Alleanza Nazionale and what he called the "pilgrimage to Israel" made by its leaders, and concluding with these words: "Poor people: haven't they understood that they never have been fascists?".
So I found quite odd that - in this quibbler and rambling attempt to divert attention from the main issue - you're trying to associate myself to a political movement, and more in general to political milieu, to which actually you, together with your leader and the other sovrumanists, are very close _today_.
Posted by estropico on 02/12 at 11:46 AM
First of all, I must say that I'm not 100% sure who I'm replying to here. MG (Mahutg) is the nick of Mafalda Grandi, one of the "neofascist transhumanists" mentioned in our article. But the *rumor* in Italian transhumanist circles is that it is another pseudonym of Stefano Vaj. My *personal opinion*, I must say, is that it is more than a rumor. "Vaj", in turn, is a made-up surname, as the secretive "Vaj" has decided not to use his real name to sign his books and his many political articles on the net - understandably, given their often controversial nature.
But let's see where we stand. Whether it's Stefano or Mafalda, it looks like the sovrumanists' response to our article is going to be a series of increasingly desperate attempts to change the subject. Their "accusations" grow more surreal and more sweeping, and are typically offered without any corroborating evidence. And just a little research is all it takes to show how unfounded they are, as in the not exactly thought through attempt to smear TecnoUmanista (see his reply, above).
My political leanings. If I *had to* pigeon-hole myself, I guess I would describe myself as a liberal (european sense), with some libertarian tendencies. But politics is not my main interest, and I have found myself forced to become an "accidental antifascist" by the emergence of the Italian sovrumanists. I don't write articles on political websites or even on political mailing lists, unlike the sovrumanists whose activities are documented in our article. My online activities are confined to transhumanism, in the form of my website (Estropico.org). But whatever my political leanings, I have made a conscious effort to make Estropico a resource for transhumanists from both the right and left. Check by yourselves: go to the homepage. You don't even need to read Italian, just look at the pictures of the the people featured in the more recent articles. Right now you'll see that the most recent additions are the translations of an interview with Ben Goertzel and one with Jamais Cascio... What really upsets Vaj & co is that *they* and *their* neofascist politics are not welcome there.
Cheers,
Fabio (Albertario)
Posted by David De Biasi on 02/12 at 12:01 PM
MG said: "Rinascita opposes privatisations, western imperialism, dismantling of welfare, cultural colonisation, globalism, exploitment of the working classes and of third world countries, interferences of the church in Italian affairs".
Yes, the notorious "Third Position" between capitalism and communism...
You're playing with words. For example, the Members of the National Socialist German Workers' Party did not refer to themselves with the fascism-word, nor the nazism-word. They referred to themselves as socialists and/or national socialists and they used the actual entire name of the party... It is one of the peculiar ironies of history that there are no limits to the misunderstanding and distortion of socialist theories and marxist thought...
Posted by jhughes on 02/12 at 01:17 PM
THIS THREAD IS NOW CLOSED. THANK YOU ALL FOR PARTICIPATING.
Posted by Giulio Prisco on 02/12 at 01:24 PM
While I am not going to waste time by replying to the not very cogent posts of the anti-AIT clique, I think this exchange shows how politics is never simple.
We are used to simplified binary political categories like right-left, authoritarian-liberal, reactionary-progressive, individualist-collectivist, but the reality is much more entangled, and often difficult to disentangle. This is always true, but it may be especially evident in Italian politics.
History shows that, in Italy, the early fascist party was closely associated to socialist groups not only before, but also after its rise to power in the 20s. Conversely, the socialist and especially the communist parties after the war were run as authoritarian dictatorships. Some of the groups mentioned in this debate are especially difficult to classify. The old right-left, socialist-fascist binary labels don't apply, and we seem to need new categories.
Or, even better in my opinion, we need to stop insisting on easy, binary and worn-out categories, and start paying more attention to what persons and groups actually say and do. Are they in favor of X? Are they against Y? What is their proposed approach to solve Z?
The only thing I can say is: If you agree with me on most of the issues that I consider important, I will consider you as a political ally. If you not only agree with me, but also do something to advance our common agenda, I will consider you as a very valuable political ally. Regardless of labels.
Posted by Giulio Prisco on 02/12 at 01:25 PM
OOPS sorry James, our posts crossed. Thread closed.
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