A Bloody Nose for Bloomers?

A couple of days after he had drawn women’s undies, Italian PM Silvio Berlusconi looked like someone back from battle.

The two events may not be connected, but it is interesting to find some connection.

Milan, December 13: At a political rally the PM is left with a fractured nose, two teeth knocked off and bloody cuts on his lips after a man hurled a miniature replica of Milan’s gothic cathedral at him.

After the attack

Brussels, December 11: At a meeting to discuss climate change, the Italian premier draws women’s inner wear and passes the papers around to other heads of state. It causes some embarrassment, some anger and some amusement.

The Daily Mail shows a sample of Victorian underwear

For a moment, imagine you are a world leader attending such a high-level meeting to discuss climate change. The pieces of paper have doodles that include the Egyptian loin cloth, Victorian bloomers, French satin panties, thongs, G-strings.

What would you do?

I think I'd see it as a symbolic representation of how women coped not only with social mores but also with how they chose to cover up intimate parts of their body. It might seem like stretching it a bit, but from the warm Egyptian clime to the cold English one, the way these undergarments were worn does give inkling into the climate.

As a moral issue, one could ask two questions:

1. Why did he choose women’s wear and not men’s? It is simple. He is not interested in men and men as nurturers of the womb of the earth do not have any totem value.
2. Does it become a head of state to indulge in such flippant gestures? It does not, but he could have sketched and not passed them around and then it would have been a secret and they’d imagine he was deeply interested in the talks that were taking place. Ethically, to mislead is wrong. It is quite probable that he was merely revealing the complete uselessness of such summits, and if it comes from someone who is rich and powerful, then it does send out the signal that the world needs to look deeper (and no pun this) instead of merely talking heads.

I am quite certain that were he asked to draw his own underwear he would have gladly done so.

How does it in any way connect with his bloodied face later? Some people were shouting out calling the PM a clown. Clowns are laughed at by people who see them as entertainment or for being silly. They are not seen as vicious enough to be physically harmed.

Was the man who lunged at him a moralist? He has been described as someone who has a history of mental health problems. It could be that he does not like Berlusconi’s politics. It could be that he does not approve of the scandals his PM is involved in. It could be that news of his drawing those thongs and things really was the final straw and he used a Biblical image, that too a medieval one rooted deeply in a spiritual union with god.

He did not use a camera tripod, the way another attacker had done several years ago when Berlo was less tainted.

In both instances the instruments made a pointed statement, and were phallic symbols, if one may say so.