Italian Veline

When the former Prime Minister of Italy Silvio Berlusconi voluntarily resigned from his post in the face of mounting political pressure last year, many Italian women saw it as sign of hope not only for the future of their nation, but also for their place in society. An in-depth article in the LA Times called it the beginning of the post-bimbo era in Italy.

Prior to his turn as Prime Minister of Italy, Mr. Berlusconi was a broadcast media mogul. Italian television was transformed by Mediaset, the TV conglomerate he controlled prior to his ascension to power. Media analysts claim that it was Mr. Berlusconi’s attitude towards women that is largely to blame for the state of Italian TV these days. They cite his predilection for veline (showgirls), the beautiful and curvy women who are a staple of television in the Mediterranean country these days.

While no one really complains about the entrancing beauty of Italian women on their TV sets, it is the way that they have been portrayed by the Gruppo Mediaset over the last few decades that is to blame for a saturation of nearly misogynistic imagery that some say has extended even to the state  broadcaster RAI (which can be watched on some cable television networks in Costa Rica).

This is how the LA Times described the current situation in Italian media:

“Kittenish models pose seductively on billboards to hype not just perfume and lingerie but also groceries. Serious newsmagazines find flimsy excuses to put scantily clad babes on their covers to increase street sales. The same yogurt maker that depicts happy families in its television commercials in France shows a slinky sexpot eating its product provocatively in Italian ads.

Visitors to this country are often shocked by the abundance of buxom bombshells on television, at all times of day, in images approaching soft porn.”

Now that Mr. Berlusconi is no longer in power, Italian women like marketing specialist-turned-activist Lorella Zanardo are seizing the opportunity to bring awareness to the degrading phenomenon with the hope that it will be stamped out. In 2009, Ms. Zanardo made a video collage of several scenes from Italian network television called “Il Corpo delle Donne.” The title is a play on the term “corpus” -principal sum- and the word “body.” The English-subtitled version of the video has been watched more than fifty thousand times. It is introduced as follows:

This project took off as a matter of urgency. It all started with the observation that women–real women–are an endangered species on television, one that is being replaced by a grotesque, vulgar and humiliating representation.

We sensed the enormity of this loss: the erasure of women’s identity is happening right before our eyes, but without a proper reaction, not even from women themselves.

Is Costa Rica Headed Towards a Bimbo Era?

The demise of the populist Berlusconi administration was hasty, and it worried many political analysts who think that the former Prime Minister essentially suffered the same fate as George Papandreou, his counterpart in Greece. Both European countries suffered are deeply mired in sovereign debt; their former leaders were not ousted democratically, but rather summarily by powerful bond traders.

Costa Rica is also turning to sovereign debt as a way to reduce the mounting deficit. In this regard, central bankers and economists should play close attention to accumulation of bonds and fluctuation in the markets, lest we end up in a situation similar to that of Greece and Italy. This was covered in greater detail in a previous article in The Costa Rica Star about the new global bonds and the perils of debt.

It could be argued that Costa Rica is becoming similar to Italy not only in the sovereign debt department, but also in the depiction of women on the airwaves. It all began at the turn of the century with the Repretel television show “A Todo Dar” (an expression similar to “very cool”), a program that no one was sure what it was really about, but it became legendary for its scantily-clad Tica models who pranced and bounced across the screen until the show’s cancellation in 2005. A Todo Dar was vilified by media observers for its apparent objectification of attractive (and often surgically-enhanced) Ticas, but the show enjoyed very high ratings nonetheless.

Once A Todo Dar was cancelled, many of the show’s models turned to the Pasarela circuit, a phenomenon that ran parallel to A Todo Dar. Pasarelas are essentially fashion shows where the overwhelmingly male spectators don’t really care about fashion; the models are on display rather than the minuscule attire they struggle to keep on. The lives of these models are often reported on by another show on Repretel: “Intrusos de la Farandula” (intruders of showbiz). On “Intrusos”, every interview with these models consists of clips of their catwalk routines and close-up camera shots that linger over the model’s body.

The choice of novelas (soap operas) that the TV networks in Costa Rica are purchasing also gravitate towards the gratuitous in terms of showcasing women’s bodies. These novelas, which are mainly Brazilian, Colombian, and Mexican productions -although many are produced and filmed in Miami- are getting more risque, perhaps in an effort to win over male audiences.

A Todo Dar may be off the air, but we now have Combate on Repretel, a game show where opposing teams face off in a series of physical and dexterity challenges for the right to stay on the show and be on camera for the hundreds of thousands of Ticos who tune in each night. The stars of Combate are the competitors, who are barely dressed in athletic attire that seems too tight for comfort. And just like its A Todo Dar predecessor, the stars are highly attractive and perform sultry suggestive dance routines.

There are two main differences between the sultry novelas and Combate, with regard to Italian TV. First, the steamy novelas are generally banished to late-night television by law. Second, the nearly-naked contestants of Combate are male and female, and they both gyrate in front of the cameras. This attempt at gender equality in entertainment should offer some hope to those Ticos who worry that the airwaves in Costa Rica are becoming like their Italian counterparts.