If I may express my personal opinion, for me, May Day, with its related and connected demonstrations, can go fuck itself. Every May 1st, I feel a greater sense of sadness that grows with each passing year. I mean, May Day should be a celebration for all workers; it should unite everyone—be they factory workers, freelancers, office employees, and so on. Instead, this date has become (or perhaps has always been) an excuse for pathetic and anachronistic parades, as well as cursory political and union commentary on today's labor market, and yet another opportunity to throw shit at political opponents (from both sides, mind you) with empty discourse and perpetual electioneering.
I would like to see all categories of workers march in Rome, not just those transported by buses and special trains (without paying for a ticket, which makes it a joke that there are then thousands of people, and this also applies to the concert), but above all, I would like to see young precarious workers marching—those constantly balancing between employment and unemployment, most of whom are graduates and not retirees, sixty-year-old workers and all those categories of jobs protected by ironclad collective contracts.
I wish it were truly a celebration for all workers, while instead, May 1st is only felt as a prerogative for some. The concert should simply be abolished. I went a few years ago (I don’t even remember who performed), and in Piazza San Giovanni, I saw everything except for workers. Nobody was watching the concert (myself included), but everyone was busy dealing and smoking weed or drinking alcohol of any sort, all making noise and being a nuisance. What the fuck is the point of such a concert if, then, the audience (most of whom are teenagers who think they're being supportive of everything the holiday represents just because they wear Che Guevara T-shirts, when in reality, if you ask them a simple question even about Che himself, they can't answer) doesn't pay attention to the music and what is being said (except for the few chosen ones in the front rows)?
For me, it’s just an occasion to smoke a joint in peace and get drunk in company (something I myself did when I went). P.S.: Before insults rain down on me that I couldn’t care less about, I want to clarify that I was born into a family of workers. Vincenzo, from the South, a graduate, a newly minted lawyer looking for a practice (this is to respond to the idiot anonymous). But above all, from the South, like many of my friends and countless other Southern graduates like me, who are scattered around Northern Italy doing temporary office jobs to make ends meet.
