When we were young, they used to tell us: «Son, you better study, or you’ll be a nobody in your life».
And so we did. After having spent years studying hard, they said: «Don’t you know that a degree is just a useless piece of paper nowadays? You should have rather learned how to work!».
And so we did. After having learned some profession, they told us: «What a pity though, all that study wasted to learn such a crappy job?».
We got sick of that, so we gave up.
But since we gave up, we got left without a cent.
So we started to hope again, hopeless.
At first we were too young and without any experience. Then, after just a while, we were already too old, with too much experience and too many qualifications. Eventually, we managed to find a job anyway. Piecework. Non-payed annual leaves, no illness, no Christmas bonus, no severance pay, no trade unions, no rights. Yet, we struggled to defend that non-job. We had no children, for an obvious sense of responsibility, and we grew up.
Hence, looking down onto us from their wealthy jobs, easily found in the 60s with just a scrap of a diploma or even less (when life was really easy-winning), they said: «You little spoiled brats, when will you stop being mummy’s boys and have your own family?». And in the meantime we were paying for their retirement pensions, while definitely saying farewell to our ones.
So we did, we reproduced; but then they told us: «What are you doing? You bear children without any certainty, any job with a permanent contract? Don’t you feel irresponsible towards them?».
At that point we couldn’t kill them, I guess.
So we emigrated.
We went somewhere else, looking for a safe place somewhere in the world.
We found it. We felt fine. We felt home. Finally.
But one day, at that very moment we couldn’t expect it less, the “Italia system” failed, and everyone got screwed.
Hence they told us: «Why haven’t you done anything to prevent it?».
At that point we couldn’t do anything else.
«Fuck off!», we replied.
(translated from: Torto O.G., Breve storia di una generazione)