There have been men and women whose words are invaluable and irreplaceable condemnations of the most corrupt of systems, too often ignored: “La Mafia”. An organism whose sole function is to excrete the venom that poisons men’s souls and corrupts their conscience. A progressively larger, more powerful cancer that metastasizes by feeding on the fear of those who fail to speak out, and crushes any hope in humanity.

These men and women never capitulated despite being surrounded aby a wasteland constituted by people whose hopes were ravaged by villains armed with guns. Those men and women died young yet fully aware that their ideas would echo in the centuries as critiques of the exercise of power against the weak by those that have buried their conscience underneath rotten waste.

“Cosa Nostra” in Sicily, “’Ndrangheta” in Calabria, and “La Camorra” in Campania: these three organizations alone, with their drug smuggling, sex trade, extortion and manipulation of government contracts, make up more than ten percent of Italy’s GDP. Our “omertà”, our complicit silence, has for decades irrigated the “malapianta”, the weed that has ramified throughout the whole country. Because of businessmen from the North, from cities just like the one I am from, and their willingness to launder money. Because of politicians from the Middle of Italy and their willingness to turn their eyes away and let the Mafia manipulate electoral results. Because of the cities in the South and their institutionalization of the Mafia as the de facto government.

The most terrible part of it all is that I and everyone else have to look into the mirror if we truly seek who is responsible; because in our failure to speak out we are each accomplices to the rotten and malignant system bankrupting our future at every corner! We failed as statesmen the moment we became the gears of “la macchina del fango”, the machine that produces the mud that piles up in front of us, slowly dis-empowering us from creating a political conversation about acting united against organized crime.

Thus Italy’s greatest enemy is not foreign but domestic: an institution that operates not in the dark but in the shadow of our heads, as they consistently turn away from the real problem in a futile attempt to avoid the humiliation revealed in our illogical acceptance a life lived in misery.

And that is the reason why the greatest lesson Italy has taught me is to be brave: to overcome fear with the strength I can draw from the ideals that I chose to define myself with. Because in the moment I refuse to subjugate myself to the Mafia or any other oppressive entity, I undermine the core of its power as I inspire others to no longer be afraid to voice their dissent, and to speak out with fervor and conviction against organized crime, abusive governments, and authoritarian despots. Because the time to stand for justice and regain our dignity is always now.