Bans on kissing while driving a car, feeding stray cats and building sandcastles are among a rash of new laws Italians say threaten to turn the country into the ultimate nanny state. More than 150 "public security" laws have been introduced since Silvio Berlusconi, the prime minister, granted extra powers to local councils to help them crack down on crime and anti-social behaviour.
In the latest episode in the fight to maintain "public decorum", Vigevano, a town near Milan, this week slapped fines of €160 (£130) each on a young couple who dared to sit on the steps of a local monument. "It was really hot, so we just sat down for a moment," said Giada Carnevale, 24. "The only other alternative in the piazza is to go to a bar but there they charge you €5 just for a drink. We were just chatting – we weren't eating or drinking or smoking." But the town's mayor justified the fine, saying the council spent precious time and money each month cleaning up after idlers on the steps.
Passionate Italians caught kissing in a moving car in the town of Eboli, south of Naples, face a €500 fine. The coastal town of Eraclea, near Venice, prohibits the building of sandcastles on the beaches because they can "obstruct the passage" of people strolling along the strand. If you are caught having a smoke on the white beaches of Oristano, in Sardinia, you can be hit with a €360 fine.
On the island of Capri, wearing noisy wooden clogs is banned. In Bergamo, you can be fined €333 for feeding the pigeons, while Venice punishes the same offence with a €500 penalty. The town of Cesena on the Adriatic Coast extends the ban to feeding feral cats. The Italian press has slammed what they claim is a return to the bureaucratic straightjacket of the Mussolini era.
5 comments:
Some of those laws are ridiculous, but banning feeding pigeons and feral cats is a wise move.
I don't understand the problem some people have with others feeding pigeons. I live in a big city and even if you dont feed them they will eat all sorts of junk anyways. I saw one eating a chicken wing once.
If the pigeons get too accustomed to people and getting food from them, they'll stop respecting people's personal space altogether. It's not nice and might be even dangerous.
Except if it was common sense, you wouldn't need a law for it in the first place.
I for one am very glad that especially under Saint Berlusconi himself, his country finally cleans up it's act... *DONT_KNOW*
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