Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf

One of the most read fairy tales to children before falling asleep is Little Red Riding Hood. And the most recurring question to parents is: why did the Big Bad Wolf disguise himself as a good old granny? To deceive and eat Little Red Riding Hood, the answer. Metaphorically speaking: in the dramatic story of the wind and photovoltaic assault on Sardinia, we see many bad wolves disguised as good old grannies, excited by the easy prey that, mostly unaware, is destined to be deceived.

There are those who arrive dressed to the nines, polished up like the day of their confirmation, with a fluent way of speaking, a sly and winking eye, convincing those who are willing to believe, out of naivety or prejudice, the biggest and most phantasmagorical lies. Do you Sardinians know - they say - that wind farms are useful for the modernity of the Island because they are a sign of advancing progress? And that - they add - they also provide you with significant employment and economic benefits? Do you know - they continue - that they also have an educational function for school children, on the subject of green transition? And do you Sardinians know - the most daring say - that wind farms and photovoltaic plants are tourist attractions?

Bad wolves disguised as harmless grannies are, instead. Deceit is their moral code.

Wolves love to be in packs to attack their prey in a coordinated way, surround it and confuse it. So do some humans who have regressed into wolves. They divide the tasks: some prepare the ground, that is, the rules; the others, well informed and well positioned, take advantage of it and, applying them, take possession of the prey. Easy.

The most experienced, convinced that they are more intelligent than their prey - only slower to understand, the latter, through distraction, indolence or resignation - also pretend to convince us of the conspicuous advantage that the appropriation of the prey would procure for the plundered.

In this poor and unfortunate Island of ours we have seen so many predators and takers and bandits. We thought we were done with these. It is not, finished, and, because of our guilty and unforgivable naivety, it will perhaps never end.

We have no memory of the distant past, nor the recent past, nor even of the events of the present time. If we had, we would also have the antibodies, capable of exterminating the vultures that circle around the coveted prey, that is, us and our beautiful things. If every now and then we remembered, without going too far back in time, that the owners of our mines had the surnames Brander, Hotzendorf, Mandel, Bosen d'Hildescheim; that the holm oaks in our forests were sawn down to make sleepers for the mainland's railways, not for the island ones; that the Sardinian banking system, which took more than a century to build, was dismantled in a flash, so that part of the local savings feed the mainland's economic systems. If we had had memory, we would have learned from our mistakes and saved ourselves a lot of trouble. But we didn't. We are like a child who faces a complicated world for the first time, forced to pay the price that each new experience entails. We are a community prey to packs of wolves that rule our home, favored by national and international political logics at the service of economic interests that have names and surnames and decision-making centers outside Sardinia. And by local political logics and interests, for our historical inability to unite to defend the inestimable assets we possess.

The pack takes advantage of our weaknesses and even allows itself to make fun of us, convinced that everything passes, that even the worst atrocities will be digested and assimilated by a population accustomed to abuse.

Our history, even the most recent one, proves them right.

Disguised as gentlemen, they buy lands, approval, favors.

They carry out their predatory job by virtue of mocking and violent rules, when they impose the expropriation of privately owned land, under the cover of the declared public interest “kindly” guaranteed, to be handed over to private speculators to enrich themselves.

There is no substantial difference between the feudal system, which endured here for four centuries, and the current system of landscape exploitation in progress.

In the first, the sennores - barons, counts, marquises, etc. - were owners of lands, herds, tools and even holders of the execrable ius primae noctis , humiliation and mortification of wives and husbands - they lived, in their beautiful frescoed houses, on the income guaranteed by the exploitation of farmers and shepherds, procured for them by the local podatari delegated to manage and collect it.

In the second system, the current one, the same thing happens.

The modern sennores arrive here, exploit and destroy our collective identity assets and leave again, towards their beautiful homes, sure that the taximeter of state incentives will run for decades to guarantee them conspicuous returns. The regional budget will be burdened, as already happened with the mines, by the disposal of the rubbish they will have left us.

And who are the new local podatari ? They are those who, knowingly or not, favor the pack in the authorization procedures, each of which means deformation and decay of the landscape and environment, archaeological, monumental and cultural; it means compromising the tourist potential, a growing source of income also for ancient towns and villages in the interior, whose countryside, hills and mountains have become prey to be torn apart.

Of these new podatari , about whom there would be much to say, the news and history will tell in depth their deeds.

They say that this is the market. That this is capitalism. No, it is neither one nor the other. It is called appropriation of someone else's property, to be kind. Let us take the example of a company with a capital of 10 thousand euros, which, having obtained the authorization titles, was shortly resold, without hitting a nail, for a good 30 million! Let's think about it: a piece of paper that authorizes the devastation of the landscape guarantees a rate of return on the small capital invested equal to 3,000%.

It is not true and healthy capitalism that those people practice here. It is, instead, predatory colonial capitalism, which should be sanctioned not only by moral law, but also by criminal law.

But, there is a but .

The proposed Popular Initiative Law Pratobello '24 seems to have awakened dormant consciences. The consistent influx to the designated places to sign it demonstrates this and gives hope for the growing awareness of the people, eager to participate and influence decisions that concern their collective assets and their future.

The credit goes to the courageous mayors, to the numerous committees that have sprung up, to the city councilors, secretaries and municipal staff, all architects of the expected result.

The message that emerges from the heartfelt popular participation is that landscape, nuraghi, churches, identity monuments and so on cannot be deformed or devastated. The request that comes from the Sardinian Community is that the institutions responsible for the good of Sardinia urgently adopt the Pratobello'24 bill proposal, thus consolidating the constraints already mapped by the Region itself, as also indicated in the document of the Committee for Insularity in the Constitution published here a few days ago. The regional institution already has, for having commissioned some time ago from the Sardinian Universities the map of the unsuitable areas - presumably also paid for, without the need to repeat time-wasting tasks - corresponding to 98.8% of the regional territory. The constraints reported and already binding for Sardinian residents must be transformed into prohibitions with the proposed urban planning law, also valid for non-Sardinians, by virtue of the exclusive statutory competence of constitutional rank (art.3, letter f), the only effective remedy, given the current emergency, to stop the devastation.

It would allow dealing with the State on the remaining 1.2% of the territory from a position of non-genuine weakness, demanding that the energy transition in Sardinia develops in the variety of renewable energy sources, as established by the Draghi Decree itself in Article 2, paragraph 1, letter a), which defines what is meant by renewable energy and which is reported here in full: "energy from renewable sources" or "renewable energy": energy from non-fossil renewable sources, namely wind, solar, thermal and photovoltaic energy, and geothermal energy, ambient energy, tidal energy, wave motion and other forms of marine energy, hydraulic energy, biomass, landfill gas, residual gas from purification processes and biogas".

And in art. 2, paragraph 1, letter u): “forest regeneration”, reconstitution by natural or artificial means of a forest area following the removal of the previous forest population by felling or by natural causes, including fires or storms”.

The decree also talks about hydrogen, a recurring proposal for a medium-term solution in this newspaper.

We are not condemned to host wind and photovoltaic, says the decree. We are not obliged to indulge the greed of those who find it easier, more practical and faster to devastate our territory. It is not that we lack wave motion and dams, for example, or forests to reconstitute. The same incentives can be allocated to alternative renewable sources, less invasive and harmful for Sardinia, but limited to the remaining 1.2% of our Territory, given the sacredness of the 98.8% which, for wind turbines on land and at sea and photovoltaic in the areas already mapped as unsuitable, must remain untouchable.

We will continue along this line until everything that can still be saved of this Territory has been saved.