Youth

I don`t know if you come from Italy ..if you are really Italian or something...but I really don`t like what you said in your pages! Many Italians having a job live still with their parents just because they want to!Because we are still able to feel something for parents! And Italy,anyway,is not jus Roma or Venezia or Firenze or Vicenza!!! I come from the south of Italy,which is beautiful,people are very warm and you can have very much fun! But of course people who have never been there,just listen to the news on TV and to the CHAT ....the South is not just MAFIA or CRIME!!! So....where are the pictures about Southern Italy???????????????????????????????????????????

I'm a photographer from Italy and I agree on what you said about Italians... people still live with their parents over 30 not till 30! We are really spoiled, and unorganized too, but we are artists! Italy's got the 40% of the art in the world. By the way, your pictures are really good. ciao Marco

Actually, I've lived in two countries overseas as a former military brat - Italy, and Germany. The fact is, Europeans in general have always lived with the culture of families staying together under one roof and sharing all. Our American culture has not always been so, and we have to take a look at our own youths of today and see how spoiled we are. Teenagers with their own cars, cell phones, still living at home...sound familiar? Not only that, but more and more American families are staying together out of necessity in today's high cost of living market and divorced single parents needing assistance from home. So, things are not so much different, eh?

I have moved to the States a few years ago, and when I was in Italy I was living with my mother. Why? Because the costs of living are high,there are not so many homes to rent... and only "rich Americans" can afford certain rates in Venice!! But also because I loved her, respected her and my family values are true. I didn't have a cellular phone, but kids here are not better!!! At least we stand for our family and we care for them! Your picture are greats just this comment is really out of place!!!!!!! Tatiana Shafer

I'm a 37-year-old Italian, who still lives with his mother . . . I'm against generalizing and I cannot answer for the whole "Italian Youth", but I have to say that my choice wasn't totally free from economic concerns. I was maintained at the University from my parents, but then I became their only source of income, so I'm more or less paying my debt. It's uncommon in Italy to work and study at the same time and there is hardly a "college" life. Mostly, are the young people from South or from small Provinces, who come to big cities and Universities and are then obliged to have a life of their own, completely separeted from their parents. I disagree with the vehemence of other readers' comments, and I think that the photos taken are beautiful (partly "naof", but all honest). Marco

It's a good fact that you haven't written something about, Philip. Obviously everyone can have some "impressions" during his trips around the world, and some of them can turn out true too. But it's too easy to generalize like ...we all sing and eat pizza...you all go to the analist eating hamburgers... and so on... :-) I really think that we are all different for some reasons, but the "easy way" you see in the young Italians arise from the "americanization" that in all Europe is growning.... it's not in our culture... or, sadly, better to say : in our old culture...

Anyway, this www-site is really well made with very good photos. regards Alberto

Your pictures are absolutely beautiful! I can't wait to visit Italy. The comments are very strong towards your statement, seems like you really generalized about the country. Perhaps you should walk in there shoes before you speak.

Thank you, Denise Abrucci

WOW !!! Finally somenthing interesting, deep and illuminating about italian youth! Thanks for your beautiful pictures and please accept a little suggestion... next time you want to come vist Italy think about giving away the money for the trip to help someone less fortunate... believe me you don't need to see Italy again, you already understood everything about this little country!!!! Luca Silvestri

The Picture

I' m from Rome and I simply love the one with two guys in "Campo de' Fiori" I found it moving myself, thanks Phil !

The Comment

I simply love my people as I hate them:
so many times I found myself talking bad about Italians, trying to exorcize all the things that I don't like, of people I leave with everyday. But as I recognize all this little social patterns inside this huge mass, I can't not recognize the wanderfull complexity of our culture. Don't bother about the generic view; life is full of microcosmos, this is what I learned in years of mental trips. Read (even you Phil!) "Become Illiterate (i.e., present multiple views)" in Chapter 1 in Philip and Alex's Guide... by Philip Greenspun. That is what I mean.

I loved to look at the pictures and to read all the comments, I think especially because today I feel a bit blue and a bit homesick. What I want to say is that ITALIANS live with their families, yes, longer than in other cultures, yes, but the door is open both ways...I mean you can live with your family (is it there anything more beautiful?), you can leave your family, you can go on your own, you can appreciate both dimensions, you can come back to your family and be always welcomed. Whereas here, in the US, I have found that people perhaps want but mostly HAVE, are EXPECTED to leave their family-home and often it is like they cannot go back, or they are loosers, or they have to pay rent ...I think that is pretty sad and sick. But I love both countries, I love the universe and sometimes I hate it.

ciao

chiara

There was an interesting piece on Mammoni--the italian word for mammas boy--on Sixty Minutes tonight, March 3, 2001. Goes into detail as to why Italians live with their parents longer than in our culture.

I see here there is something about italians living with parents for a long time. I moved out from my parent's house 5 times (one to go abroad) and get back 4.I always suffered the difficulty to get a decent life in Milan being a single. But I never stopped to find a way to get my house in a nice place. However, country's habits are linked to the main values of the people and the average income (including spending priorities). I love to live as a single here more than I liked it in Geneva where I had more than twice the income I get here. I had a couple of time the opportunity to move to California, to get an even better income. But I was too scared about being alone in that country. And still I am (at 39 years old).

I am 27 year old and I still live with my parents in Monza, a not so small town next to Milan, a reach part of my country. My student's career finished last year perfect regularly and the best points possibile. This means I entered the world of working from less than a year. How can you think I can rent a home for a single in Milan and live in autonomy? It's simply impossible! By the way, I live bad in my parents' house so I hope exit in a year or so. When I will be 28. I had no alternatives, save working during study, but in that case it would be very difficult to finish my studies in 5 years, the minimum possible in communication science. Youth life is very different in Italy compared to Usa. Ciao

--Goberiko

I'm a bit mystified by all the emotional comments to the text on this page. Phil has stated nothing more than his intent to comment on several topics related to Italian youth - but he hasn't done it yet! Many of the respondants are making wild assumptions about what Phil's comments will be when and if they are ever written. Given the quality of his other writings I would encourage everyone to smoke a bowl and wait for something substantive to react to and knock off injecting non-existent meaning into someone's words.

Hello There!! Pics are really great!! Yes it's well known that Italians live with their parents till 30 years old or older..like the Italian men loves their mothers more trhan everything in this world. This is not a negative comment contrary this is one of the reasons why I adore Italian culture and people... It's similar in here(turkey) too. My elder brother is 28 years old he still live with us and I'll live with him and her wife when they get married..This is not something interesting. Of course it's for Americans or other nations esp. north Europe. And we see the results of life that you live in these countries. The members of the same family who don't talk each other to much,estranged each other like they're strangers, very surfacial conservations the people who doesn't communicate each other at all. And it's very clear that the situation of the youth of these countries. Estranged,individual,and hit the buttom in a world consist of drugs... They're looking for love in drugs.. If this is what you advise us thanks but we can't accept. Maybe the northern country people and scientists should think about that before their youth become lost more than this. But I think they're content of that otherwise how they could exploit the whole world with a generation who are aware of the things that happens every day...???????

Philip just about to write opinion etc. He has not written it yet,thus, the point-to-be has not been elaborated yet and i think we shouldn't suddenly blame or say 'i hate what you say or whatever'. If you are Italians who know better, have your words here rationally not emotionally. Thanks

I read the Phil's opinion in a particular moment of my life. I started working just one month ago, and I'm 27. I studied environmental engineering,and now I work exactly in the centre of Milan, for Milan municipality. After taking the degree, I had to give 10 months of my life to the State: civil service, which substitutes military service, but it's still compulsory. In Italy we finish high school at 19, and is almost impossible to end University in the regular time (5 years for engineering). It took me almost 7 years, which is exactly the average. One of my best friends - which is exactly a genius, not joking - completed his studies (electronical engineering) in 6 years. I'm not a genius, but I'm not a stupid (94/100 my degree vote).

I hope these infos would help you to understand why youth in italy live with parents till 27, 28...or more, exspecially if you study at university. When you study you don't have (usually) time enough to work, so when you finish you have a degree but no money, and maybe you live near Milan, which is - apart from Venice - the most expensive city of Italy. Now I can't go and live on my own, I don't have money enough.

But there is another fact: my parents. When I was younger I dreamt of go and living on my own,as a moment of freedom, just to "escape" from my parents. But now I realise that they're getting old, and they need me. And I love them, they gave me all I needed. So , every time I think about going away, I also think to my parents, about te fact that probably I've spent with them the greatest part of the time we had to spent. And I wonder if, maybe, I can wait a little more before leaving them. They deserve it.

Ciao, ste