#we don’t get another one in the states for another 20 years 😔 and then after that not till 2078

[leefi]

tearing my hair out trying to trip plan for the total solar eclipse. The totality passes through southern Illinois (my state) so I don’t know if it’s worth paying an arm and a leg to get down to Texas if potential cloud coverage isn’t gonna be much clearer there. RAGGHHH

[the-ghost-king]

people calling nico italian instead of venetian is lowkey richard’s fault bc that man speaks italian and is clearly interested in italy,,, and just chose to ignore the differences between regions dialects & culture when he wrote about the di angelos 😔😔

Yeah, I know it’s Rick’s fault- classic “American tourist goes to Venice and learns nothing about the culture while also failing to realize the locals don’t want him there” lmao- this problem with “Oh Venice is Italian!” isn’t just a Rick problem but a problem anyone who doesn’t interact with Venetian locals (Hi) or has a weird interest in Italian regional history (also hi) also has, and it’s so pervasive throughout so many cultures. I can’t blame one man for an issue that permeates almost every fucking article you read about Venice, but oof.

I need to make a long post on this but I haven't yet tbh, I want to, but in general I am just rather sick of seeing Nico is Italian... He is Venetian... Venetian =/= Italian...

Just because a country owns a plot of land, doesn’t mean the people there want to be a part of that country. It’s hard to find anything written by Venetians about Venice, or Venetians talking about Venice, because the Italian government doesn’t want people to know that one of their biggest tourist cities, hates tourists. 

Venice, as a lived-in city, is dying. A population which peaked at 164,000 in 1931 is now hovering at around 60,000. Since about 20 million tourists pour in each year - 55,000 a day - it's a safe bet that most days there are now more tourists than locals in Venice. "The number of locals has dropped 600 since we started counting last March and we are set to go under the psychological 60,000 barrier in May," said Secchi, who heads a residents' group, Venessia.com, which is planning a procession to mark the occasion. "We will hold the funeral of Venice and take a coffin down to the town hall," he said.... "Tourists were welcome, but the point was to show we feel like we are living on a reserve," said Secchi. Leaflets in five languages said: "Our cultural identity is at risk of dissolving if Venice becomes a theme park - we Venetians will not surrender!" (X)

(Venessia.com, a pro-Venice website, in Venetian)

Over 89% of Venetians want to succeed from Italy (and I’ve seen other sources cite more), Venice has its own individualized culture and language which is being systematically erased by the Italian government, and it has been this way for over a hundred years now (here's about Venetian art erasure, how tourism and the government are ruining housing in Venice)

Italy's mismanagement of Venice has caused most of the original population to leave Venice, to leave the homes and the island their families have lived in for generations, to leave behind their culture because mass tourism mismanagement that the government refuses to fix is destroying not just the Venetian culture, but peoples ability to even live in the city.

The Venetian language is so separate from standard Italian, that two people, one speaking each language, could not understand one another- yet the Italian government refuses to recognize Venetian as a language

“It’s the language spoken in my family, in schools, at work. I am Venetian, Mr. President, my language is that of Venice,” Bricolo said in his dialect before his microphone was switched off because he was breaking a rule that states only Italian may be spoken in parliament. (X)

I think the saddest thing is seeing how happy Venetians were at the way COVID-19 stopped all the tourism, they've been trying for years to get people to recognize Venice as separate from Italy in a desperate attempt to save what is left of their culture.

I can't blame this issue on fandom or even on Rick when it's so massively prevalent in everything, but I guess thanks for letting me rant a bit on the back of your ask? lmao, feels good

Nico is unlikely to consider himself Italian personally to be honest, because although I've presented mostly modern articles and publishings about these issues... They've been going on for hundreds of years slowly building, and around WWII (following the Italian government retaking control of Venice) many citizens often discussed life as better, and didn't consider themselves Italians even back then, but Venetians- always Venetians never Italians.

(I want to specify a little more on using the word hate to describe Venetian locals opinions of tourists, but essentially, they don't hate the tourists themselves and they understand why people want to see Venice. They hate the disrespect and lack of regard for Venetian life that the tourists showcase, in addition to the mismanagement by the Italian government who has little to no idea what happens in Venice, and rarely cares)