This is the initial "Sempre Avanti" monthly column that Sons of Italy, written by Dona DeSanctis, offered free to all publications.  An Excellent Idea!

In regard to CARRES (Coalition Against Racial, Religious and Ethnic Stereotyping), we can only hope that this is only the first of a series of strategic campaigns.
It was impressive to see the Major Italian American Organizations coalesce.

Thanks to the little but mighty Italic Institute that first recognized the depravity of the threat, aroused the community, and fearlessly led the charge until help arrived.

On another topic, I can not begin to tell you how disappointed I am, but NOT suprised that in this campaign CARRES was snubbed by the NAACP, the Anti-Defamation League, the Hispanic La Raza and other civil rights groups,
who Not only refused to join CARRES, BUT did Not even criticize Shark Tale!!

I say Not Suprised, because I served on the Los Angeles City Human Relations Commission for 7 years, and I saw such "unbridled self interest", and such "indifference" to others, especially those who are not "privileged" minorities.

The Commission's concern about bigotry was so "selective" and hypocritical, that I finally gave up hope of persuading them to be more open to opposing ALL bigotry, even though for those many years I had been an effective advocate for THEIR concerns, that I was elected to the Presidency of the Commission my last 2 years!!

Those who are "self absorbed" are making me realize that I must be less receptive to the Complaints of those Organizations who can ONLY feel their own wounds, and I must FIRST be more concerned about those assaults on MY Heritage and Ancestry.

If I am not for myself, Who will be for me? If not now, When?

As expected, Steven Spielberg’s children mafia movie, Shark Tale opened with great
fanfare nationwide on more than 4,000 screens October 1, 2004, (RAA: ironically and sacrilegiously) the first day of Italian American heritage month.

For the 10 months prior to that premiere, Italian Americans coast to coast had been
fighting this movie that passes the stereotype of Italian Americans as gangsters to children around the world.

THE CARRES ALLIANCE:

Most of these efforts were coordinated through the Coalition Against Racial, Religious and Ethnic Stereotyping (CARRES), an alliance of more than 30 organizations, including Italian American groups, the Arab American Institute, the Polish American Congress and the esteemed civil rights organization, the National Conference for Community and Justice.

CARRES was formed in January 2004 by the three leading national Italian American
organizations-- the Sons of Italy Commission for Social Justice, the National Italian American Foundation and Unico National together with the New York-based Columbus Citizens Foundation and the Italic Institute of America. These founding members also pooled their resources to hire a large public relations firm to help them in the fight.

THE CARRES CAMPAIGNS:

>From January to October, CARRES and its members devoted enormous time and energy to Shark Tale. They sent out press releases protesting the film and met with political leaders to express their concerns about Shark Tale’s influence on children. They organized letter-writing campaigns to Spielberg and DreamWorks, asking them to change the names of the gangsters.

CARRES and its members also lobbied the Motion Picture Association of America
(MPAA) to give Shark Tale a PG-13 or R rating. It launched a boycott of products like Burger King and Coca-Cola that were helping to promote the film and protested the honorary citizenship that Italy was planning to give Shark Tale star Robert DeNiro during the movie’s premiere in Venice last September.

Meantime, DreamWorks, one of Hollywood’s most powerful studios, spent $75 million to make this movie and another $145 million to market it. Clearly this was a David and Goliath struggle. So who won?

Let’s start with what CARRES did Not do.

It did not stop Shark Tale in its tracks. It did not get the names of the gangsters changed. It did not convince the MPAA to give Shark Tale an “R” or even a “PG-13” rating. It did not gain the support of political leaders like Mario Cuomo or Rudy Giuliani or of the NAACP, the Jewish Anti-Defamation League, the Hispanic La Raza and other civil rights groups, who refused to join CARRES or even criticize Shark Tale.

So what did CARRES accomplish?

THE CARRES SCOREBOARD:

First, CARRES sent a very powerful message to the media, to the MPAA, to our political leaders, to corporate America and most of all, to Hollywood that Shark Tale crossed the line by passing mafia stereotypes to children too young to distinguish fact from fiction.

CARRES put DreamWorks’ feet to the fire. In interview after interview, this megastudio was forced to defend Shark Tale and its stereotypes—often with weak arguments.“They’re fish,” DreamWorks spokesman Andy Spahn told one reporter. “They don’t speak Italian.”

But CARRES relentlessly countered that the gangster characters all had Italian last names and were voiced by some of the most famous “Mafia” actors in the business, including DeNiro along with Vincent Pastore and Michael Imperioli from The Sopranos and GoodFellas director Martin Scorsese.

THE MPAA:

As a result of Shark Tale, CARRES established contacts with the MPAA, the movie
industry’s powerful trade association. While declining to give Shark Tale the rating CARRES argued it deserved, the MPAA is now considering adding ethnic stereotyping to racial and religious stereotyping as part of its rating criteria.

CARRES will continue to lobby for this addition to the MPAA rating system. It is
important because a film’s MPAA rating can affect its box office gross and, as everyone knows, Hollywood is guided more by the dollar sign than by artistic merit in choosing which films to produce.

THE MEDIA:

The CARRES campaign reached the desks of many reporters here and abroad.
Consequently, when the film opened, a number of movie critics commented on the movie’s stereotyping of Italian Americans, including reviewers from The Washington Post, the Village Voice, the Boston Globe and the Associated Press news agency.

Significantly, such observations were a first. The stereotype of the Mafia gangster is so much a part of the entertainment landscape that reviewers invariably fail even to notice how it maligns an estimated 16 million Italian Americans. With Shark Tale, CARRES succeeded in sensitizing movie critics to this issue.

DE NIRO CITIZENSHIP:

The honorary Italian citizenship for Robert De Niro appears to be on indefinite hold,
thanks to the protests the Sons of Italy and other CARRES members made directly to Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

Equally important is the fact that more than 100 newspapers in the U.S., Europe and even Asia reported that Italian Americans were criticizing Robert De Niro for his role in Shark Tale, bringing the issue of Italian American stereotyping before an international audience for the first time.

The criticism reached De Niro who was forced publicly to defend the mafia movie roles he has chosen over the course of his long career. Adding insult to injury, the NIAF, which had honored De Niro in 2002, published a letter it sent him expressing its “extreme disappointment and feelings of betrayal” over his role in this film.

AN HISTORIC ALLIANCE:

But the most important achievement of CARRES and its struggle with Shark Tale is the fact that this is an historic alliance. For the first time in our history, the major national Italian American organizations with support from smaller state and community groups, banded together to fight the issue of stereotyping.

CARRES plans to remain active and is prepared to challenge any unfavorable portrayal of Italian Americans by the U.S. entertainment, advertising and news industries. We have just begun to fight!

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Dona De Sanctis is deputy executive director of the Order Sons of Italy in America, the oldest and largest national organization in the United States for men and women of Italian heritage... During the CARRES campaigns, she was its media spokesperson.

For more information about CARRES or to join the Sons of Italy, see www.osia.org
or call 202/547- 2900 in Washington, D.C.

Washington - January 12, 2005 - A free monthly column on the most pressing anti-defamation issues concerning Italian Americans has been launched by the Order Sons of Italy in America (OSIA), the nation's oldest and largest organization for men and women of Italian heritage.

The column, Sempre Avanti, will be written by OSIA's deputy executive director, Dona De Sanctis, who also coordinates the activities of the Commission for Social Justice (CSJ), OSIA's anti-defamation arm.

The CSJ fights the stereotyping of Italian Americans by the U.S. entertainment, advertising, and media industries. It also conducts research on the achievements and contributions of Italian Americans to the United States.

"The purpose of this column is to help concerned Italian Americans become better informed about the most important issues facing our community and encourage them to take action," says Joseph Sciame, OSIA national president.

"The column will offer facts, statistics and other evidence about the damage that stereotyping does, especially to children," says Albert DeNapoli, CSJ national president. "But it also will highlight the history and achievements of Italian Americans."

OSIA offers the column at no charge to all interested newspapers and newsletters. It will be emailed to editors at the beginning of each month.

Kylie Cafiero, Communications Manager
email: kcafiero@osia.org , voice: 202/547-2900