Hitler and Mussolini's Wine Production Halted (It's About Time)
Scatti di gusto and Gusto discussed the matter, contacting Andrea Lunardelli, of the Friulian winery that, at the initiative of his father Alessandro, has been selling wines dedicated to the Führer and the Duce since 1995.
We won't tear our hair out, nor will wine lovers miss these bottles. But it's a little funny, and a little angry, to hear Lunardelli's words, his reasons, and his explanations. He says his eighty-year-old father agrees with his decision and "can't take it anymore." Of what? Controversy: "Recently, he even received death threats from Russians who were promoting our bottles as a sign of the Nazi presence in Italy. We're not Nazis, and ours has never been an apology for fascism, so much so that we've won three lawsuits."
All right, but meanwhile, Austrian doctor Dagmar Millesi said she saw her fellow Austrians travel as far as Jesolo to buy the bottles. The German Jewish Forum against Anti-Semitism has taken a strong stance against it. The American edition of Vice also wrote about it.
On the website—where Amaro del Duce still appears on the homepage—it's clearly stated: "This is an exclusively commercial site. We reject any kind of political propaganda." Of course, the line of "historic" bottles also includes Franco and Stalin, Marx, Princess Sissi, and Napoleon. But, let's face it, who has ever seen a bottle featuring Princess Sissi? Those featuring Mussolini and Hitler, on the other hand, have always been available. For example, at a wine shop in Rome's Esquiline district, but also elsewhere. Lunardelli's justification is laughable and infuriating: "Ours were only historical bottles, not commemorative ones."
Among the latest additions were (and still are on the website) “Il Camerata” and the “Liquore alla Rosa X Mas”.
Of course, no one thinks Lunardelli is a Nazi. So what? Lunardelli is worse than a Nazi: he's someone who for years has ambiguously exploited Italians' nostalgia for Fascism and Nazism, profiting from it. It's the cynicism of capitalism, which doesn't care about ethics or politics, and makes money by exploiting bad feelings. But, of course, this isn't the end of the story. It won't be long, you'll see, before some other nostalgic or simply greedy producer jumps on the vacated business.