GLR January-February 2023

appear on the cover of American Vogue . He wore a Gucci lace trimmed ball gown and tailored tuxedo jacket. Anew generation of queer artists is challenging homophobia and misogyny in film, television, and music, including hip-hop and rap (Figure 4). Most prominent is openly queer Lil Nas X, who wore an en semble designed by Donatella Versace at the Met Gala 2021, which consisted of a dramatic cape, gold-plated armor, and a crystal-beaded bodysuit. Nas is well aware of the homoerotic possibilities in the song “Jailhouse Rock,” which includes the lyrics “You’re the cutest jailbird I ever did see./ I sure would be delighted with your company./ Come on and do the Jailhouse

Rock with me.” Elvis performed the song in the film of the same name with gyrating pole dancing; and Freddy Mercury per formed it strutting shirtless and sweaty. Nas’ prison-themed ver sion in his music video “Industry Baby” is overtly sexual, with inmates dancing naked in a communal shower. Since the late 20th century, representations of gender have been challenged by feminists and transgender and LGBT ac tivists in resistance to hegemonic, immutable constructions. The reformulation of gender has dominated academic, social, and political discourse with genderqueer people in the vanguard. The world of fashion, too, can be subversive and transgressive.

How Italy’s Anti-Mask Law Was Weaponized HISTORY MEMO

A MANDA M ADIGAN I N 1967, Nicola De Bartolo appeared be fore Italy’s Supreme Court of Cassation. She was appealing a conviction for “wearing a mask in a public place.” Unbe knownst to De Bartolo, her case would mark a watershed moment in Italian legal history. It would be cited frequently to jus tify the repression, surveillance, incarcera tion, and even deportation of queer people in Italy throughout the 1960s and ’70s. Something was strange about De Bar tolo’s conviction for “wearing a mask in a public place.” De Bartolo was not wearing a mask at the time of the arrest. Instead, she was dressed in a blouse, “a skirt, nylon tights, women’s shoes, long hair, make-up, painted nails” and carried a “woman’s purse”—but no mask. The lower court found De Bartolo guilty of mascheramento , or “mask-wearing,” because her material dress obscured her “natural” biological sex. Because De Bartolo was biologically male, the Court found, her typically “feminine” dress made it impossible to recognize “him.” For the lower court, this alleged ob fuscation amounted to a criminal act. The Supreme Court of Cassation affirmed. Why were Italians prohibited from wear ing masks? And why was De Bartolo’s gen der expression conflated with wearing one? The answer lies in a little-known Fascist law that hadn’t been enforced for decades: Article 85. During Italy’s Fascist period, Mussolini’s legal regime aimed to blur the lines between the public and the private, regulating indi vidual expression, and justifying the state’s intrusion into the private sphere by citing public safety and morality. El Duce ’s Minis ter of Justice, Alfredo Rocco, revised Italy’s penal code to make it manifestly more au thoritarian. Article 85 was found in a selec tion of articles regulating stage performance: “Appearing masked in public is prohibited. The offender may be arrested

and will be fined between 100 and 1000 lire . The use of masks in theatres and other areas open to the public is prohibited. ... Vi olators and people who do not remove the mask upon the request of law enforcement officers may be arrested and punished.” When Nicola De Bartolo appeared be fore the Supreme Court of Cassation, they argued that mascheramento laws should be read literally as prohibitions against wear ing face coverings in public. The Court dis agreed with this interpretation, broadly reading the article as a protection against those who obscure their identity to engage in criminal activity and elude law enforce ment. Because De Bartolo was dressed “as a woman,” the Court found, they were not readily recognizable and therefore a threat to public safety. The Court’s reasoning grew out of the expansion of the definition of a “mask” over time. Initially, maschera mento laws did aim to regulate wearing physical masks in public, and its roots reach as far back as the early Middle Ages, from the famously mask-centered tradition of Carnival. Carnival was one of the few times of year that medieval Italians were permitted to wear masks. It was a break from the estab lished social order. Gambling, violence, sexual transgression, and blasphemy were ubiquitous during the festival. Furthermore, masked subjects were considered dangerous because they were unidentifiable and could commit these criminal acts, among others, with impunity. Although masks were per mitted during certain hours of Carnival, leg islative decrees prohibiting mask-wearing outside of festival times proliferated. Viola tors may have been fined or undergone cor poral punishment. During the Fascist period, the definition of a “mask” was expanded. After a group of parading masked people were prosecuted under Article 85, the Supreme Court of Cas sation found that “any alteration of the face that makes a person more or less unrecog

nizable to police agents, even if not imped ing the ability of relatives or acquaintances to recognize him, contradicts the substance of Article 85. ... Therefore, the use of make up on one’s face ... falls within the bounds of this prohibition.” This reasoning laid the groundwork for the punishment of queer people in the postwar period. As the Sexual Revolution took off in Italy in the late 1960s and homosexuality became more visible, the government in creased its efforts to regulate public moral ity and decency, creating a new police division dedicated to policing the bound aries of acceptable expression and behavior. Arrests under Article 85 followed. Police and politicians continued to cite the bland justification that Article 85 was intended to prevent masked individuals from getting away with crime. But as queer people began to gather more frequently and in greater numbers, the police raided their community spaces and nightclubs, seizing makeup, wigs, and clothing. There were many others like Nicola De Bartolo. Queer people de scribed spending nights in jail, being de ported out of big cities, facing curfews, and surviving police brutality for being queer and trans. Nevertheless, they persisted. Queer Ital ians founded community advocacy organi zations, staging protests and crafting networks of support and care. Leading queer figures wrote prolifically. One such figure, Mario Mieli, argued that the true mask was that of heterosexuality. “From our vantage point,” he wrote, “it is ‘normal’ people who are the true transvestites,” hid ing their true, “marvelous” human nature behind “standard outfits.” Italy’s Article 85 has never been re pealed, so it is technically still in force despite many attempts to abrogate the law in its entirety. Amanda Madigan is a third-year student at Harvard Law School.

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