BigMama all'ONU contro il body shaming: il diario fotografico del viaggio e il testo integrale del discorso

Marianna Mammone è nata a San Michele di Serino, in provincia di Avellino, un Comune che su Wikipedia ha circa 2400 persone. Ci starebbero tutti, due volte, sulle sedie dell’Assemblea Generale delle Nazioni Unite, nel celebre Palazzo di Vetro a New York. Qui, la scorsa settimana, l'artista che oggi tutti conosciamo come BigMama ha parlato davanti a studenti di tutto il mondo, in un discorso molto bello ed emozionante dedicato ai temi del body shaming e del bullismo, da sempre al centro del suo messaggio artistico (assieme alla questione dei diritti).

Marianna la conosciamo bene, sin dai primi pezzi usciti per Pluggers, il primo EP Next Big Thing e tutto quanto ha fatto in questi ultimi anni fino a Sanremo e La rabbia non ti basta. Qua alcuni momenti da brividi nel suo incontro con Omar Pedrini al DR. MARTENS FEST presented by MI AMI, qua il suo Notturni con Populous. 

Questi giorni newyorkesi sono stati un saliscendi emotivo notevole per Marianna, cui è successa una cosa davvero unica e totalmente impensabile nella vita. La foto che trovate qua sopra rende perfettamente l'idea. Tutte le foto di questa gallery, invece, le ha scattate lei per noi. Qua sotto trovate due testimonianze speciali da un'esperienza irripetibile a New York: il suo fotodiario e il testo integrale portato all'Onu, per come l'ha scritto (quindi in inglese) e letto. 

Believing in your dreams can save you.
It's the phrase from my song “La rabbia non ti basta” that I feel most connected to.

All my life I was made believe I wasn't enough, in fact, they made me believe I was completely wrong. My physique made people think of me as “not good enough”, even before they got to know me. 

A fat person in the imagination of others is a sluggish, lazy, inactive, unintelligent person who makes bad choices and often has no desire to improve. I grew up believing that I wouldn’t amount to anything, that I would never get where I wanted. For a person like me, dreaming was useless. I couldn't have done it anyway, I was just a fat little girl.

But I am much more, and now I am finally aware of it.

I come from a very small town, where few people live with an equally small mentality. It's hard to dream big when the world around you is so small. But I did it. I had to endure years of bullying, both verbal and physical abuse. I was afraid to leave the house, I felt unfitand I felt like the world hated me.

From what I remember, every single day of my childhood and adolescence was filled with words of hate: “Fat girl, go on a diet, you suck”. I tried for years to avoid suffering by staying silent. I lowered my head and pretended nothing was happening, I felt guilty. It was my fault, it was my body's fault that people hated me so much.

My first reaction was to be angry. I started to hate everything. I always answered back badly, I was aggressive, impulsive. I started to confuse love with hate and sweet words with insults. I needed something that could let me vent so I wouldn't explode.

At 13 I wrote my first song, "Charlotte". It's a rap song about suicide and self-harm, with lyrics that are too aggressive for such a young girl. However, I was ashamed of letting anyone listen to those words, so I kept Charlotte all to myself. It stayed in my phone for 3 years. A friend of mine found it one day and started making everyone listen to it. One day, in August 2016, a girl came to me crying. I remember perfectly what she said: “I feel like finally someone understands me, finally someone is helping me". I realised that someone cared about my words and that I could help others as well as myself. 

The next day, September 1st 2016, "Charlotte" was on YouTube; BigMamawas finally born.

From that moment something started to change. My social anxiety turned into something different. The fear I had of people's gazes transformed into the awareness that those same people were looking at me because they recognised “BigMama”. Marianna's lost gaze transformed into BigMama's strong gaze. BigMamawas a shield and a weapon.

Believing in your dreams can save you.

When I was 18 I changed city, I went to Milan. A university scholarship allowed me to live in Italy’s most expensive city,  even though I came from a very poor family. Milan changed me a lot, I was different, more aware of myself, my dream was even stronger, I wore tighter clothes, I felt more beautiful than ever, but I was still too afraid of people. 

I still put others first and myself second. 

I still had that problem of thinking of myself as “less than others”. 

Obviously this led to many people taking advantage of me. In Milan I met my first producers, shot my first videos, made my first collaborations and made my first contact with the music world. But just as I was about to sign my first real record deal, when I was feelingmore powerful than ever, I ended up going back in the dark. 

It was August 13th 2020 when I returned to my parents' house in southern Italy for the summer holidays. I wasn't feeling well and therefore decided to get a checkup. That August 13th all the results arrived, I had blood cancer, Hodgkin's lymphoma. 

I had 12 chemio treatments in my 20s. That was definitely the darkest period of my life, I thought for months "but why me?", “why does the world still hate me so much?”, “i'm only 20”. During that period the only thing that was really important to me was to recover so I could return to Milan to make music. Music really saved me. I recovered, as luckily my body immediately responded very well to the treatment.

That period finally taught me that I deserve first place. That if I don't love myself no one will do it for me. That if I don't save myself no one will do it for me. Once I healed I reevaluated myself, I understood that I was a strong woman.

I returned to Milan and changed friends because I had understood that the old ones took advantage of my weaknesses. I found love, real love, a wonderful girlfriend. I have to have the best, I will not settle for anything less. I have found independence, I have been paying for my house alone for months now. I write songs to feel better and help others too. I recorded 2 albums, I did 2 summer tours. I found people who really love me and I work with a  beautiful team of people that appreciate me for who I am. I now know that I am beautiful, intelligent, strong. I know I deserve everything I have. I understand that I’m worth it.

Because, believing in your dreams can save you.

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L'articolo BigMama all'ONU contro il body shaming: il diario fotografico del viaggio e il testo integrale del discorso di BigMama è apparso su Rockit.it il 2024-02-26 15:45:00