Learn Italian: Dovete firmare la petizione, visto che il problema è grave. - You must sign the petition, seeing that the problem is serious.

Dovete firmare la petizione, visto che il problema è grave.

You must sign the petition, seeing that the problem is serious.

Breakdown of Dovete firmare la petizione, visto che il problema è grave.

her/it (direct object)

Questions & Answers about Dovete firmare la petizione, visto che il problema è grave.

How does visto che work here, and could I use perché or dato che instead?

You could use perché (because) or dato che (given that) here with basically the same meaning. However, visto che and dato che are much more flexible than perché. You can move a visto che clause to the very start of the sentence: Visto che il problema è grave, dovete firmare la petizione. You generally cannot do that with perché.

Is il problema masculine or feminine? The -a ending is confusing.

It is masculine, which is why it takes the article il. Many Italian words ending in -ma that come from Greek (like il problema, il sistema, and il programma) are masculine exceptions to the general rule that words ending in -a are feminine.

Why does firmare stay in its infinitive (dictionary) form here?

It follows dovete (you all must), which is a modal or helper verb. When a modal verb is conjugated to show who is doing the action, the second verb expressing the main action always stays in the infinitive.

Would the adjective grave change if the noun were plural?