Things are getting tense in Catalunya.
The Government has approved a law to organise a referendum on Independence on 1st of October which proclaims Spanish legislation cannot touch it. Spanish government and tribunals have reacted by indicating that anything referendum-related is forbidden and that the law is suspended.
There's more details, but well, the most probable outcome at this point seems a vote happening on 1st of October nevertheless, where "yes" wins.
The Catalan laws were approved with questionable procedures that limited the possibility to debate them....but then again it was done like this because Spain was indicating that even debating such things was illegal, and therefore there were no other options.
In all this mess, several newspapers have started a misinformation and lying war against independence, while several people have made articles or comments where they attacked the referendum.
And in all that, what I have not ever seen are arguments about why we should not vote, or vote "No", that could stand on their own. So I want to comment on some of the arguments said and why they're bullshit....but I also want to point out that there are arguments, valid ones, and it's just mind-boggling that people that I though were smart are not mentioning them....
1-Because it's illegal:
-This one is the first thing that lots of people mention that are against the referendum, and it's really really stupid. For starters, its legality is a matter of interpretation. However, let's say it was clearly and without doubt illegal. So fucking what? As lots of people mentioned, legality is not an indication of morality or ethics. People say that one should respect the law in a democratic country, but I disagree on mindless obeying. First question to ask regarding anything illegal, is to ask why is it illegal. Is it morally or ethically wrong? Is it harmful? Is it plain stupid? If you check this, it's rather evident that some laws make perfect sense. You cannot rob, kill and/or rape because it's ethically terrible. You are not allowed to do drugs because it's a danger for your well-being. Of course there's already shades of gray, and for example maybe rather than forbid drugs for that last one it is better to control and regulate them..this could be debated, and that's why some laws are a must, but others can be debated. Why is a referendum illegal? Because it would leave the integrity of Spain int he hands of Catalan people. And why is this bad? Well, here is where it fails. The only reason this is bad is if you believe in frontiers, in countries, if you feel patriotism for Spain without any other reasons than being Spanish and feel personally insulted by the though of Spain not having some piece of land that was theirs before. I consider patriotism idiotic, since where you are born is a rather random thing to be proud of, it's the same as being proud of having 5 fingers, as if you are personally responsible for them. A referendum is also illegal if you believe people should not decide things, which is antidemocratic as hell. And there's plenty of things that were illegal and should not have been, like women voting. Legality cannot limit ethical causes, and if that's your main reason, what should change is the law.
2-Because it's nationalistic propaganda/patriotism, which as you said it's rather stupid.
-First of all, Spanish nationalism is SO much worse than Catalan one. Second, while there may be some people that really want to be independent because they don't feel Spanish at all and are really really proud of being Catalan, this is also patriotism, which is stupid. However, if you check the general opinion among independentists, the nationalism aspect is not that important compared with the chance of self-governance. Currently, Spain's government and institutions are a cesspit of incompetence and corruption, unable to do much apart of behaving like a corrupt dictator, with the novelty that they do so in group. This is fairly evident for anyone not suffering from brain damage, and that includes a big chunk of the Catalan people, who want to get rid of that and be able to promote a better management and better laws. Lately a lot of progressive laws that could have improved life in Catalunya have been suspended or nullified by creating another law that supersedes them. The problem is that in Spain at the moment we do have a lot of brain-damaged people apparently, and the main parties that are corrupt, dictatorial and useless keep getting votes, so there's no clear solution for Spain. A clean break from that sure would solve the issue for Catalunya.
3-Because in the context of the European Union it makes not sense to put more frontiers, and in general frontiers are stupid.
-Indeed, frontiers are stupid. For example, the Spanish frontiers are not allowing refugees and are also kicking them out back to the sea on the heat of the moment, something that has been declared as illegal by international right. Controlling such frontiers in Catalunya would not be to close the region to the world, but to open it a lot more than what Spain is allowing.
4-Because it's right-wing propaganda and it will become a dictatorship/neo-liberalist hell worse than Spain (so what you say about making progressive laws or opening frontiers won't apply).
-The independence moment is really transversal, and if you check any demonstration or statistic you will see that people of all ideologies are supporting it. What's more, this movement has forced the traditional right-wing party of Catalunya (which disgusts me) to move toward the centre and become much more progressive (but I don't trust them at all still and I know they have corruption, but not as bad as the Spanish one). Also, the parties that have always been more supportive of a referendum and independence have always been more on the left side of the spectrum.
5-Because it's left-wing propaganda and it will become a lawless/communist hell like Venezuela
-Again, the movement is transversal and you can see that a lot of ideologies are involved. It is true the left has more supporters in Catalunya and inside the independentist movement, but the left parties involved have been very calm and rational in the last years while ruling, promoting more social justice and never advocating for pure anarchy, trying to follow a model more north-European if anything.
6-Because the law of the referendum and its conditions have not been agreed with Spain.
-This one is the most used by people more in the middle/undecided, or against the referendum as it is but not against the idea of voting/doing something political to solve the issue instead of just illegalizing it. The problem here is that this depends on Spain. Spain has a tradition of being authoritative and is not used to negotiate much. Let's be clear: The left lost the civil war against fascism because there is a lot of fascists tendencies in Spain, a lot of patriotism for the wrong reasons, and there's only one accepted way to be Spanish, and since then things have not improved greatly about this topic. For a big group of people, Catalunya is not Spanish enough, instead of thinking that Catalunya is another interpretation of Spain, as valid as any other. The current government has the support of such people and any negotiations would be considered as weaknesses. That's why in the last years the Spanish Government has never even considered any negotiations, and has just said Catalunya should shut up and behave, basically. The Catalan government has offered to negotiate until the last minute, but Spain has never offered or proposed anything. So, how can this be negotiated if one of the parts negotiate by saying "no, end of discussion"? Some of the people defending this argument say that this is now, but that we should work to change this dynamic, and vote to put into power people more open to negotiations. The reality however is that with the latest election results we are very far from having a big majority of parties open to that. One of the parties currently not ruling that is defending this argument or proposing other solutions ruled for 8 years and did nothing of the sort, so their promises feel pretty much empty. Asking to pact is asking for people to wait maybe 40 years while renovating the parties, to reach an unknown situation where maybe things improve...or maybe they don't. People defending this option are way too optimistic about it, I think, based on previous experiences. However, I can understand to a certain point people defending this.
7-Because independentism excludes and divides people.
-This one I've heard it from several newspapers that I thought were better than this. This argument, similar to the patriotism or frontier argument, assumes or tries to tell that independentism is about Catalunya being isolated and defending "proper Catalans". However, this is easily disproven by the fact that there's a lot of independentist that are immigrants and children of immigrants. This movement has always been inclusive, and you can see that people in Catalunya just love it when newcomers integrate. One of the best things that Catalan government has promoted since Franco's dead is the fact that, to be Catalan, you just need to live and/or work on the region, and this attitude is clear in all the movement. Most of the divisions come from the unionist side's attitude, where statistics show that the emotional component of feeling Spanish is the most common reason to want to avoid independence, and therefore tend to act in more emotional and extreme ways (although lately it is true there has been some extremism on each side)
8-Because Catalunya will be kicked out of EU.
-First of all, as long as people remain Spanish (which is an option available), they will be part of the EU. As for the theoretical new country, you don't need to be in the EU to have some of the benefits of the EU, as Switzerland or Norway show, but also it's unlikely that EU will not manage things to include a rich region that would be in the top tiers of GDP compared with the rest of European countries.
9-Becasue Catalunya will become poorer.
-Of course if Catalunya becomes poorer, EU may not want to accept it. However, the general consensus is that industry and business in Catalunya is strong enough that there are 2 likely outcomes: If Spain negotiates with Catalunya, Catalunya's economy will rapidly grow from the start. If Spain penalises Catalunya, Catalunya's economy will have problems for a short-term period until it regulates the situation and then it can grow at medium-term.
I could list more reasons that I heard these days, but most of those are over-simplifications of the situation or just plain wrong. The only one that might kind of work is number 6, but it ignores reality too much....which brings me to one reason I have not heard yet, but it is actually good, and I'm surprised no one has mentioned loudly yet, that I know.....
10-For solidarity towards the poor Spanish people that will be left with the brain dead, conservative and corrupt Spanish traditional parties.
Now this is a reason I can get behind to defend not separating. Catalunya is a very progressive area compared with the rest of Spain. The current vote estimation for Catalan elections indicates that around 60% of the people would vote a party on the left spectrum. Checking the results of the last Spanish elections, Catalunya gave around 2.100.000 votes to parties from the left-centre. In Spain in total, there were around 11.700.000 votes to parties from left-centre. Almost 18% of the total votes for the left came from Catalunya, while the region represents only 14% of the total votes in Spain. Losing those votes, even if you also lose the votes of the Catalan right, means it's much harder to implement changes on Spain, especially since the party that seems to really want to change things in Spain (they're not perfect but so far they're at least trying) was the most voted party during these same general elections in Catalunya.
Basically, separating from Spain is a bit like abandoning any hopes of changing it. It's admitting that the system is too corrupt, too biased, to change it from inside. It's a bit like admitting defeat. And it's leaving all this great nice Spanish people more at the mercy of a group of bastard.
However, there's an alternative approach to this. Spanish politics are stuck in a bad place, for too many years. Breaking from that would be traumatic yes, and would leave the progressive side weaker in Spain. Nevertheless, maybe that's what is needed to make people in Spain react, and see the old parties for what they really are: A bunch of useless corrupt assholes.
Maybe a shock therapy like this can put some life into this old and outdated system....
The Government has approved a law to organise a referendum on Independence on 1st of October which proclaims Spanish legislation cannot touch it. Spanish government and tribunals have reacted by indicating that anything referendum-related is forbidden and that the law is suspended.
There's more details, but well, the most probable outcome at this point seems a vote happening on 1st of October nevertheless, where "yes" wins.
The Catalan laws were approved with questionable procedures that limited the possibility to debate them....but then again it was done like this because Spain was indicating that even debating such things was illegal, and therefore there were no other options.
In all this mess, several newspapers have started a misinformation and lying war against independence, while several people have made articles or comments where they attacked the referendum.
And in all that, what I have not ever seen are arguments about why we should not vote, or vote "No", that could stand on their own. So I want to comment on some of the arguments said and why they're bullshit....but I also want to point out that there are arguments, valid ones, and it's just mind-boggling that people that I though were smart are not mentioning them....
1-Because it's illegal:
-This one is the first thing that lots of people mention that are against the referendum, and it's really really stupid. For starters, its legality is a matter of interpretation. However, let's say it was clearly and without doubt illegal. So fucking what? As lots of people mentioned, legality is not an indication of morality or ethics. People say that one should respect the law in a democratic country, but I disagree on mindless obeying. First question to ask regarding anything illegal, is to ask why is it illegal. Is it morally or ethically wrong? Is it harmful? Is it plain stupid? If you check this, it's rather evident that some laws make perfect sense. You cannot rob, kill and/or rape because it's ethically terrible. You are not allowed to do drugs because it's a danger for your well-being. Of course there's already shades of gray, and for example maybe rather than forbid drugs for that last one it is better to control and regulate them..this could be debated, and that's why some laws are a must, but others can be debated. Why is a referendum illegal? Because it would leave the integrity of Spain int he hands of Catalan people. And why is this bad? Well, here is where it fails. The only reason this is bad is if you believe in frontiers, in countries, if you feel patriotism for Spain without any other reasons than being Spanish and feel personally insulted by the though of Spain not having some piece of land that was theirs before. I consider patriotism idiotic, since where you are born is a rather random thing to be proud of, it's the same as being proud of having 5 fingers, as if you are personally responsible for them. A referendum is also illegal if you believe people should not decide things, which is antidemocratic as hell. And there's plenty of things that were illegal and should not have been, like women voting. Legality cannot limit ethical causes, and if that's your main reason, what should change is the law.
2-Because it's nationalistic propaganda/patriotism, which as you said it's rather stupid.
-First of all, Spanish nationalism is SO much worse than Catalan one. Second, while there may be some people that really want to be independent because they don't feel Spanish at all and are really really proud of being Catalan, this is also patriotism, which is stupid. However, if you check the general opinion among independentists, the nationalism aspect is not that important compared with the chance of self-governance. Currently, Spain's government and institutions are a cesspit of incompetence and corruption, unable to do much apart of behaving like a corrupt dictator, with the novelty that they do so in group. This is fairly evident for anyone not suffering from brain damage, and that includes a big chunk of the Catalan people, who want to get rid of that and be able to promote a better management and better laws. Lately a lot of progressive laws that could have improved life in Catalunya have been suspended or nullified by creating another law that supersedes them. The problem is that in Spain at the moment we do have a lot of brain-damaged people apparently, and the main parties that are corrupt, dictatorial and useless keep getting votes, so there's no clear solution for Spain. A clean break from that sure would solve the issue for Catalunya.
3-Because in the context of the European Union it makes not sense to put more frontiers, and in general frontiers are stupid.
-Indeed, frontiers are stupid. For example, the Spanish frontiers are not allowing refugees and are also kicking them out back to the sea on the heat of the moment, something that has been declared as illegal by international right. Controlling such frontiers in Catalunya would not be to close the region to the world, but to open it a lot more than what Spain is allowing.
4-Because it's right-wing propaganda and it will become a dictatorship/neo-liberalist hell worse than Spain (so what you say about making progressive laws or opening frontiers won't apply).
-The independence moment is really transversal, and if you check any demonstration or statistic you will see that people of all ideologies are supporting it. What's more, this movement has forced the traditional right-wing party of Catalunya (which disgusts me) to move toward the centre and become much more progressive (but I don't trust them at all still and I know they have corruption, but not as bad as the Spanish one). Also, the parties that have always been more supportive of a referendum and independence have always been more on the left side of the spectrum.
5-Because it's left-wing propaganda and it will become a lawless/communist hell like Venezuela
-Again, the movement is transversal and you can see that a lot of ideologies are involved. It is true the left has more supporters in Catalunya and inside the independentist movement, but the left parties involved have been very calm and rational in the last years while ruling, promoting more social justice and never advocating for pure anarchy, trying to follow a model more north-European if anything.
6-Because the law of the referendum and its conditions have not been agreed with Spain.
-This one is the most used by people more in the middle/undecided, or against the referendum as it is but not against the idea of voting/doing something political to solve the issue instead of just illegalizing it. The problem here is that this depends on Spain. Spain has a tradition of being authoritative and is not used to negotiate much. Let's be clear: The left lost the civil war against fascism because there is a lot of fascists tendencies in Spain, a lot of patriotism for the wrong reasons, and there's only one accepted way to be Spanish, and since then things have not improved greatly about this topic. For a big group of people, Catalunya is not Spanish enough, instead of thinking that Catalunya is another interpretation of Spain, as valid as any other. The current government has the support of such people and any negotiations would be considered as weaknesses. That's why in the last years the Spanish Government has never even considered any negotiations, and has just said Catalunya should shut up and behave, basically. The Catalan government has offered to negotiate until the last minute, but Spain has never offered or proposed anything. So, how can this be negotiated if one of the parts negotiate by saying "no, end of discussion"? Some of the people defending this argument say that this is now, but that we should work to change this dynamic, and vote to put into power people more open to negotiations. The reality however is that with the latest election results we are very far from having a big majority of parties open to that. One of the parties currently not ruling that is defending this argument or proposing other solutions ruled for 8 years and did nothing of the sort, so their promises feel pretty much empty. Asking to pact is asking for people to wait maybe 40 years while renovating the parties, to reach an unknown situation where maybe things improve...or maybe they don't. People defending this option are way too optimistic about it, I think, based on previous experiences. However, I can understand to a certain point people defending this.
7-Because independentism excludes and divides people.
-This one I've heard it from several newspapers that I thought were better than this. This argument, similar to the patriotism or frontier argument, assumes or tries to tell that independentism is about Catalunya being isolated and defending "proper Catalans". However, this is easily disproven by the fact that there's a lot of independentist that are immigrants and children of immigrants. This movement has always been inclusive, and you can see that people in Catalunya just love it when newcomers integrate. One of the best things that Catalan government has promoted since Franco's dead is the fact that, to be Catalan, you just need to live and/or work on the region, and this attitude is clear in all the movement. Most of the divisions come from the unionist side's attitude, where statistics show that the emotional component of feeling Spanish is the most common reason to want to avoid independence, and therefore tend to act in more emotional and extreme ways (although lately it is true there has been some extremism on each side)
8-Because Catalunya will be kicked out of EU.
-First of all, as long as people remain Spanish (which is an option available), they will be part of the EU. As for the theoretical new country, you don't need to be in the EU to have some of the benefits of the EU, as Switzerland or Norway show, but also it's unlikely that EU will not manage things to include a rich region that would be in the top tiers of GDP compared with the rest of European countries.
9-Becasue Catalunya will become poorer.
-Of course if Catalunya becomes poorer, EU may not want to accept it. However, the general consensus is that industry and business in Catalunya is strong enough that there are 2 likely outcomes: If Spain negotiates with Catalunya, Catalunya's economy will rapidly grow from the start. If Spain penalises Catalunya, Catalunya's economy will have problems for a short-term period until it regulates the situation and then it can grow at medium-term.
I could list more reasons that I heard these days, but most of those are over-simplifications of the situation or just plain wrong. The only one that might kind of work is number 6, but it ignores reality too much....which brings me to one reason I have not heard yet, but it is actually good, and I'm surprised no one has mentioned loudly yet, that I know.....
10-For solidarity towards the poor Spanish people that will be left with the brain dead, conservative and corrupt Spanish traditional parties.
Now this is a reason I can get behind to defend not separating. Catalunya is a very progressive area compared with the rest of Spain. The current vote estimation for Catalan elections indicates that around 60% of the people would vote a party on the left spectrum. Checking the results of the last Spanish elections, Catalunya gave around 2.100.000 votes to parties from the left-centre. In Spain in total, there were around 11.700.000 votes to parties from left-centre. Almost 18% of the total votes for the left came from Catalunya, while the region represents only 14% of the total votes in Spain. Losing those votes, even if you also lose the votes of the Catalan right, means it's much harder to implement changes on Spain, especially since the party that seems to really want to change things in Spain (they're not perfect but so far they're at least trying) was the most voted party during these same general elections in Catalunya.
Basically, separating from Spain is a bit like abandoning any hopes of changing it. It's admitting that the system is too corrupt, too biased, to change it from inside. It's a bit like admitting defeat. And it's leaving all this great nice Spanish people more at the mercy of a group of bastard.
However, there's an alternative approach to this. Spanish politics are stuck in a bad place, for too many years. Breaking from that would be traumatic yes, and would leave the progressive side weaker in Spain. Nevertheless, maybe that's what is needed to make people in Spain react, and see the old parties for what they really are: A bunch of useless corrupt assholes.
Maybe a shock therapy like this can put some life into this old and outdated system....
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