Category Archives: Politics

Expats against immigration!

Language, Politics, PP, Spain, , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The BBC’s got a story on how some expats living in Spain are getting involved in Spanish municipal elections. All EU citizens are eligible to vote – or stand – in council elections. I mentioned last week that I’ll be voting for the Green/United Left (aka the communists) as they’ve done a lot to improve both the look and the feel of Cerdanyola.

Much further south (the traditional home of the British expat), people haven’t got so much to be grateful for. Successive administrations from the PP, the PSOE and other parties have been criticised for large-scale corruption, especially in their dealings with land and building permissions.

So some Spaniards and ex-pats have united in a party called ‘Progreso y Orden‘ (Progress and Order). The party’s platform is to do away with those problems that ruin life in la Vega Baja of Alicante. Problems like corrupt politicians, excessive land speculation, ‘delinquency’, drug use and… immigration! Unusual as it may seem, non-Spaniards are involved with a Spanish party which is opposed to immigration. As you might have guessed, I smelled a rat. A big fat racist rat.

So I had a look at Progress and Order’s homepage (web geek’s observation: probably the worst designed website in existence: I had to use Firefox’s ‘Page info’ dialogue to navigate the site!) (Updated: here’s the link to their homepage!). When I eventually managed to find the Spanish language ‘About us’ page, I found out a lot about the founder of Order and Progress. He’s called Fernando Gadea. He’s an ex Guardia Civil (not that there’s anything wrong with that), an ‘intelligence expert’, an expert in ‘electronic security systems’, a former Spanish legionnaire and a former municipal official. He spends quite a lot of time talking about himself (even more than I do in my ‘About’ section), and seems to be your typical ex-military, ex-Guardia, private detective sort of nice chap.

Unfortunately, he forgot to mention one thing on his new party’s site which might be of interest to residents of San Fulgenio, as well as the BBC journalists who missed this little tidbit. When he was a ‘concejal’ (town councillor), he was there as a listed member of España 2000. Those of you who haven’t heard of España 2000 can check out its Wikipedia entry which is both accurate and amusing. Other Nazis in Spain consider them to be something of a joke. A splinter-group of theirs is apparently based in Catalonia, and puts up stickers in Cerdanyola which call for the repatriation of ‘non-Spaniards’ (which we can assume doesn’t include wealthy Brits or Germans: the photos all seem to be of Muslims).

So there you go… not exactly surprising that a party called Order and Progress is a bit dodgy. The BBC should probably have done some better research for their story, as it would have been interesting to read a ‘Brits and Germans in far-right Spain pact’ headline, but never mind. It’s also worth noting that not all Brits in Spain are voting for the local equivalent of the BNP. While many expats see fit to spew invective about the ‘Asians’ back home, there are plenty of us who didn’t leave home because we were sick of seeing brown faces everywhere.

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As has been reported on other blogs, British involvement in Spanish politics doesn’t stop at San Fulgencio. Bernie Ecclestone, short-arsed owner of the Formula One franchise, has just announced that there’ll be a new Grand Prix in Valencia ciutat. But only if the electorate remember to vote PP in the regional elections, as the local party boss is a chum. What a revolting little episode. I’m boycotting it. But good luck, Lewis, anyway!

YouTube: racism and homophobia are OK

Internet computer, Politics, , , , ,

I mentioned in a post some time ago that I was disappointed that a video with a bit of swearing in (Nick’s epic bowling movie, for example) could be banned from YouTube.com whereas videos from the BNP which solicited almost explicitly racist comments are left untouched. This situation is symptomatic of a problem with the far-right in online communities: they’re far better organised than the left wing are. So, for example, a video during which a Socialist party member reads from a selection of BNP literature and describes them as racist is met with responses like ” Can you explain the non-stop HATE I see every day in the eyes of black men…?”.

Later, the comments devolve into opposing sides referring to eachother as “Moron” and later, “C*nt”. Intriguingly, this last word is banned from videos on YouTube but not from the comments people leave. Check out the abuse this user gets on his profile page. Interestingly, I only stumbled upon that user’s profile because he, in turn, had been sending me offensive and threatening messages because he thought I’d posted a video spoofing homophobic reggae ‘star’, Buju Banton. In turn, a video of fellow reggae performer Shabba Ranks saying the bible supports Buju’s positon features the comment “Heah i aint famous so f*ck it, all queers should be shot dead it aint right and should be dealt with by aggression and plenty of it cut there cocks off if they cant use it properly f*ckin sick bastards.. [sic]”.

I recognise that in the US, where YouTube is registered, there exists a stronger belief in freedom of expression, whatever offence is caused. And yet, YouTube’s Community Guidelines state “We encourage free speech and defend everyone’s right to express unpopular points of view. But we don’t permit hate speech which contains slurs or the malicious use of stereotypes intended to attack or demean a particular gender, sexual orientation, race, religion, or nationality”. The advice given by YouTube is that if you’re not happy with something, you should flag it as inappropriate and it will be dealt with. I know, however, that this is just not applied to offensive comments.

So what should be done? Some people will say that frankly, freedom of speech should be upheld above all other rights. I disagree when it comes to hate speech as categorised in YouTube’s own rules. YouTube really needs to make more of an effort to moderate debate on its pages. There’s no stopping stupid thugs making unpleasant videos like this but YouTube should be checking the content that gets uploaded to its site.

ERC: hardcore separatists

Catalonia, Politics,

Yeah, they’re at it again. So-called separatist-friendly, hardcore-porn producing friend of the people, Conrad Son, has been given more money by the Generalitat to make some ‘girl friendly’ porn, en Català. Apparently, he’s a big fan of Josep Carod-Rovira (and no doubt, the ERC leader is a big fan of… hot Catalan action… yuck*).

There are a number of serious questions raised by this (is there really no material considered out of bounds for those keen on spreading the word of Catalan? is it not morally reprehensible for a ‘left-wing’ party to get involved in the production of porn, even if it is ‘for women? doesn’t porn for women just mean it’s toned down a bit?)… the main concern has to be this: Conrad Son, please don’t let Carod-Rovira become the Catalan Ron Jeremy.

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*I have no problem with hot Catalan action, myself.

Ann Coulter and the gay porn star

Politics, , , ,

An amusing (and, if I may, revealing) article by Max Blumenthal here covering the slightly embarrassing CPAC event last weekend. It seems that after calling (or nearly calling) John Edwards a ‘faggot’, Coulter cosied up with former gay porn star and rentboy, Cpl. Matt Sanchez.

There is of course nothing inherently wrong with Sanchez being a gay porn star or a male escort. His past is only notable because he chose to join a movement that exploits anti-gay sentiment for political gain. Coulter’s now-famous “faggot” remark was not an aberration, but rather a symbol of the politics of resentment that propels the conservative movement and its elected Republican surrogates; a reflection of the bigotry conservatives have sought to write into the Constitution through the so-called Federal Marriage Amendment. The ascendant “family values” wing of the right is also responsible for sabotaging legislation allowing homosexuals to serve openly in the armed forces, a maneuver that may now spell the end of Sanchez’s career.

This is yet another story which gives the lie to conservative ‘ownership’ and ‘custody’ of morality. I wouldn’t mind them so much if they didn’t spend half their time slagging people off for doing things they, or their mates, are perfectly happy to indulge in. The point is that no one, left or right, can own morality… but it is conservatives who frequently claim to.

In praise of reason

Politics, UK, , , , ,

We live in confusing times… I remember only a few years ago watching the famous BBC documentaries about the Taleban’s insane regime in Afghanistan – their destruction of Buddhist monuments, their repression of women, their official homophobia. The era of the Taleban was as absurd as a Monty Python sketch, with its beard laws and its choice of executions (stoning or have a wall pushed over on you). We marvelled, I remember, at the way these twisted individuals had managed to overrun a whole country with their crazy beliefs.

The Catholic Church in England has little in common with the Taleban. While they are the representatives of a foreign theocracy, they are never to be seen toting AK-47s at airports, as the Taleban were wont to do. But they are, in their own little way, attempting to subvert the UK’s comittment to equality of rights and opportunities by attempting to derail legislation which would force them to allow same-sex couples to adopt children from Catholic adoption agencies with the same rights as hetrosexual couples.

Their argument, unconvincing as it is, is that the new legislation will interfere with the rights of Catholics to ‘make a moral judgement’, and thus denies them their human rights. A BBC presenter referred to this as ‘a clash of rights’ today on 5Live, as if we were dealing with two sets of faith-based beliefs which were in opposition. That is not the case. What we’re dealing with is the clash of basic human rights of equality against the traditional right of religious folks to exercie their prejudice as they like.

There’s no doubt that the Catholic adoption agencies have helped a lot of children and a lot of couples over the years. But it would be wrong for the government to cave in to demands by a religious group to legalise their dislike for gay partnerships. Modern society should not have to make allowances for the superstitions and prejudices of pressure groups.

On a different tack, I once again offer the marvellous badscience.net as a vanguard against those who would challenge reason and scientific practice in the quest for a cheap buck. More of this, please.

Scratching a bad rash

'Terror', Politics, UK, , , , , , , , , , ,

I’m getting a bit sick of the design and layout arond here. Thinking about a change. Also, the content: more righteous indignation, less paranoid speculation. Or was it the other way around?

Actually, I’ve been reading Nick Cohen’s interesting criticism of the left in today’s Observer. He makes a number of salient points in his dissection of everything that is wrong today with liberal-left politics and its general failure to adapt to the 21st century. I don’t agree with him on everything. But he does remind me why I decided some time ago never to align myself with any political group or party because there are simply none who seem to have the right approach to things. Spain is a classic example: I’m not a Catalan nationalist but I’m sympathetic with those who would like more autonomy for Catalonia. At the same time, I couldn’t support any of the parties who push for greater autonomy here because their memberships and leaders seem to be conniving, divisive pricks to a man. Besides, if greater autonomy means more laws banning me from drinking calimotxo or Xibeca and smoking weed at the beach with my mates, then perhaps it’s not such a hot tip?

The Iraq debacle is another good example (and this is what Nick Cohen is focused on): I’m naturally a Labour man but how can I vote for that party when Tony Blair still insists that it was the right thing to do. It wasn’t. Saddam was an awful, murderous bastard but the hell which has been unleashed on ordinary Iraqis does not justify his removal. Nick Cohen’s main argument seems to be that the left has lost its way because in its opposition to illegal wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, curtailed human rights at home, rendition and Guantanamo, it has failed to condemn the evil which so called ‘neo-conservatives’ are determined to defeat. There’s a lot of ammunition for this argument and those employing it get a very real thrill from expounding the claim that the left wing is stuck in a bygone age when it could rely on being morally superior and nothing more. And it is true that numerous anti-American and anti-Semite worms have crawled out of the woodwork just in time to make us all look bad.

But the problem with Cohen’s position is that all he’s doing is claiming the moral high ground for the neocons. Basically, he seems happy to tell the left that they don’t recognise that the world has changed and things aren’t as clear cut as they once were, while at the same time he’s stating quite firmly that this is a simple case of moral imperative: we had to remove Saddam at any cost. Clearly, he wants to have his cake and eat it.

He continues by drawing attention to the millions of left wingers who demonstrated against ‘the overthrow of a fascist government’. To emphasise his point, he makes trite references to Rome, Madrid and Berlin – as if the residents of cities which had once lived under the shadow of a dictator should somehow ‘know better’. The problem is that opposing the war was never the same as appeasing Saddam. Who cares if he was happy about the protests? The point of the demos was to let our governments know that we weren’t going to be hoodwinked into an illegal war which would end up killing tens of thousands of civilians. And we were absolutley right.

The problem for those who were (and, carazily, still are) in favour of the war is that they really did think they were going to get things over and done with pretty quickly. They didn’t realise that they were going to visit on Iraq a state of murderous destruction not seen since the dark days of Saddam’s purges. Or if they did, they didn’t care.

The point of all this is, I suppose, to say that in the case of Iraq, there is no moral high ground. We on the left had nothing to suggest in the way of alternatives to getting rid of Saddam. We need the oil, the Iraqis need democracy and the world is a better place without that awful man. At the same time, supporters of the war must accept that they have made a colossal mistake in Iraq, causing the deaths of many tens of thousands of civilians, enraging an already volatile muslim community, establishing the dangerous precedent of pre-emptive attack and handing vast strategic power to a much more dangerous country: Iran.

In the end, Nick Cohen’s article is more or less spot on, insofar as it discusses the facts of the dispersal of the left-wing in Britain… (I only wish he’d write another about modern conservatism). While there are aspects of his argument which I find I can’t agree with, he’s correct about two important things: the left wing has lost its way horribly and we have failed to display any reasonable degree of solidarity with the Iraqis: the true victims of all this mess. Think on.

The new ‘anti-nacionalismo’

Catalonia, Language, Politics, PP, Spain, , , , ,

Spanish-language blog, El Siglo de las Luces, has a well written and interesting post about moves by the Spanish right to expand its influence by forming and supporting supposed NGOs and pressure groups around the country. These groups traditionally start out as single-issue before becoming more and more embroiled in the two topics which seem to excite the political extremes in this country: left versus right; and the question of nationalism (this term usually only referring to Catalan and Basque nationalism/separatism.

The classic example of this is the AVT (Association of Victims of Terrorism). Ostensibly formed as a support/pressure group for victims of ETA and their families, the AVT long ago became a sort of rent-a-mob for high profile, low impact demonstrations in Madrid where protesters gnash their teeth and do the whole Two Minutes Hate thing.

I’ve written about the AVT before (I stand by everything I wrote six months ago) and currently words fail me to describe how bitterly I dislike their nasty mixture of pressure politics, rhetoric and sheer anti-reason. There is simply no point in attempting an ordinary criticism of the AVT because they are so astoundingly out of it. Sometimes, I think it’s part of a clever plot to utterly confound critics: where do I start? they’ve opened a battle against logic on so many fronts that I get headaches just trying to list them.

Instead, I recommend reading that blog post at El Siglo de las Luces. And consider that even though it may not be working that well, the PP’s strategy is pretty clever. By politicising members of the Spanish working class (nominally against one thing they don’t like, e.g. subsidies for Catalan language, ETA, etc), the PP have forged a plan which, should it eventually start working, could well extend their platform of support and – more importantly – their political influence throughout Spain.

All this environmental stuff

Catalonia, Politics, Rants, Spain, UK, , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

I know I’m meant to be worried. Sometimes I do worry. And I’m glad that the news is talking about climate change and pollution again. I do consider it to be a far greater risk to my life than, say, ‘international terrorism’.

But when it comes down to it, I’m not planning to do much to help to deal with climate change, CO2 emissions, etc etc. There are a few reasons that I’ve come to this conclusion and the first is that stupid one I always criticise other people for using: I cannot make any difference so there’s no point bothering.

Now, before you say I’ve lost my mojo, just think. Given that I already conserve energy in a loose, easy sort of way at home, I’d say that my energy consumption is probably average for Spain. The new TV uses a lot of juice but then I never drive. If I managed to reduce that energy use to nil, the resulting effect on the overall consumption of energy in Spain (or in Catalonia or Barcelona, for that matter) would be so infinitesimally useless and pathetic that all I would really have succeeded in achieving would be ruining my quality of life by forcing myself to eat raw vegetables and lentils soaked in (spring) water over night. Never mind the emissions that a diet like that would cause.

A popular statistic around at the moment is that if the UK closed down all their CO2-emitting power stations, it would take China only six months to fill in the gas gap that we’d left behind. What about India and China together?

The problem with climate change is that there is literally nothing any of us can do to help the situation. Why not recycle? Did you know that most of the stuff you recycle ends up in land-fill? Gemma and I recycle religiously… it’s something to do, you know? And yet I know that it’s a complete waste of time.

When it comes down to it, the single worst thing I ever do to the environment is air travel. I like to fly to places. It’s much quicker than taking a canoe or a bullock-cart. It’s selfish of me and I know it’s not helping but I like to see my parents once a year if I can. How else am I going to do that? If I forswear that I’ll no longer fly then I guess they’d eventually fly out to see me here. So what would I have achieved then? I’ve got two sets of parents (both parents and both step-parents), a brother, a sister, a step-sister and two half-sisters. By my refusing to fly, I’d force them to fly. So there’s no point bothering with it.

My other reason for not helping any more than I already am is skepticism. I’ve got a sneaking suspicion that things aren’t quite as bad as Al “I couldn’t even beat George Bush in an election I’d won” Gore would have us believe. The initial warnings on climate change, emissions and environmental damage which came out thirty years ago warned about very similar consequences and that it would be too late by 2006. Well, we haven’t done a single thing about it and now we’re being told we’ve got more time, even though the picture being painted is that things are even worse than we thought they were.

My point is: either we’re already screwed, or the science isn’t completely right. If the science is right, we’re already too late to do anything. While this doubtless smacks of lazy refusal to do more to combat climate change, it’s something I’ve struggled with for a long time. I was a real environmentalist a few years back and I’m still pissed off that Bush didn’t ratify Kyoto. So what’s changed? I got so sick of the religiosity behind the environmentalist movement that I started to question it. My central belief when it comes to politics has become: whatever people keep saying over and over again, mistrust it.

So that’s it. I’ll keep up with the useless recycling, the energy saving light-bulbs, the public transport and the support for green alternatives to burning coal for electricity production. But I’m going to keep up with my air travel, my expensive, energy hungry gadgets, the coal fire at home in Devon in the winter, putting the heater on, using the tumble-dryer etc etc etc. I make no apologies. I’m just sick of the whole business.

ERC: most evil people in history?

'Terror', Catalonia, Politics, Spain, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

It has come to my attention recently that there has been something of a campaign of misinformation recently concerning the Catalan nationalist political party, Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya. I feel that as someone committed to truth over opinion, sophism and rhetoric, it falls to me to refute these claims and redress the balance somewhat.

Myth 1: ERC are a misguided bunch of beardy nationalists who are no more threat to Catalonia’s future than the long dead Gen. Franco.

Response: This is a complete lie. Anyone who knows anything about ERC knows that they are the most dangerous political party in existence today. Worse than the Basque Communist Party, worse than the Galician PP, worse even than CiU. ERC hold as a central party commitment the subjugation of all non Catalan speakers, the construction of a 30M wall all along the region’s border with Spain, a complete boycott of Madrid and that the Olympics should be held in Vic – even though they were only held in Barcelona 14 years ago!

Myth 2: ERC have other policies besides a neo-fascist Catalan superstate.

Response: This is a complete lie. Anyone who knows anything about the leadership of ERC knows not to trust a man with such a well-groomed moustache. Remember when Carod-Rovira snuck off to speak with Basque nazis in France? Well, the whole story wouldn’t have come out if it weren’t for brave officers from Spain’s ‘intelligence’ services taking time out from not monitoring Al Qaeda operatives who instead decided to spy on an elected official. And thank God they did! If he hadn’t been rumbled, it is believed that Rovira’s plan was to sell a field in Manresa to the terrorists so that they could use it as a training camp.

Myth 3: The boycott against Catalan products was organised as a response to Catalonia’s proposed new Estatut by a bunch of neo-fascist pricks with nothing better to do.

Response: This is a complete lie. Anyone who knows anything about Spain knows that the real neo-fascist thugs are the ones proposing to increase Catalonia’s autonomy from Spain via democratic measures. Besides, the boycott had nothing to do with a climate of confrontation during which the head of Spain’s army threatened to invade Catalonia. The reason brave Spanish patriots boycotted Cava is because Carod-Rovira called on Catalans not to support Madrid’s bid to host the Olympics – even though it’s over 14 years since they were held in Barcelona! Suggestions that the boycott was linked to a tiny group of concerted radicals who operated a suave ‘word-of-mouth’ campaign via email, internet forums and text messages are totally unfounded.

Myth 4: It’s disingenous to refer to ERC as ‘nationalist socialist’ at every single opportunity, clearly suggesting that they are the natural successors of the Nazis.

Response: This is a complete lie. Anyone who knows anything about political parties should know that ERC are a left-wing nationalist political party and that when the Nazis called themselves ‘national socialists’ they weren’t lying and trying to trick Germany’s large number of uneducated but left-leaning industrial workers: they were just telling it like it was! So what if it’s CiU who have officially stated that they don’t want any more muslims coming to Catalonia? So long as no one else reports that, we’ll be able to pin it on ERC within a week!

In closing: I hope I’ve done something to assuage some of your doubts about the true nature of Esquerra Republicana. The final piece of information is of key importance though: even the PP are better than them.

Think about that as you watch your neighbours go to the polls on Wednesday.

PP in far-right placation (again)

Catalonia, Politics, PP, Spain, , , , , , ,

Much has been made by anti-Catalanista bloggers and commentators of the behaviour of certain minor extremist groups who take direct action against people they consider to be ‘fascist’ or otherwise undesirable. I’ve been directed to read one particular article about JERC teenagers causing trouble at a political meeting, by the man who penned the piece, naturally. The argument against interrupting meetings, threatening ‘undesirables’ and generally interfering with those who espouse an apparently antithetic ideology is simple: these thugs, by preventing other parties from expressing themselves freely and without fear, are attacking the very basis of our democratic society. They’re as bad as brown-shirts burning books.

So I’ve been surprised to see that these fearsome defenders of human rights, crusaders for freedom of expression and opponents of ‘bully boy tactics’ are as yet silent on the case of Pepe Rubianes. This actor’s latest play, a work about the poet Lorca (murdered by the fascists, incidentally), has been cancelled by the mayor of Madrid.

The reason for this censorship is that Rubianes has made himself unpopular with the Spanish right wing. A few months ago, he uttered some pretty offensive comments about Spain during an interview on TV3. This incident led to him being threatened with a law suit, and further enraged those same supporters of freedom and critics of Catalan TV – for having the nerve to broadcast his outburst. When it became known that this monster (who had, in the meantime, apologised and tried to explain his comments) was to perform an unconnected play in a municipal theatre in Madrid, the right wing wiped the foam from their mouths and started a campaign to stop him. At all costs.

So the campaign went into action. Blog posts were written, threats were made, demonstrations were (apparently) called. All this pressure came to bear on the one man who could do something to stop this disgraceful indulgence. Mayor Gallardon couldn’t handle that pressure. Whether it was the awareness that he was elected by ‘Libertad Digital’ reading pricks or a more personal hatred for the freedom of expression, Gallardon moved to stop the play from being performed. Another great day for democracy and freedom of expression under the PP.

At first, this case looks much like those where political meetings have been violently broken up by ultra-nationalist youths: the employment of mob rule to prevent people you don’t like from saying things you don’t want to hear. But this case is far worse. In this case, the mob has spoken and elected officials have moved to placate it. The precedent is far more dangerous and deserves strong opposition from those who oppose repression of free speech.

So where are the crusaders?