Published originally in Spanish. Manuel Cruz. El Confidencial
A common view in Catalan public opinion is to classify as excessive any initiative coming from Madrid that questions the Govern decisions at any level
“Do not exaggerate, your Honor” was the sentence, already famous, with which agents from Mossos d´Esquadra replied to the head of the court of instruction number 2 of Amposta, to whose judicial area belongs Alcanar (Tarragona), when she mentioned her suspicions that the gas bottles found in the illegally-occupied house that exploded two days before the terrorist attack in the Ramblas of Barcelona last August could be preparations for an attack. I have been reminded of the sentence by the reactions of some people in pro-independence circles after the speech delivered by King Felipe VI some days ago.
I might be worth starting by clarifying that the point is not to compare situations, in this case the imminence of a terrorist attack and the imminence of a UDI, but to compare reactions. It would be fair to say that a common view in Catalan public opinion is to classify as excessive any initiative coming from Madrid that questions the Govern decisions at any level.
So has happened, just in the last few weeks, with issues from police charges to searches on printing shops premises, from measures to control finances to prosecution of high-ranking officers. The list goes on and on, and they are often put in a bad light not as much for being improper or unjust as for its supposed overreach. It is as if many in Catalonia, shocked by the reaction caused by their actions, were constantly surprised by these consequences: “It is not such a big deal! Take it easy!”
Anyone believing that this is just an expression of cold blood or an almost oriental impassivity would be quite wrong. The core of the issue is related to an attitude pertinaciously induced for years in Catalonia, practically until the beginning of the ‘procés’, that has caused an absence of any political criticism worth of that name in the public sphere in general, and complete lack of self-criticism of the part of Catalonian rulers in particular. The general belief that the policy supported by each party was based on different approaches of the relation with Madrid represented by them, as if the internal policy lacked any importance, ended up fueling a second belief that has proven to be disastrous. This belief can be summarized as the idea that nothing bad can come out of our actions, and if it did such outcome could only be Madrid’s fault.
That’s the reason why, surprising as that might be from outside Catalonia, there are still some here who do not consider an imminent declaration of independence as a motive for serious concern, or even those that have stated as first (and in many cases only) comment to the royal speech the absence of the word “dialogue” in it. It can be noted that the implicit reproach is that somehow Felipe VI should be held responsible for the sense of alarm that might have been established since then. These critics have so avoided discussing the core of the issue.
Beyond the question of whether it can be interpreted that the King was supporting or not with his words that the government of Mariano Rajoy took some legal measures (Article 155 of the Spanish Constitution in particular), the most relevant part of his speech –as the King himself emphasized even with his body language– lied in a different place, more specifically in the fact that he denounced that the Govern of the Generalitat had crossed all the red lines of institutional disloyalty. Obviously, before a criticism of such magnitude and forcefulness, it is hard to maintain the idea of the centralist exaggeration, which has forced the Independence supporters to use a reinforcement line of argument, already used often in previous occasions.
This line is to try to defend from criticism by confronting a past suffered grievance. The logic apparently underneath the pro-independence discourse in relation with the interpretation of their own acts is that these, whichever they were, can’t be condemned because they constitute a reaction against something. In this way the secessionist mix up, if I may be allowed the simplification, having a reason to act in a given way with having the right to do so.
You may think that the difference is simple, but it doesn’t seem to be perceived with the same clarity by the pro-independence movement. Its discourse seems to be based on a logic summarized as: anything that the central government does and I don’t like (even if only because I expected more) or that it does not do while I wanted it to happen (e.g. make a proposal), justifies whichever action I consider appropriate, without being subject to criticism whatsoever or even less condemnation.
But it is obvious that the errors of the other part do not make good any answer on ours. A, let’s say, excessive answer, is not justified by the fact that it was motivated by a previous grievance. For it to be justified it must keep some sort of proportionality or correspondence with that it tries to counter. Otherwise we risk incurring into the situation commonly described in popular language as “using a sledgehammer to crack a nut”.
Therefore this is a notable instance of what in a philosophical language could be named as irreducible innocence or argumentative impunity, choose whichever is most pleasant for you. In simpler words, by definition, for the independence supporters they are not responsible of anything nor require providing consistent arguments for what they do, that is the extent of their naked voluntarism. Let’s consider, for instance, some of the last declarations of President Puigdemont, specifically those on October 1st itself.
In the first of them, on Sunday mid-morning, he just discredited the Spanish State with all kind of adjectives for the excessive police charges that took place early that morning, as if his own Govern was utterly innocent on the respect and had no relation whatsoever (either directly or through its related associations, ANC and Omnium Cultural) with the summons of citizens to overcome legality and occupy during the previous night the schools that would serve as polling stations.
But maybe even more relevant was his speech after the closing of the polling stations. He appeared before the press surrounded by all members of his Govern and, without providing any figure (it is to be expected that he must have thought that such trivial details as the exact result of the poll were irrelevant in such an historic moment), he just repeated his criticisms to the actuation of the police before, without further argumentation and as if it was an obvious inference (whereas it was a flagrant non sequitur), conclude that the Catalan people “had earned the right to be independent”.
That the so-called referendum had failed to comply with all the required estandards to be recognized as such in any democracy worthy of that name was, for Puigdemont, a totally irrelevant subject, a moot point with no importance at all. This is the best example of what we were mentioning. Apparently, a grievance legitimates any answer, whatever the victim deems fit. In this case the issue is more than clear: for the President of the Generalitat a police charge legitimates a rigged election.
