Reason 33: Only way to have and ensure (a real) self-government

When democracy was reinstalled after the dictatorship, Spain did not want Catalonia and Basque Country to have a ‘special treatment’. In order to give them a kind of self-government, they created the so called ‘State of the autonomies’, which consisted of a division of Spain into autonomic (reed regional) ‘governements’. Catalans and Basques thought that was a good idea and believed this would offer them enough competences in order to develop essential aspects of the Catalan and Basque nations. The fact the all the other regions got a self-government they never asked and they didn’t feel they ‘needed’ was irrelevant.
The Catalan government got several competences, such as Civil law, education or health care (1). During the last decades Catalonia has made several laws and applied most of them. But the Spanish government never abolished the Spanish ministries on these matters, even though they did not have these competences any longer. After more than 30 years of making laws Catalans can say today that living in Catalonia differs in many ways from living in other parts of Spain. A recent example is that bull fights are in Catalonia forbidden.
But the reality is that during this time Catalans have tried to play as if Catalonia was a sovereign country or a nation, while they had the competences any other Spanish region also had. We see our country, Catalonia as a nation, the Spaniards see it as a region. So, we Catalans played our ‘role’, in some cases through law making, and when law was not possible (blocked by Spain) we seeked for surrogate solutions (such as the stickers for car number plates with ‘CAT’).
But this Catalan dream seems to be coming to an end. The reality is that none of the competences has ever been transferred completely, and whenever a Catalan law does not like the Spaniards they annihilate it. Some of us woke up when the Spaniards reduced the new Organic law of Catalonia ‘Estatut’. And we can see how the Spanish ministries are more and more unsatisfied with the ‘State of autonomies’.
Even though the Spanish prime minister has said not to want to dismantle the ‘State of autonomies’, the idea is present within the Popular Party (PP) and within the Spanish population. This has come out lately in the news(2). The Spanish dream consists of Spanish supremacy all over the Spanish territory. And the ‘State of autonomies’ is a thorn in the eye of many of them. Many Spaniards (I think most) see as a logic, as proper, as a fundamental right to have equal Spanish education for everyone in Spain. This ensures their language’s supremacy. It also unifies content at school for everyone within Spanish borders (Spanish geography, history, literature, et cetera). Many Catalans can still remember a world like that (1939-1978).
This week Esperanza Aguirre (PP) declared her dissatisfaction with the ‘State of autonomies’. She spoke of taking back competences such as Civil Law, Education and health care.

A positive vote of PP and PSOE for such an idea could mean the end of the ‘State of autonomies’. They have got the majority and have shown to be capable of taking any step in order to ensure the continuity of a united Spain and the recovery of Spanish supremacy.
Today we can see the Catalan government does not seem to have any real competence, and even its existence is unsure as long as we remain under Spanish command.
Only becoming a sovereign state in Europe can ensure we will have real competences and will be able to really decide for ourselves without anyone else prohibiting us to be how we want to be.
As for now, the danger is getting bigger. I just hope enough Catalans wake up before it’s too late.

(1) http://www.gencat.cat/generalitat/eng/estatut/titol_4.htm
(2) http://www.directe.cat/noticia/193759/el-pp-engega-motors-per-liquidar-lestat-de-les-autonomies
(image ols Spanish school book: http://www.rafaelcastillejo.com/escuela-2.htm)

Reason 30: ONLY WAY TO ENSURE NORMALITY IN EDUCATION IN CATALAN LANGUAGE

In a normal (sovereign) country nobody puts in doubt that every citizen must have the right and the obligation to learn and to be able to speak in the ‘national’ language. In the artificial creation of the 18th century nation states, such as France, the absolutist regimes (dictatorial monarchies, dictatorships so to speak) engaged a crusade to abolish any other culture and any other language in ‘their’ territory than theirs. They imposed the idea that their territory was ‘a nation’ and that it had to have only one language, theirs. But the territory they had in charge was not at all ‘a nation’ and was not at all monolingual.

Even though this phenomenon had happened already several times by several other authoritarian regimes before (such as the Romans, to remain in the same area of the globe), the beginning of the 18th century can be seen as a decisive turning point, in which languages and cultures that did not enjoy the protection of a monarch, started to suffer an unprecedented cultural genocide ever since the fall of the Roman empire. Not only the Catalan language, but also the Frisian, the Flemish, the Occitan, the Gaelic languages, the Basque language, and so on, they were all persecuted and sentenced to death. Their use was prohibited at schools, governments and churches, it was prohibited to right books in those languages and even to have a name in those languages.

Today, in democratic Europe, the scars are still open, and even though some moribund; many of these languages are still spoken. It is sad to say that the phenomenon and the mentality that thinks it is legitimate to destruct these languages is still there, alive and kicking; in France, in the Netherlands and of course in Spain.

The Spaniards prosecuted Catalan speakers in horrendous ways, with discrimination, punishments, and even imprisonment because they used Catalan language. The famous architect Gaudí was also imprisoned just because he spoke Catalan to a police officer. Just to be a Catalan has been for the last 300 years a constant disadvantage and a reason to be discriminated by the authorities imposed by the Spaniards. Official positions in Catalonia ever since the abolition of the Catalan state in 1714 were given only to Spaniards (in some cases to Catalans who turned themselves into ‘neat’ Spanish speakers, called botiflers). Officers never spoke a word of Catalan and showed such an aversion to you as Catalan that you tried to sound ‘as less Catalan as possible’ when needed to deal with authorities in order not to be discriminated. Something I have experienced myself and shall never forget. This is something nowadays still happens too often to Catalans who speak Catalan to police officers or even children who at hospital talk Catalan to a nurse that does not want to understand it. It is a very serious offense and very painful experience to be discriminated in your own country in this way.

Spain is very far away from the really democratic Zwitserland, where there are clear language borders in which every one respects the fact that it is a state with 4 languages and no language has the right to be imposed upon the others. Belgium is not Zwitserland, there we see a language collision, in which the French act in the Spanish role and the Flemish in the Catalan. The big difference is that Flanders already has got the autonomy of an independent state, as Belgium is a federation in which Flanders acts with full independence in all domestic politics and the French speakers would not even dear to demand French education for their children in Flemish schools.

But Spain is different. The persecution of Catalan language is still going on and the mentality that every Spanish citizen (read Castillian speaking citizen) should have the right and obligation to be educated in Spanish, even though Spain is not a monolingual state, is also still there. They cannot conceive that the Spanish state hasn’t become monolingual like France.
Catalonia has tried to bring the Catalan language to a normal situation, in which every citizen who grows in Catalonia has the right and obligation to learn and to be able to speak the language of the country, which is Catalan. This, next to the obligation and right to learn and to be able to speak Castillian (which is the language our neighbour country, imposed upon us). The Catalan policy wants to offer equal education to all, without discriminating anyone linguistically. It is easier to find a job is you speak both languages than if you only speak Castillian. The Catalan education system makes clear that in Catalonia the predominant language is the language of the country, Catalan, and some Spaniards cannot accept this. That’s why some Spaniards have brought the Catalan education system to the Spanish Constitutional Court. And this court has said that the Catalan educational system must offer the option to be educated in Castillian language, and that Catalan language cannot be the predominant language.

Spain will never be like Belgium or Zwitserland. Spaniards keep trying in many different and subtle ways to turn Catalan into a minority language and reinforce the supremacy of their language in the whole of ‘their’ territory. Spain is an unfinished and failed copy of the French model, which achieved a higher degree of homogenization, where all is left over are zombie languages scattered around the southern half of their territory (Breton, Occitan, Catalan, Basque) the existence of which is practically unknown by any other European citizen.

To me again one thing is clear, only with a Catalan state we can guarantee normal education in Catalan. A Catalan state would mean a more natural administration of Catalonia, a protection of Catalan rights, language, culture and economy, in own territory and abroad, the abolition of impositions from our neighbours, who clearly have another mentality and other interests than we. We don’t go to impose Catalan in Madrid, why don’t they leave us in peace?