Catalonian Independence...?

This seems very much in the news right now. I myself don’t have any strong opinion about it. In fact, I know almost nothing about the merits (or otherwise) of independence.

But I am completely dumbfounded by the actions of the Madrid government. Surely, a violent suppression of a referendum, having old ladies being attacked by police officers, etc…all of this has now made independence from the rest of Spain much more likely, hasn’t it!? :-0

It is however fair to point out that the referendum was illegal and it had no right to take place in the first place.

How Madrid reacted to the Catalans ignoring the state of law was however out of proportions in my opinion.

They could’ve better just let it go and ignore the outcome.

Furthermore I have read that, if the president of Catalonia declares independence (approx upcoming monday) he might get arrested as well as all the other people in function, and can get replaced by people chosen by the government in Madrid.

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I am wondering who will win the first title in the catalan football league. Barca comes in mind but I don’t see how they could keep paying their best players in a league with only Barca and Andorra.

Do they want to leave the EU too ? Should they leave Spain, I think we should send them out of EU - secure our borders with them and maybe bomb them before they bomb us. War is always what comes when some think to be better than others.

Of course I hope for another way.

i’m not a spaniard but my gf is so i can’t takea side but i have been there many times and i love catalonia the heavy handed tactics used by madrid government was excessive and just might unite the separatists more

Barca would intent to join a different league (they would be too proud (or stubborn) to stay in La Liga I think) probably the French league.

If Catalonia seperates itself it will have to go trough the whole EU-procedure to become a member again, so they will not automatically be a member of the EU.

I don’t think anyone has to be bombed here, they just need to respect the law and the problem will be solved.

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“It is however fair to point out that the referendum was illegal and it had no right to take place in the first place.”
Unless I have got the wrong end of the stick, I understand that under Spain’s post-Franco constitution it is unlawful for any regional government to unilaterally spend public funds on holding a referendum. In which case, fine, Madrid is legally justified in going after the local politicians who organised it. But that doesn’t necessarily imply that, a regional government having decided to go ahead and have a referendum anyway, it would therefore be a criminal act for the citizens of that region to show up and cast a vote. And yet the images we’ve been seeing look a lot like the police are treating the voters as acting unlawfully, not just the Catalan politicians who set up the referendum in the first place. That’s not a good look.

As a matter of general principles of justice, any polity which says to its regions “this union is forever; no matter how dissatisfied your people are with the national government, you can never leave” is acting pretty tyranically, or at least potentially-tyranically - if Castille wants to maintain a union with Catalonia that badly, it is morally incumbent on Madrid to make sure that Spain remains a polity that an overwhelming majority of Catalans are happy to belong to.

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@WinterShaker the second part of your post is based on your feelings and not on facts. The Spanish constitution, unlike the American, Canadian, or British constitution does not recognize the country as a union of pre existing entities (territories, regions), but as the land of the Spanish people.

Artículo 2. La Constitución se fundamenta en la indisoluble unidad de la Nación española, patria común e indivisible de todos los españoles, y reconoce y garantiza el derecho a la autonomía de las nacionalidades y regiones que la integran y la solidaridad entre todas ellas.

Let me point out that Spain is one of the most decentralized countries on the planet. Moreover, the constitution was approved by 95% of Catalans in a 1978 referendum…I don’t see how that is tyranical.

This isn’t to say that the Guardia Civil should have repressed the voters who have been mislead by Carlos Puigdemont, but I also saw videos of people screaming in the face of policemen and then wondering why they get shaken up which is typical of Western protesters. I have the utmost respect for the 60% of Catalans who stayed at away from this nonsense and didn’t go out to vote.

The biggest problem with this referendum is that in Catalunya, you cannot say that you like living in Spain without being called FASCISTA or a fan of Franco and there is thus no “moderate” opposition to the nationalist movement which, by the way, has been taken over by left wing radicals (CUP, Podemos) in recent times. It is not a healthy Remaineers vs. Brexiteers situation in which both sides can present their side of the argument (and lie!) to potential voters.

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‘Moreover, the constitution was approved by 95% of Catalans in a 1978 referendum’

This constitution might just be signed to avoid radicals separating the country and launch them into a civil war.

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I just wonder whether Spain could be on the brink of a civil war here!?

We can see from history (Northern Ireland, for example) how things can get really ugly - even if it is only a determined minority that wants separation.

If, on the other hand, there is actually a majority of people in this region that wants independence, I don’t see how the Madrid government can stop that - not without indulging in ongoing violent suppression…

Hang on, 95% of voting-age Catalonians voted for the constitution 40 years ago ? That’s relevant how ? Do the millions of under-58 year olds (~94% of the population) not have an opinion ? You are an absolute mug. Please think about what you’re saying before you say it you’re just looking completely foolish to anyone bothering to pay attention.

42 per cent of 5.3m voters turned out and 90% said independence.

Even without full turn out the ‘independence’ voters total nearly half of all eligible voters.

‘respect the law’ - i’ll translate - ‘do what they’re told and sit down and shut up’. They CAN’T ‘legally’ vote because the Spanish government won’t GIVE them a vote. Fool.

“The Spanish constitution, unlike the American, Canadian, or British constitution does not recognize the country as a union of pre existing entities (territories, regions), but as the land of the Spanish people”.

Well maybe, I haven’t read it all, but if the Spanish constitution doesn’t recognise that modern Spain came together out of smaller formerly independent kingdoms, most importantly the union of Castille and Aragon, that doesn’t make it untrue. Anyway, a plain reading of the text suggests that the Spanish constitution does recognise the country as a union of pre-existing entities. You quote it yourself: “La Constitución reconoce y garantiza el derecho a la autonomía de las nacionalidades y regiones que la integran” (the constitution recognises and guarantees the right to self-government of the nationalities and regions of which it is composed).

“Let me point out that Spain is one of the most decentralized countries on the planet”
Maybe; I’m not sure how it compares to, say, the USA, or the UK, in terms of the amount of law-making powers that are devolved to its constituent parts, but I understand that one of the contributing factors leading up to the current crisis was a 2012 ruling by the constitutional court to roll back some of the devolved powers that had been granted to the regional Catalan government - meaning that at the very least it is not as decentralised as it was immediately prior to 2012, and presumably not decentralised enough for a lot of the inhabitants of that region.

“Moreover, the constitution was approved by 95% of Catalans in a 1978 referendum…I don’t see how that is tyranical”
What is at least potentially tyrannical is declaring that the Catalan voters of 1978 get to override the wishes of their descendents for all time to come. If it is legitimate for the Catalans of 1978 to elect to join a union, but not legitimate for the Catalans of 2017 to elect to leave that union, then that is a double standard that needs to be argued for, it cannot simply be assumed. The idea of democracy does not usually include the principle that a law, once made, can never be unmade, no matter how dissatisfying it may turn out to be for subsequent generations.

“I have the utmost respect for the 60% of Catalans who stayed at away from this nonsense and didn’t go out to vote.”
That is a tricky one. I think the truly courageous thing if you wanted to register your objection to the referendum happening, and didn’t want to legitimise it by actually voting one of the proposed options, would have been to go, but to spoil your ballot. However, I can totally understand someone deciding to just stay away. Still, the optimal solution to the problem of an illegitimate referendum is to have a legitimate referendum. If Madrid was confident that Catalan independence was an obviously bad option, they could have agreed to allow the vote to go ahead, in the full expectation that the majority of voters would vote no.

“The biggest problem with this referendum is that in Catalunya, you cannot say that you like living in Spain without being called FASCISTA or a fan of Franco and there is thus no “moderate” opposition to the nationalist movement”
That is indeed a problem, and we tasted something of the same phenomenon here in Scotland with our own independence referendum a few years ago. But again, if the Spanish central government has acted in such a way as to prompt enough Catalans to vote for parties promising to push for independence, then the problems started long before the independence movement got taken over by left wing radicals. Having got to that point, the sensible thing would have been to agree to hold the referendum while it was still very likely that the majority would have voted no, and then in the subsequent years, work to repair relations so that an overwhelming majority of Catalans would prefer to remain in a united Spain.

I am not old enough to remember, but I understand that in Scotland, for generations, the independence movement was a tiny lunatic fringe, and it wasn’t until the Thatcher government that it started to take off as a serious possibility. If the Thatcher government had managed to avoid disproportionately raising the hackles of Scottish voters, the SNP might never have become a party to be taken seriously, let alone become the powerful party they are today.

I am still undecided on the question of Scottish independence. I don’t expect that it would have made a massive difference to people’s lives either way. But I am glad that the UK government agreed to have the referendum, which they won comfortably if not overwhelmingly, rather than send in the riot police.

I think this is a fair, balanced presentation but maybe that’s exactly what internet forums do not want???

Glad to see you again, guys! I’ll give a rose to each of you to welcome you.

“Barca comes in mind but I don’t see how they could keep paying their best players in a league with only Barca and Andorra.”

How about a new league with Barca, Andorra and AS Monaco?

That would make an international competition. Espanyol de Barcelona need a new name, maybe AS Barcelona or AD. Still a small league.

Why would that be the case? I mean Champions League and Europa League are also international tournaments, it’s not like teams change there names when they play international completions.

We are trying to figure out how the national catalan league would look. So no AS Monaco because Monaco is not catalan. Barca, Andorra, Espanyole if they rename themself.

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they are used to playing in that sort of league already the financial disparity between them and therest of league is so great it guarantees that only barcelona or madrid will ever win the spanish league ,