Brexit: Bad Advice from the People

By IAN McEWAN

There is no turning back. The stubborn negotiation to say enough about Theresa May, and after Boris Johnson for a brief period, has achieved the most masochistic and meaningless ambition ever dreamed of in the history of the islands. The rest of the world, with the exception of Presidents Putin and Trump, attended the process in amazement and dismay. In December, a majority voted in favor of the parties which called for a second referendum, but these unfortunately could not make common cause. Now we have to pick up the tents, maybe to the sound of church bells, and hope that the 15 years of difficult road we are going to take will bring us back to something similar to what we had, with our multiple trade and security treaties, health and scientific cooperation, in addition to thousands of other useful agreements.The only sure thing is that we will be asking ourselves questions for a long time. Let’s put aside for a moment the lies of the campaign in favor of leaving the EU, its suspicious funding, the Russian intervention or the ineffective Election Commission and let’s think of magic dust. How is it that a question of constitutional, economic and cultural consequences of such magnitude was settled with a simple majority and not with a super majority? A parliamentary document (Briefing 07212) from the time of the Referendum Law of 2015, indicated the reason: the referendum had to be purely consultative. The consultation was to "allow the electorate to express an opinion". How has "consultative" been transformed into "binding"? Thanks to the blinding dust that the populist hands threw into our right and left eyes.

We have endured the crippling bond between the government and the opposition. Corbyn held the door to Europe open for Johnson to cross. In this case, if one went far enough to the left, one ended up meeting the right which came from the other side and threw himself into its arms.

What have we learned in our blindness? That those who did not prosper in the old state of affairs had no compelling reason to vote for their maintenance; that our prolongation of parliamentary chaos was the result of an error in approach when formulating a yes or no question for which there were dozens of answers; that the long-standing ecology of the European Union has deeply influenced the landscape flora of our country and that the uprooting of these plants will be brutal; than what used to be called hard Brexit became soft; compared to the threat of non-agreement which still persists today; that any form of exit, according to the calculations of the government itself, will cause the economy to contract; that we are good in the multiple and bitter division: young against old, cities against countryside, university graduates against those who give up; Scotland and Northern Ireland against England and Wales; that any past, present or future international trade agreement limits our sovereignty, as is the case with the Paris Agreements that we sign or with NATO membership, and that, therefore, "regain control" has been the most promising and empty cynical of this deplorable period.

We were surprised. A few years ago, we were asked to list the country's problems - the gap between the rich and the poor, the overwhelming national health system, the north-south imbalance, crime, terrorism, austerity or the housing crisis, among others - the majority would not have thought of including our membership of the European Union. How happy we were in 2012, with the feeling of satisfaction that followed the success of our Olympic Games. So we didn't think about Brussels. What set us in motion was what Guy Verhofstadt called a "cat fight" in the Tory party. These cats have been fighting for decades. When they dragged us on and pushed us to take sides, we suffered from a collective nervous breakdown. Then enough people wanted the anxiety to go away and wanted "to get Brexit done." Repeated ad nauseam by the Prime Minister, it seemed almost rude to wonder why.

At the very beginning of the referendum campaign, we learned that “at the gates” referred exclusively to emigration, but also that it was the decision of the United Kingdom, and not of the European Union, to authorize the unlimited emigration of persons from countries applying for EU membership before the expiration of seven years of legal residence; that it is the United Kingdom which has chosen to allow emigrants from the European Union to stay in the country for more than six months without work; that the UK has successfully defended EU enlargement to the east, and that it is our country, not the Union, which admits that emigration from third countries continues (and why not?) while that from the EU decreases. We also learned that it was the United Kingdom, and not the European Union, which had decided to replace our patriotic blue passport by a garnet one. Although, when I look at them, my old passports seem almost black to me.

History has committed many injustices with the British state, but very few come from the European Union. Brussels did not insist that we neglect the post-industrial cities of the central and northern regions of England. Nor did he ask us to let wages stagnate, to allow billionaire donations to go to the CEOs of bankrupt companies, or to put shareholder value to social good, to sink our health care system, our social assistance and our Sure Start Family Assistance Program, we will close 600 police stations and allow the breakdown of public education centers.

The task of the Brexit campaign was to convince the electorate otherwise. In the referendum, it obtained a success of 37%, enough to change our collective destiny at least for a generation; to lead a sufficient number of people to believe that the source of all their grievances is a hostile external element is the oldest trick in the populist's manual. Like Trotsky for Stalin, the United States for the mullahs of Iran and Gülen for Erdogan, it's now Brussels' turn.

Hedge fund owners, plutocrats who donate to the cause, Eton elders and newspaper owners present themselves as enemies of the elite. No more magic powders. To say that the problem in Northern Ireland has been resolved is a dangerous hoax. We have seen the shame of the reasoned argument fall. The Brexit impulse contained important elements of the blood and earth ideology with touches of imperial nostalgia. These frightening desires went beyond mere facts.

We adopt a slang: "article 50", "frictionless trade", "just in time", "safeguard". How much we liked to use this slang. We have learned to respect an "invisible border". Before it all started, only a few knew the difference between the customs union and the single market. After three years, little has changed. A survey carried out last year found that many Britons thought that "falling asleep" was the same thing as being on duty. I wish.

Brexit leaders and the Leader of the Opposition have always lacked the time to start the two-year article-50 clock. They were afraid that those who had voted for the exit would change their minds; that among voters who did not go to the polls last time, supporters of the permanence doubled those for the exit, and that young voters who joined the census were overwhelmingly in favor of the European Union. The generals of brexiters they rightly feared a second referendum.

At a minimum, we can all agree that we will be a little poorer. As one of my school teachers said, if it’s really worth doing something, it’s worth it even if it’s done wrong. Theresa May never dared to say that with Brexit we would be better. She did not even tell us if she would vote for the exit in a second referendum. We must recognize her honesty. On the contrary, Boris Johnson, during his presentation to Parliament of his vision of the post-Brexit panorama, promised to close the wealth and opportunity gap between the north and the south of the United Kingdom, and to make the country the nerve center of the most advanced battery technology. He forgot to mention that the European Union had not intervened against the realization of any of these projects.

The redefinition of our new trade relations with the European Union will be a concern that will last for several years. As for the position of the United States, take a good tour of the Midwest of the country and spend a month crossing a desert of monocultures without seeing a wild flower. To compete with this, our agriculture should be ready to receive an injection of hormones. Our farmers should get rid of unproductive hedges, trees that separate fields and three-meter limits, all those parts now pieces of a museum. In its trade talks with the European Union, the United States has not considered tightening its regulations on animal husbandry, food production and environmental protection, although this would have given them access to 500 million consumers. The great American agrarian industry will not change its attitude for a country of only 65 million inhabitants. If we want a deal, we will have to lower the bar.

The times of damage and loss are coming. In a dangerous world beset by noisy "strong men", the European Union was our greatest hope for an open, tolerant, free and peaceful community of nations. The expansion of populism in Europe is already threatening these hopes. Our withdrawal will weaken resistance against the xenophobic tendency. The lesson of our country's last centuries of history is simple: the turbulence on the European continent will lead us to bloody conflicts. Nationalism is rarely a peace project. Neither does it care about the fight against climate change. It prefers to let the tropical forests and the Australian forests burn.

Take a road trip from Greece to Sweden and from Portugal to Hungary. Forget your passport. How rich, what exuberance there is in the gastronomy, customs, architecture and languages ​​of this group of civilizations, and how profoundly and proudly different each national state is from its neighbors. No sign of oppression from Brussels, nothing of the gray commercial monotony of the continental United States. Remember all you learned about the dilapidated and desperate state of Europe in 1945, then contemplate the tremendous economic, political and cultural achievements: peace, open borders, relative prosperity and promotion of individual rights, tolerance and freedom of expression. Until yesterday, it was the place where our older children, if they wanted to, would live and work.

All this is over, and for the moment the force is on the side of English nationalism. Its champion is the pro-Brexit cabinet of Boris Johnson, whose monument will forever remain a mocking smile perfected in the days of the former Soviet Union. I lie, you know, and I know you know, but I don't give a damn. Like when they said that "the five weeks of Parliament's suspension has nothing to do with Brexit". Michael Gove and Jacob Rees-Mogg were the masters of the mocking smile. The premature decision of the Supreme Court which held that the suspension was clearly illegal still stings. Recently, former Interior minister Michael Howard began to murmur against the judges. Expanding political control over an independent judiciary would be in keeping with the Johnson-Cummings project. Hungarian Viktor Orbán leads the way.

Supporters of the permanence have defended a nicer world, but we have always been the herbivores of the debate with our huge bonachonas and our ridiculed demonstrations. "A crowd full of hate," The Sun said; "An elite," The Daily Telegraph wrote. If 16 million is an elite, it’s to be welcomed that the UK is a model of meritocracy.

The truth is that we have been excluded. Thanks to the work and the grace of Corbyn and his mediocre lieutenants, we did not have an effective voice in Parliament. On her first day at the helm, Theresa May promised at the gates of Downing Street that she would rule for all British people. Instead, she threw half of the country to the dogs to appease the right wing of her party. Boris Johnson's rally was originally decided by a very small group of former voters, most of whom have said in polls that they would like Donald Trump to rule the United Kingdom and that they looked forward to hanging being restored. Similarly, Johnson reached the lowest level of populist vulgarity when he declared last June that the country would break away from the EU incubus. His dream has come true.

As for the extremes, we have never stabbed or killed a member of the Brexit Party in the street; we have rarely shown a propensity to send anonymous death and rape threats like the ones Gina Miller, Anna Soubry and many MPs have encountered on numerous occasions. However, anti-Semitic Labor Party emails were shameful, as was the crowd that besieged Rees Mogg's house and made fun of him. But supporters of the permanence do not shrewdly urge our compatriots to cause unrest in the event of a second referendum whose outcome would be unfavorable. About two-thirds of the voters did not vote in favor of the exit. The majority of businessmen, unions, farmers, scientists, finance and the arts were against the Brexit project, and three-quarters of MPs voted to remain. Ignoring the obvious public interest, however, our representatives crouched behind party cliques and "the people have spoken", that grim Soviet phrase, and his successor, "respect Brexit". It was the magic powders that clouded the mind, blinded reason and reduced the opportunities for our children. 
Copyright © Ian McEwan 2020

Would you dare to ask yourself who you really are?

El veto parental, desenmascarado

El pin parental y otras armas de coacción
Por PURA SÁNCHEZ
Portal de Andalucía, 26 de diciembre de 2019

El concepto de “pin parental” surgió como un mecanismo de control de los progenitores sobre los contenidos audiovisuales que podían recibir o a los que podían estar expuestos sus hijos e hijas. Han sido las propias plataformas audiovisuales, que elaboran o difunden dichos contenidos, las que han ofrecido a progenitores o tutores legales la posibilidad de bloquear determinados canales o servicios, como el de vídeo bajo demanda.

Desde su aparición, el partido de nombre en latín ha dado sobradas muestras de su agilidad a la hora de hacerse con conceptos, ideas e incluso eslóganes de otros, para adaptarlos perversamente a sus intereses. Así ha ocurrido con el denominado “pin parental”, un mecanismo que, según sus propias declaraciones, tiene como objetivo evitar “el adoctrinamiento en ideología de género que sufren los menores en los centros educativos”; en la práctica, se trata de una solicitud dirigida a la dirección de los centros educativos “para que informen a los padres sobre cualquier materia, charla, taller o actividad que afecte a cuestiones morales socialmente controvertidas o sobre la sexualidad”.

Para los negadores de la violencia machista, este ejercicio de control y coacción se presenta, no podía ser de otra forma, como un acto de protección. Esta manipulación suele ser un clásico de los sistemas autoritarios, que pretenden disolver la previsible reacción contraria al control, presentando las actuaciones coercitivas como actos protectores de un “duce” paternal que cuida de sus díscolos hijos a quienes hay que proteger, incluso de sí mismos.

Pero vamos por partes. En primer lugar, el llamado “pin parental” no está pensado para “las” escuelas, para todas las escuelas, sino solo para aquellas donde no llega, de momento, su control ideológico, es decir, la escuela pública. Por tanto, se trata de instrumentalizar a ciertas familias para que controlen al profesorado de sus hijos e hijas, al que no pagan directamente, porque al que pagan, directamente e indirectamente, en los centros con ideario, caso de la educación privada concertada, a ese ya lo controlan.

En segundo lugar, la supuesta protección se ejerce de manera que entorpezca todo lo posible el que otro alumnado reciba esos contenidos; es decir, por razones prácticas, para hacer factible el uso del “pin parental”, lo mejor sería eliminar determinados contenidos “controvertidos”, conformando de paso un alumnado que en poco tiempo pueda ser potencial votante del partido. Y tan contentos.

En tercer lugar, para tratar de justificar su petición, invocan “su” derecho a ejercer dicho control. De nuevo, en el contexto educativo, el concepto de derecho aparece manipulado, como cuando se invoca el presunto derecho de las familias a “elegir” la educación de sus hijos e hijas. Un derecho que puede ejercerse, sin duda, pero no hay obligación de que dicha elección la paguemos a escote todos y todas, tanto quienes  pueden permitirse elegir, como quienes no. En cuanto al derecho a controlar la formación moral o religiosa que reciben sus vástagos, efectivamente, pueden e incluso deben hacerlo, pero hay valores y contenidos que no están en cuestión. Por poner un ejemplo: no son cuestionables los valores éticos ligados a la defensa de los derecho humanos.

Ocurre además que sus ansias controladoras no se quedan en lo que se declara, que ya es lo suficientemente ambiguo, transversal, dicen, como para que se pueda intentar intervenir tanto los contenidos de ciencias sociales como los de valores éticos o los de ciencias físicas. De hecho, la memoria histórica, o cualquier contenido relacionado con la historia del siglo XX, en España o Andalucía, también quiere ser controlado e intervenido.

Traigo aquí a colación lo sucedido en Sevilla, en el mes de noviembre último, en un centro de Secundaria y Bachillerato, a propósito de unas jornadas de memoria histórica que quisieron impedir; presumiblemente una persona con acceso directo al grupo parlamentario del partido de nombre en latín movió ficha para movilizar a la inspección educativa provincial. Al objeto de darle a la posible intervención manu militari apariencia de protectora legalidad, se encargó expresamente analizar los contenidos que se iban a difundir por si contuvieran un nivel de violencia inadecuado para el alumnado. Vaya a ser que los y las jóvenes estudiantes se enteraran de que las fuerzas paramilitares de Falange rapaban y violaban sistemáticamente a las mujeres rojas, animados por las charlas radiofónicas del general genocida Queipo de Llano y ello hiriera su joven sensibilidad…

Y luego está la cuestión de la ideología. La secta abascaliana, y otros partidos que incluso se atreven a llamarse “constitucionalistas”, acostumbran a denominar “ideología” a todo cuanto no coincide con su esquema de pensamiento. Pretenden hacernos creer, por una parte, que ellos carecen de ideología y, por otra, que toda ideología manipula y oculta la realidad, cuando en verdad ideología es cualquier conjunto de ideas que caracterizan a una persona o a un colectivo y que componen su cosmovisión.

La puesta en marcha de procesos de control, manipulación y coacción, con mecanismos tales como el llamado “pin parental”, está empezando a tener nefastas consecuencias dentro y fuera del sistema educativo público. En primer lugar, en no pocos claustros, de forma individual o colectiva, ha empezado a funcionar la autocensura. En segundo lugar, hay que decir que cuando se somete a alguien a este control arbitrario, injusto e injustificable, se arroja una sombra de sospecha sobre él, convirtiéndolo en persona no digna de confianza. Se tarda mucho en conseguir que familias y profesorado tengan una relación de confianza y está comprobado que es uno de los factores que inciden positivamente en la educación del alumnado. La quiebra de esta confianza, más pronto que tarde, vendrá a incidir también en el deterioro de la educación pública, de manera que sea todo el sistema el que resulte sospechoso.

En cuanto al adoctrinamiento, precisamente la clave para evitarlo no es el control ni la coacción, sino posibilitar que el alumnado pueda acceder al conocimiento a través de personas diversas, con ideologías diversas y formas de pensar diversas, de modo que la institución escolar sea ese lugar en el que, como en la vida, nos encontramos la diversidad dentro de la escuela. Por definición, una escuela adoctrinadora es aquella que deja la diversidad fuera.

Hay que decir de una vez que la escuela pública no adoctrina, excepto cuando se “imparte” religión, en días y horas concretos, por un no profesional de la enseñanza, elegido por la autoridad eclesiástica y pagado con fondos públicos, de un estado que se declara aconfesional. El resto de los contenidos de la escuela pública están regulados y presididos por los principios del rigor, el cientifismo y los valores que consagran los derechos humanos, esos que también garantizan la dignidad, la vida y la libertad de los liberticidas, los indignos y los intolerantes. La cuestión es paradójica y nuestra deficiente democracia soporta mal las paradojas; que quienes quieren acabar con la tolerancia y la libertad de ideas y de pensamiento, estén esgrimiendo para lograrlo precisamente la tolerancia y la libertad es una prueba de ello.

Es importante enfrentar esta situación redoblando los esfuerzos por trabajar colaborativamente desde los centros educativos con las familias, prestando apoyo a quienes se pretende desprestigiar o convertir en sospechoso, evitando la autocensura y combatiendo la coacción y el control de forma que a quienes pretenden acabar con la libertad de ideas y pensamiento no les salga gratis.

De nosotros y nosotras, del profesorado, pero también de la sociedad civil, de todos y todas depende que resolvamos la paradoja o que dejemos a quienes “oran y embisten, cuando se dignan usar la cabeza” que campen a sus anchas.

Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s Brexit

By FINTAN O'TOOLE
The Irish Times, December 1st, 2018

The UK’s decision to leave the EU is like living through the anarchy of punk all over again

If you are English and in your 50s or early 60s, two things are likely to be true of you. One is that in 2016 you voted to leave the European Union: 60 per cent of both men and women in the UK aged between 50 and 64 did so.

The other is that you were, in the immediate period after the UK joined the Common Market, a punk. Or if not an actual punk, then a vicarious one, living off the thrills of the most powerful and original English cultural movement of modern times.

These two truths are closely related. At the level of high politics, Brexit may be defined by upper-class twittery. It seems more PG Wodehouse than Johnny Rotten. But at the level of popular culture, it is pure punk. John Lydon (formerly Rotten), having initially opposed Brexit, later identified himself with it: “Well, here it goes, the working class have spoke and I’m one of them and I’m with them.”

In a sense, this is the wrong way round – they are with him, or at least with the Johnny Rotten of the mid-1970s. Had it not had the genius of Take Back Control, a perfect slogan for the Leave campaign would have been Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s Brexit! For it is in punk that we find not just the nihilistic energy that helped to drive the Brexit impulse but, more to the point, the popularisation of masochism. What heroic failure and fantasies of Nazi invasion did for the middle and upper classes, punk did for the young and the working class.

Many Brexit voters were formed by its most breathtaking, counterintuitive stylistic gesture – the idea of masochism as revolt, of bondage as freedom. Punk took bondage gear out of the bedroom and on to the street; Brexit took coterie self-pity out of the media-political boudoir and into real politics.

Objectively, the great mystery of Brexit is the bond it created between working- class revolt on the one side and upper- class self-indulgence on the other. There would seem to be an unbridgeable gulf of style and manner – let alone of actual economic interests – between the stockbroker superciliousness of Nigel Farage or the self-parodic snootiness of Jacob Rees-Mogg on the one side and the raw two-fingered defiance of working-class patriotism on the other. Brexit depended on an ostensibly improbable alliance between Sunderland and Gloucestershire, between hard old steel towns and rolling Cotswold hills, between people with tattooed arms and golf club buffers.

One great binding agent was Anarchy in the UK, the sheer joy of being able to f**k everything up. Boris Johnson, who used The Clash’s London Calling as the theme song for his successful campaign to be mayor of London, also chose the same band’s version of Pressure Drop on Desert Island Discs in October 2005.

On that programme, in a rare moment of self-reflection, Johnson spoke of the pleasure of making trouble that motivated his mendacity: “So everything I wrote from Brussels, I found was sort of chucking these rocks over the garden wall and I listened to this amazing crash from the greenhouse next door over in England as everything I wrote from Brussels was having this amazing, explosive effect on the Tory party, and it really gave me this, I suppose, rather weird sense of power.”

Essentially, this differs not at all – either as a psychological satisfaction or as a career move – from the way Johnny Rotten made himself famous: “Johnny Rotten, a member of the group,” the Guardian reported in 1976 after The Sex Pistols had exploded into wider British consciousness in an outrageously offensive TV interview, “said in a BBC interview that he had launched himself to stardom by walking up and down the King’s Road in Chelsea, spitting at people. ‘I did it because they were stupid’.”

Throwing rocks over the garden wall to hear the crash from the neighbour’s greenhouse windows is the upper-middle-class Home Counties version of spitting at people on the King’s Road because they are stupid. And each has the same performative quality of edgy clowning in which everything is at once very funny and highly sinister.

The somewhat despairing question that Bill Grundy asked in his notorious Sex Pistols TV interview – “Are you serious or are you just… trying to make me laugh?” – hangs over Johnson’s entire political and journalistic career. Tory anarchism always had a taste for the outrageous: before the Sex Pistols said “f**k” on television, the last person to do so was Sir Peregrine Worsthorne, then deputy editor of the Sunday Telegraph and an obvious journalistic model for Johnson.

They are all bad boys. It is not accidental that the far-right Faragist side of the Brexit movement chose to paint itself as a political wing of the Sex Pistols. Its supplier of dark money, Arron Banks, called his hastily cobbled-together book The Bad Boys of Brexit: Tales of Mischief, Mayhem & Guerrilla Warfare in the EU Referendum Campaign. “Let’s shake this up,” Banks records himself saying to Farage in July, 2015, as they are planning what would become an openly racist campaign. “The more outrageous we are, the more attention we’ll get; the more attention we get, the more outrageous we’ll be.”

Mischief, mayhem, bad boys, brutal laddish mockery, the knowledge that the more outrageous they were the more attention they would get – all of this was pioneered by the Sex Pistols’ Svengali, Malcolm McLaren.

It would be a good quiz question to ask whether this passage is by McLaren or Banks: “I had created a feeling that was both euphoric and hysterical. On that tour bus, you couldn’t help but be aware of an enormous range of possibilities – that whatever was happening couldn’t be predicted, that it was a movement towards a place unknown. We had the means now to start a revolution of everyday life.” It is actually McLaren on the Pistols’ first tour, but it could describe the careening course of the Brexit campaign.

This is an edited extract from Fintan O’Toole’s Heroic Failure: Brexit and the Politics of Pain, published by Head of Zeus; Jonathan Coe reviews it here

How To Become Bilingual

By CARLOS MARTÍN GAEBLER

Being able to speak English as a second language opens up a world of opportunities for you in many walks of life. Speaking a foreign language not only makes you a richer person both socially and culturally, but also allows you to feel like a citizen of the world. A reasonable competence in understanding and speaking the English language will certainly make you feel confident wherever you go, even in Europe! Within the European Union alone there are several countries, apart from Ireland, where English is broadly spoken by the majority of the population, which makes it easy to get by. Such is the case with Sweden, Denmark, Holland or Malta.

Travelling offers you the best way to practise your English. In this respect, the Erasmus Mobility Programme provides Spanish university students with the best chance to acquaint themselves with their European fellow students. Bear in mind that quite a number of European universities offer some of their courses in English. So you might want to consider the possibility of applying for an Erasmus grant and spending a few months at another European university. Studying for a year abroad should be an integral part of every young Spanish university student’s education. It always turns out to be a once-in-a-lifetime experience and I warmly encourage you to seize the opportunity. You’ll never regret it later! Also remember that travelling in Europe has become much easier after the euro, the European single currency, has been adopted by nineteen EU countries.

It is common knowledge that tourism has become Seville’s number-one industry. Thousands of people work or intend to work in this field, but sadly enough very few of them could claim that they have an acceptable level of English. It is a fact that the level of English of local shop assistants, taxi drivers, waiters or bank clerks, for instance, leaves a lot to be desired. Being competent in English should go with certain jobs, even if some do not seem to see the logic of it. In this case, speaking a foreign language is just another way of being hospitable.

Finally, one of the best and most enjoyable ways of achieving some kind of bilingual ability is watching films in their original English version. In Seville you can now do so at the Avenida, Nervión Plaza or Metromar cinemas (in Málaga at the Albéniz and Plaza Mayor cinemas), which regularly show English-speaking films with Spanish subtitles. Netflix or Movistar also allow you to watch films, series or documentaries in English with Spanish or English subtitles. Not only will you learn new expressions or recognise the ones you have already learnt, but you will also enjoy the different accents of great actors and actresses, because, as any film lover would tell you, a good film is a magical combination of moving images and human voices, and the latter should never be dubbed.

In short, being bilingual will broaden your perception of the world around you and will give you the tools to become part of the multilingual global society we live in. If you overcome your initial communicative shyness and reach the point when you feel confident to speak today’s lingua franca at any time anywhere, you will have the world in the palm of your hand. If other Europeans can do it, so can you! Remember the saying, “Where there’s a will there’s a way.” Have a go and enjoy the difference!

Discover Europe on InterRail

Interrailers from Algeciras en route from Bruges to Antwerpen.

The time has come to make that InterRail trip! Take to the rails for a whistle-stop tour of Europe. Meet other travellers, improve your English, experience everything Europe has to offer and collect lifelong memories along the way.

Europe's modern rail network makes train travel easy, comfortable, efficient and environmentally-friendly. With an InterRail Pass you have the freedom to travel wherever you want in and between all of 30 participating European countries for a certain period of time. The main exception is that high-speed trains and night trains often require a paid seat reservation. Step on board the train with your buddies and discover Europe's secrets.

Here are 7 Interrail tips to fall in love with train travel in Europe, plus 10 cheap backpacking tips. You can easily book accommodation at Youth Hostels around the continent. Bon voyage!

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The Prado Museum: A Collection of Wonders_documentary

We are in one of the temples of world art, a site of memory and a mirror to the present with 1700 works exhibited and a further 7000 art treasures preserved there. Its collection tells the story of kings, queens, dynasties, wars, defeats and victories, as well as the story of the feelings and emotions of the men and women of yesteryear and of today, whose lives are intertwined with the museum’s: rulers, painters, artists, architects, collectors, curators, intellectuals, visitors.

In 2019, the year of its 200^th Anniversary celebrations, telling the story of the Prado in Madrid from the day it was “founded” – that 19^th November 1819 when mention was first made of the Museo Real de Pinturas – means covering not only the last 200 years, but at least six centuries of history. The life of the Prado collection began with the birth of Spain as a nation and the marriage between Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabel of Castile, a union that marked the start of the great Spanish Empire. Yet, for a long time over the centuries, painting had been a universal language that knew no boundaries. If there is one museum where it is clear that painting was not affected by nationalism, then that museum must surely be the Prado, with its eclectic and multifaceted collections demonstrating that art has no passports limiting its circulation, that rather it is a universal means to understand and convey the thoughts and feelings of human beings.

For this reason, taking the leading role in THE PRADO MUSEUM. A COLLECTION OF WONDERS are its art masterpieces and the great artists who made them, the crowned heads who collected them, but also the European and libertarian inspiration behind a museum and its wealth of art treasures and stories. Furthermore, there is an extra-special feature: Oscar® winning actor Jeremy Irons will be guiding spectators on a discovery of a heritage of beauty and art. Starting from the Salón de Reinos, in a deliberately bare architectural style that comes alive with people, lights and projections, taking the visitor back to the glorious past of the Spanish monarchy and the Siglo de Oro, when hanging from the walls then were many of the masterpieces exhibited today at the Prado. At that time, the space was used for dancing, holding parties and giving theatrical performances. This was a vibrant core of Madrid and of Spain as a whole, as was the Barrio de las Letras, where writers and artists from the Siglo de Oro lived, and, in the 20th century, the Residencia de Estudiantes, where intellectuals from the Generation of 1927 would meet, including Buñuel, Lorca and Dalí.

The paintings in the Prado reflect a unique epic era, that gave rise to one of the most important museums in the world. This is a collection put together “more with the heart than the head” because kings and queens chose only what they loved. It is an inventory of tastes and pleasures that tells the story of public events, dynasties, cardinals, wars and coalitions. It is also an inventory of private matters: a wedding, a lavishly laid table, the madness of a queen. It is a close network of crowned heads, hidalgos, majas y caballeros, each with their lives, truths and messages. It is the story of an era of great patronage, of the Spanish monarchs’ love for the great masters, like Goya, whose strong presence at the Prado is a body of work totalling over nine hundred items, including most of his drawings and letters. Goya’s art has influenced many modern artists, as is the case with 3^rd May 1808, a painting that depicts the effects of the Spanish revolt against the French army. This work would become a symbol of all wars and would give Picasso the inspiration for his Guernica. Like Picasso, Dalí and García Lorca were also captivated by the museum, while writer and painter Antonio Saura, who would continuously go there to bask in its magical atmosphere, called the Prado “a wealth of intensity”. So, this is art that illuminates the present and asks us: what has the Prado Museum been in these two hundred years, what is it today and what will it continue to represent for future generations – this living museum, a beacon for all Spaniards during the dark moments of the dictatorship, and a home to return to for exiled artists and intellectuals?

The aim of the authors, consequently, was to tell the story not only of the formal beauty and enchanting appeal of the Prado collection but also about how much the themes of the works exhibited are current today, and how through the history of art, they can also be a narrative of society, with its ideals, its prejudices, vices, new ideas, scientific discoveries, human psychology and fashions.

THE PRADO MUSEUM. A COLLECTION OF WONDERS is not only about these extraordinary works of art, which are the heart and soul of the documentary, but also about the landscape, the Royal palaces and buildings that set the scene and saw the birth and development of these art collections. This heritage is universal and includes not only the works of Velázquez, Rubens, Titian, Mantegna, Bosch, Goya, El Greco preserved in the Prado, but also the Escorial, the Pantheon of the Royal family, the Royal Palace of Madrid, the Convent of Las Descalzas Reales, the Salón de Reinos. It is a fresco contrasting interiors and exteriors, paintings and palaces, brushstrokes and gardens. 

The birth of the Prado Museum is an engaging story. In 1785 Charles III of Bourbon commissioned court architect Juan de Villanueva to design a building to house the Gabinete de Historia Natural. It would never serve that purpose. The building was transformed into the Museum we know today. Walking through this place of beauty means never ceasing to be amazed, removing prejudices and contradictions, discovering the myths and symbols of a wonderful, sometimes revolutionary, world. It means an interactive exchange through the history of art. It means being enraptured by masterpieces such as the Deposition by Flemish artist Van der Weyden, Adam and Eve by Titian, the Black Paintings of Goya’s later years, Las Meninas by Velázquez (“The air in Las Meninas is the best quality air that exists“, declared Dalí), El Greco’s twisted, elongated, unconventional figures, The Garden of Earthly Delights by Bosch, which arouses curiosity, expectation, attention in visitors of any nationality and culture, or the work of the Flemish Clara Peeters, who had the courage to paint miniature self-portraits in her still-life paintings and stake a claim for the role of female artists, or even Ribera’s The Bearded Lady, where a woman, face covered by a thick beard, breastfeeds the new-born baby she holds in her arms.

Next showing at Avenida cinema: Thursday, January 23, 8pm

Impeachment

Fake News are FREE

"THEY ARE ALL LIES, BUT THEY ARE FREE!"

Recoger las redes

Por JUAN GABRIEL VÁSQUEZ

Abrí mi primera cuenta de correo electrónico en 1998. Por esos días el fenómeno era todavía reciente, pero ya mi tardanza había comenzado a parecer un acto de escepticismo y aun de terquedad. De manera que 12 años después, cuando empecé a sugerir en público que las redes sociales eran una pérdida de tiempo, que en ellas predominaban el narcisismo risible y el exhibicionismo pueril, y que además estaban estropeando la conversación política, tuve que aceptar la posibilidad de estar equivocándome otra vez: la posibilidad de que me encontrara arrepintiéndome de mis recelos a la vuelta de unos meses y abriendo, yo también, mi cuenta de Twitter, mi página de Facebook. Nunca lo hice, y ahora tengo una certeza: ha sido una de las decisiones más clarividentes que he tomado jamás. Pero pocas veces me ha parecido tan triste tener razón.

Lo pienso ahora que he comenzado a ver por todas partes la resaca de las redes sociales. No es que su popularidad haya decaído, ni su influencia; pero en el último año han aparecido resmas de páginas que prueban, con estudios sociológicos y datos concretos, lo que algunos nos atrevíamos a sugerir sin ellos hace poco menos de una década.

Jaron Lanier publicó el año pasado un libro-panfleto que lo dice con palabras suficientes: Diez razones para borrar tus redes sociales de inmediato. Lanier es un habitante de Silicon Valley: es uno de los inventores de la realidad virtual, por ejemplo, y en su momento hizo tanto como cualquiera por convertir Internet en un fenómeno ubicuo. Es por eso por lo que sus alegatos contra las redes sociales escuecen tanto entre los cautivos. Es alguien que habla desde dentro.

Lanier cree, por ejemplo, que las redes sociales nos están convirtiendo en cabrones (la palabra que usa es assholes, y en la traducción española pone “idiota”. Creo que se queda corta). Lo que quiere decir es que las redes son un ecosistema donde gana quien más atención reciba; y debido a una compleja relación entre los algoritmos y la naturaleza humana, quien más atención recibe es siempre quien insulta, quien agrede, quien matonea o calumnia. Esto sucede, en parte, por la facilidad que dan las redes al trol que todos llevamos dentro, pero también por la manera misteriosa en que las redes minan la empatía: los algoritmos diseñan una realidad a la medida del usuario, fabricada para cada uno de nosotros con nuestros prejuicios y aun nuestros odios; de manera que cada uno va perdiendo con el tiempo la capacidad para entender la realidad de los demás y va ganando, en cambio, cierta facilidad para considerar que todos los demás son sus enemigos. Y en esas condiciones, por supuesto, el ejercicio de la política, en algo imposible, pues las redes están diseñadas para dar un protagonismo inusitado a la paranoia y a la mentira: la verdad no da clics.

¿Cómo responder? Cerrando las redes. Lanier reconoce, por supuesto, las revoluciones pequeñas y grandes que sin las redes no habrían ocurrido. Por eso no dice que las eliminemos de nuestro futuro, sino que nos rebelemos contra las que existen, contra un modelo de negocio montado enteramente sobre la adicción y la manipulación, sobre la explotación económica de nuestros lados más deplorables. Es la única forma, dice, de forzar la invención de un mejor sistema. Lo único que lamento de no tener redes sociales es no darme el gusto, después de leer a Lanier, de cerrarlas para siempre. El País Semanal, 10.11.19

Devaluación continua

Por BERNA GONZÁLEZ HARBOUR

Andreu Navarra, profesor de Lengua y Literatura de Secundaria, retrata la incapacidad de concentrarse de la nueva generación de “ciberproletariado” o la ausencia de debate sobre el futuro al que esta sociedad quiere conducir a sus jóvenes. Navarra no es un teórico, pero sí un torrente de verdades que acaba de publicar Devaluación continua (Tusquets), un latigazo contra la ceguera, una llamada de emergencia ante la degradación del modelo educativo.

“Los profesores queremos crear ciudadanos autónomos y críticos, y en su lugar estamos creando ciberproletariado, una generación sin datos, sin conocimiento, sin léxico. Estamos viendo el triunfo de una religión tecnocrática que evoluciona hacia menos contenidos y alumnos más idiotas. Estamos sirviendo a la tecnología y no la tecnología a nosotros”, afirma Navarra. “El profesor está exhausto, devorado por una burocracia para generar estadísticas, lo que le quita energía mental para dar clase”.

El testimonio de Andreu Navarra (Barcelona, 1981), historiador, tiene el valor de quien ha impartido clase durante seis años en colegios concertados y públicos, en zonas ricas y castigadas, donde encuentra por igual “profesores heroicos” en un sistema educativo estresado por la propia sociedad de la que es espejo: hay padres ausentes porque trabajan demasiado; hay violencia; hay chicos sin comer o desayunar; hay muchos problemas mentales; y hay una generación ausente por su concentración en las redes y su identidad virtual.

“Lo audiovisual está creando una nueva Edad Media de personas dependientes de satisfacer el placer aquí y ahora, cuando la vida es muy diferente. En la vida hay que saber leer contratos, alquilar pisos, cuidar a tus mayores, criar hijos. Pero el ciberproletariado se viene abajo ante cualquier problema. Son personas que no serán capaces de trabajar porque tienen la concentración secuestrada por las redes”, dice. No es que todos los jóvenes encajen en su mirada crítica, pero sí ve el riesgo de exclusión de una cuarta parte de los alumnos en una tormenta perfecta de precariedad y vida virtual.

El libro de Navarra recurre a Ortega y Gasset para apelar a un debate necesario antes de todo lo demás: a dónde vamos. “Si sabes a dónde vas, si abrimos un debate sobre el modelo de futuro al que queremos avanzar, después regularás la tecnología, los horarios o lo que sea, pero antes de aumentar o disminuir las horas tienes que pensar qué quieres hacer con ellas”, sostiene. Y el modelo de sociedad que convierte en héroes carismáticos a Pablo Escobar o Jesús Gil en series de televisión; la falta de ejemplaridad de unos políticos “pillos, de ahora no te hablo, de quién la tiene más larga”; la mentalidad Fraga de “turismo y populismo que prosigue en Salou, en Magaluf, en que destrocen Barcelona” no ayuda. “Falta reflexión sobre la sociedad que queremos, por qué no apostamos por un MIT español, por exportar literatura, ingeniería patentada aquí y no exportar ingenieros”. Pero “el papel de ascensor social de la educación está fracasando y estamos creando bolsas de guetos, de personas sin futuro”.

Menciona también el maquillaje de la ignorancia que practican los colegios para mejorar la estadística. E insiste una y otra vez en la incapacidad de fijar la atención, gran carencia de una nueva generación con fotos en las redes, pero sin memoria. “Hemos conocido varios capitalismos y ahora mismo estamos en el capitalismo de la atención, en una economía de plataformas que mercantilizan tu atención. Si estás viendo unos mensajes, alguien gana dinero y si ves otros, lo gana otro alguien. No podemos repensar la educación si no pensamos cómo devolver la atención a las aulas, y regresamos del mundo virtual. Ahora no podemos ensimismarnos, como defendía Ortega y Gasset, porque todo es ruido, la política es gritos, eslóganes, nadie piensa, nadie escribe, todo es tontería y eslogan y eso ha llegado a las aulas: lo simplista, lo binario, el bien y el mal”. Los Steve Jobs o Zuckerberg, recuerda, recibieron educación analógica. Y los gurúes tecnológicos mandan a sus hijos a colegios analógicos. Es por ello por lo que, concluye, “hasta que arreglemos la sociedad, no podremos arreglar el sistema educativo”. (El País, 15 de septiembre de 2019)

Boca Juniors: The Agony and the Ecstasy

By JAMIE LAFFERTY
n Magazine by Norwegian, December 2018

On a cool, clear evening in Buenos Aires, San Martín de San Juan, a small football team from western Argentina, arrives to face the music at La Bombonera. Home of Boca Juniors, the largest and most successful team in the country, the stadium is the beating blue-and-gold heart of the colourful, chaotic La Boca neighbourhood. 

Indeed, it’s known as much for the noisy enthusiasm of its fans as for the skill of its players, who’ve counted Maradona among their number. Officially the Estadio Alberto J Armando, it’s known to everyone as “The Chocolate Box”, thanks to its unusual shape. But in reality, it’s more meat grinder than confectionery container – certainly for visiting teams who enjoy little success here. This is partly owing to a police ban on any travelling supporters, put in place in 2013, that ensures a wholly partisan atmosphere permeates. 

The result is an intimidating frenzy reminiscent of the Two Minutes Hate in George Orwell’s 1984. “An ecstasy of fear and vindictiveness... [flowed] through the whole group like an electric current, turning one even against one’s will into a grimacing, screaming lunatic.” A game at La Bombonera is like that, only 45 times longer.

And yet, strange as it might sound to the nonfootball fan, this fury holds a certain appeal. In a sport where growing corporatisation has led to an increasingly bland and sanitised experience, Boca’s wild terraces are a throwback to a different era. For fans from around the world, this intensity is something to be sought out. Tickets are hard to come by, and it’s not an experience tourists can just wander into, but local tour company Tangol has begun to offer tickets to select foreigners who are accompanied by seasonticket-holding guides. As soon as I heard this was possible, I wanted to experience it. I’m from Glasgow, a city with a notorious footballing reputation of its own, but, even so, visiting La Bombonera seemed like it could be something above and beyond anything I had encountered at home. 

A couple of hours before kick-off, I’m duly picked up by diehard Boca fan and Tangol guide Santiago Puerta. Inside the minibus, there’s an eclectic mix of tourists: two stern-looking Finns, a cheery American family and a lone Iranian backpacker. “You’re coming to my house now – it’s a privilege,” says Puerta to all of us as we board, and he makes sure no one is wearing any red or white clothing (the colours of middle-class rivals River Plate) before reassuring us that we’ll be in a section of the 49,000-seat stadium away from flares and trouble. 

As the minibus moves through the city, it passes buses of hardcore Boca fans who have been touring the city for hours, shouting and singing out of the windows to let everyone know it’s game day. As we get closer to the stadium, Puerta gives us a potted history of the club, which was founded in 1905 by Italian immigrants for La Boca’s vociferous working class. Now the most popular team in the country, their jerseys are found across Argentina, but the reason for their famous colour scheme is surprisingly arbitrary. “The founders couldn’t agree on which colours to have, so because La Boca is close to the port, they decided to go down there and take them from the next ship that came in,” explains Puerta. “It was Swedish, thank God, because these colours are really pretty. This is what we have: blue and gold for life.” 

As we climb high into La Bombonera for the start of the game, those same hues are on the back of every fan and draped from all four stands. The sun is setting so even the sky seems to pay tribute to the team, shifting from a powdery blue to a burnished gold. Puerta settles his guests before taking a seat on the stairs, making it easier for him to jump up and roar when Carlos Tévez gives his team the lead after just nine minutes. The collective roar sounds like an explosion. The atmosphere at La Bombonera is intensified in part because of the steepness and semi-circular shape of the terraces, which boost the acoustics.

From high in the main stand, we have a great view of the pitch, but also of La Doce (The Twelfth Man): the relentless fans behind the goal who move from one chant to the next, with just a quick breather at half time. 

While there’s no doubting the commitment of any fans here – even we newcomers quickly lose our inhibitions when a goal is scored – La Doce sets the rhythm for the stadium, and perhaps the entire country. Season tickets at La Bombonera are generational and there are rarely vacancies in their manic stand. The section does have seats, but they’re only used as springboards, allowing fans to jump all the higher when shouting their heroes’ names. Even before scoring, Tévez was the most popular man in the stadium. A short, stocky striker, he first made his name here with Boca Juniors before making his fortune in the UK. Despite never learning English, he made a huge impression there, almost single-handedly saving West Ham from relegation, then winning titles with Manchester United, and their old rivals Man City. 

Like many South American players, Tévez eventually opted to play out the final days of his career in his homeland, back with the team that gave him his break. He’s now the highest-paid player in the league, even though his wages are a fraction of what they were in England, Italy and during an ill-judged spell in China. 

For Boca fans, the money is not important, though – what really matters is one of their most beloved sons choosing to return home. He grew up 20km from the stadium, in desperate poverty in the notorious Fuerte Apache barrio. While many footballers cover their bodies in patchworks of tattoos, Tévez came into the game scarred: as an infant he accidentally pulled a pan of boiling water off a table and onto himself. Despite his millions, he’s never had any surgery to diminish the scars that run down his neck and chest. At the end of games, he often removes his jersey, as though to remind everyone what it means for him to be here. 

He still plays the game like that too, as if getting the ball is his only way to get out of Fuerte Apache. As he smashes through defences, a neutral fan might feel sorry for his opponents but that’s not the Boca way. “He’s really one of us,” says Puerta, nodding with approval as a San Martín defender lies prone on the pitch. “Of course, people talk about Maradona, but he was already finished when he came back here.” 

If anything, Maradona is more beloved for what he achieved with the Argentinian national side than his single 1981/82 league title with Boca Juniors. In the Museo de la Pasión Boquense – the club museum in the bowels of La Bombonera – it’s clear that players such as Martín Palermo (236 goals and 13 trophies for Boca) or Juan Román Riquelme (11 trophies over two stints with the club) are held in higher regard than “El Diego”. 

However, during the 90 minutes of the match, history seems irrelevant – all that matters is what’s happening on the pitch and the irresistible rhythm of the drums, the crowd’s communal heartbeat. As they chant, fans throw their arms out as though trying to shake something sticky from their hands. When they synchronise a sort of tomahawk chop, thousands of arms slicing through the air, the collective result is hypnotic and infectious. Around the stadium, the blue and gold shimmer as Boca take a 2-0 lead, and during every goal in their 4-2 victory.

Coming to see Boca Juniors feels like travelling back to see football as it might have been in the good old days. The tribalism is very real, the atmosphere supercharged. At half time, Santiago Puerta comes over to me, keen to talk more football, listing every Argentinian player who ever played for Rangers or Celtic in Glasgow. Puerta keeps an eye on that old Scottish war, just as I like to know who wins each Boca Juniors-River Plate match, the infamous Superclásico. The battle lines in Glasgow are religious, so what about here? Why the major rivalry between La Boca and River Plate? “It’s class,” replies Puerta quickly. “Those guys, you know,” he pushes his nose back, seeming to indicate snobbery, “but this year they’re so bad it’s almost no fun to beat them... Almost.” I start to tell him that in the Europe’s top leagues, much has been lost as money has flooded the game. Season tickets are extraordinarily expensive and not enough fans support their home sides; the players are richer, but the sport is arguably impoverished. I think he’s listening, but then La Doce restarts the drums, his eyes seem to go just a little vacant and a moment later, my guide is leaning over the safety barrier, howling with 50,000 others: “When I die, I don’t want flowers/ I want a coffin that has these colours.”

Economic growth poses threat to the environment

By PHILIP O'NEILL

Irish Independent, August 10, 2019

The Celtic Tiger did much to sustain the myth that if the economy grows it will benefit all. This same ill-grounded confidence is peddled by Britain's Brexiteers, although it is generally agreed by many economists that the benefits of growth do not trickle downwards; on the contrary, a form of osmosis known as greed tends to facilitate a relentless upwards trickle. Even hardcore economists find it difficult to say "trickle down" with a straight face.

The economic divide between the beneficiaries of the fruits of economic growth and those who just observe it, has generated a political divide that reinforces the advantage over the poor of the better-off.

What is becoming evident is the fragility of democratic institutions as divisions between competing views of wealth creation and distribution vie with one another. This is significant in relation to the persistent insensitivity to the impact of the misuse of the earth's resources, where again the poor of the earth are but hapless spectators.

One of the legacies of the heady Celtic Tiger years was an emerging awareness of the significant long-term threat to the environment that rapid growth and development pose. This includes the threat of irreversible damage to ecosystems, land degradation, deforestation and loss of biodiversity.

In Ireland, our future was hijacked and forfeited to powerful companies who ministered to various forms of rogue capitalism. The housing bubble resulted from reckless gambling; our country was securely in the hands of a powerful elite who had no thought for tomorrow. The rest of us were nurtured by the rhetoric of orthodoxy and resignation.

For some economists, poverty is assumed to be the price we have to pay if our economy is to thrive. The religious minded may be content to pray for the poor. However, there is little sense in praying for them while the rest of the world preys on them. As the poet Yeats would say: "The poor have only their dreams."

Localismos y aprendizaje de idiomas

Por CARLOS MARTÍN GAEBLER

La curiosidad por conocer al otro, la cultura del otro, la lengua del otro es requisito imprescindible para el aprendizaje de un idioma diferente al nuestro materno.  Una visión cosmopolita de nuestro entorno facilita la adquisición de habilidades idiomáticas diferentes de las propias. A la inversa, sucede que cuanto mayor sea el apego por la cultura local menor será el interés por conocer una lengua extranjera. Tras tres décadas dedicado a la enseñanza de idiomas, he podido constatar que, cuando un individuo está involucrado únicamente en su cultura autóctona, éste se ve incapaz de adquirir destreza en el uso de una lengua extranjera. Se trata de una relación causa efecto. Sin embargo, aquellos individuos que viajan a otros lugares, ven y escuchan películas de otras partes del mundo, o leen sobre otros asuntos además de sobre su cultura local, muestran una disposición natural al aprendizaje de una lengua extranjera, pues consideran que ésta les enriquece como personas y les hace sentirse ciudadanos del mundo, sentimiento que no ansían quienes, en su obsesión identitaria, sólo se enorgullecen de una cultura autóctona que, por su riqueza y omnipresencia en la vida colectiva, perciben como autosuficiente. 

Por lo general, quienes simplemente se conforman con sus tradiciones, con la foto fija de liturgias locales, siempre idénticas y periódicas, carecen de la curiosidad por ver, a través de la ventana del cine, imágenes en movimiento de historias multiculturales localizadas en otras latitudes de la sociedad global. En su narcisismo no son capaces de apreciar otros acentos, otros idiomas, ni sienten la necesidad de aprenderlos. Dice Antonio Muñoz Molina que una cultura personal se adquiere con mucho tesón y esfuerzo a lo largo de la vida, igual que se adquiere la destreza para hablar un idioma extranjero; una cultura autóctona se posee tan solo por nacer en ella. Sentirse exageradamente orgulloso de haber nacido en tal o cual sitio es un acto empobrecedor y ridículo, como lo es también creerse el ombligo del mundo. El localismo es una forma primigenia de nacionalismo o, como dijo Karl Popper, una regresión a la tribu. 

Estudiar y escuchar un idioma extranjero requiere un esfuerzo intelectual que es incompatible con la práctica de cualquier forma de fanatismo. Algunos se ven incapaces de abandonar su zona de confort, fascinados de por vida por la contemplación de la patrona local, una pequeña estatua articulada de madera a la que adoran, entre otros motivos, porque representa a una mujer que, dicen, "engendró" sin sexo previo.

Una vez conocí a un universitario de una ciudad del sur de España, narcisista como ninguna otra, que confesaba que sólo le interesaban los arquitectos nacidos en su ciudad y no entendía el entusiasmo que sus compañeros de la Escuela de Arquitectura sentían tras anunciarse un taller que iba a ser impartido por dos reputados arquitectos portugueses. A quienes durante gran parte del año ocupan su pensamiento en perpetuar las tradiciones locales o nacionales poco tiempo les queda para ocuparse de estudiar una lengua extranjera que ven ajena a su propio grupo social, no creen necesitar y consideran una asignatura maría. Un estudiante de secundaria me confesó en cierta ocasión que, en lugar de irse de crucero cultural en el viaje de fin de curso con sus compañeros para conocer el Mediterráneo esa primavera, había preferido peregrinar al Rocío, ¡por décimo año consecutivo! Ninguno de los dos habla una segunda lengua. cmg2014

Mass Shootings Are Terrorism

The New York Times, August 7, 2019

If one of the perpetrators of this weekend’s two mass shootings had adhered to the ideology of radical Islam, the resources of the American government and its international allies would mobilize without delay.

The awesome power of the state would work tirelessly to deny future terrorists access to weaponry, money and forums to spread their ideology. The movement would be infiltrated by spies and informants. Its financiers would face sanctions. Places of congregation would be surveilled. Those who gave aid or comfort to terrorists would be prosecuted. Programs would be established to de-radicalize former adherents.

No American would settle for “thoughts and prayers” as a counterterrorism strategy. No American would accept laying the blame for such an attack on video games, like the Texas lieutenant governor, Dan Patrick, did in an interview on Sunday when discussing the mass shooting in El Paso that took 20 lives and left 27 people wounded.

In predictable corners, moderate Muslims would be excoriated for not speaking out more forcefully against the extremists in their midst. Foreign nations would be hit with sanctions for not doing enough to help the cause. Politicians might go so far as to call for a total ban on Muslims entering the United States “until our country’s representatives can figure out what the hell is going on.”

Even a casual observer today can figure out what is going on. The world, and the West in particular, has a serious white nationalist terrorist problem that has been ignored or excused for far too long. As President George W. Bush declared in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, we must be a country “awakened to danger and called to defend freedom. Our grief has turned to anger, and anger to resolution.”

There are serious questions about how the United States has approached Islamic extremism, but if even a degree of that vigilance and unity of effort was put toward white nationalism, we’d be safer.

White nationalist terror attacks are local, but the ideology is global. On Saturday, a terrorist who, according to a federal law enforcement official, wrote that he feared a “Hispanic invasion of Texas” was replacing white Americans opened fire in a Walmart in El Paso. In a manifesto, the gunman wrote that he drew some inspiration from the white nationalist terrorist attack in Christchurch, New Zealand, that left 51 people dead. The F.B.I. is investigating the El Paso mass shooting as a possible act of domestic terrorism. The motive behind another mass shooting in Dayton, Ohio, is under investigation.

In April, another terrorist who opened fire at a synagogue in Poway, Calif., echoed the words of the Christchurch suspect, too, and appeared to draw inspiration from a massacre at a synagogue in Pittsburgh last fall. The alleged Christchurch terrorist, for his part, wrote that he drew inspiration from white supremacist attacks in Norway, the United States, Italy, Sweden and the United Kingdom.

An investigation by The Times earlier this year found that “at least a third of white extremist killers since 2011 were inspired by others who perpetrated similar attacks, professed a reverence for them or showed an interest in their tactics.”

White supremacy, in other words, is a violent, interconnected transnational ideology. Its adherents are gathering in anonymous, online forums to spread their ideas, plotting attacks and cheering on acts of terrorism.

The result is an evolving brand of social media-fueled bloodshed. Online communities like 4chan and 8chan have become hotbeds of white nationalist activity. Anonymous users flood the site’s “politics” board with racist, sexist and homophobic content designed to spread across the web. Users share old fascist fiction, Nazi propaganda and pseudoscientific texts about race and I.Q. and replacement theory, geared to radicalize their peers.

While its modern roots predate the Trump administration by many decades, white nationalism has attained a new mainstream legitimacy during Mr. Trump’s time in office.

Far more Americans have died at the hands of domestic terrorists than at the hands of Islamic extremists since 2001, according to the F.B.I. The agency’s resources, however, are still overwhelmingly weighted toward thwarting international terrorism.

The nation owed a debt to the victims of the 9/11 attacks, to take action against the vile infrastructure that allowed the terrorists to achieve their goals that horrible Tuesday. We owe no less of a debt to the victims in El Paso and to the hundreds of other victims of white nationalist terrorism around the nation.

American law enforcement needs to target white nationalists with the same zeal that they have targeted radical Islamic terrorists. Ensuring the security of the homeland demands it.

There can be no middle ground when it comes to white nationalism and the terrorism it inspires. You’re either for it or against it.