To the nauseating spectacle of the two major Spanish political parties throwing excrement in each other’s faces (the case of Koldo, Ayuso’s boyfriend), there is a Catalan electoral campaign that essentially aspires to complicate our lives even more . We read comments again about the great tricks at play, about amazing stage tricks and tremendous ideological dilemmas. They call it politics, but it’s just tactics. The chatter of these days has as much value as the comments before a football match.
Thanks to the umpteenth electoral advance, many social, economic and cultural programs will have to suddenly slow down. Several laws that parliamentarians had been negotiating are already in the trash. Among others, the model “transitional and urgent measures law to deal with and eradicate homelessness”.
It is particularly cruel that this law has been wrecked. Presented more than two years ago, it was not an initiative of parliamentarians, but of five social institutions (Arrels, Assís, Càritas, Sant’Egidio and Sant Joan de Déu), advised by doctors of law Aguado, Pitarch, Prado and González. The vast majority of Catalan parties joined it and, right after, exhibited their “great social sensitivity” in front of the media. But already at the beginning of 2023, the alarms went off: despite the fact that the proposal had been perfectly designed by some civil lawyers, the processing of the law got stuck. Infuriatingly slow. Another year had to pass. And when it seemed that the law was finally entering the exit ramp, the election call has ruined the work done, including a collective book, Homelessness (Ed. Icaria), which will be presented, among disappointments, after Easter .
The suffering of the homeless, the worst off in this country, has quietly gone into the trash bin because, as has been proven once again, politics is only interested in itself. The interests of the parties always prevail over the needs of the country.
When, now, on the street, parliamentarians see a man stacking cardboard to make a mattress, will they dare to look at him? They could have created the conditions to make it possible for the problem of the homeless to be dealt with from the root. But a mixture of laziness, laziness, routine and tacticianism has prevented it. Aren’t they ashamed? No, I know not.
Politics has been the main issue in our collective life for many years. A problem that the media – let’s face it – have contributed to exasperating, along with social networks, the biggest instrument of polarization. That the toxicity of politics is a general disease of the West cannot console us, but it does indicate that, beyond the typical “Spain hurts” prevailing among us since the generation of Unamuno and Maragall, there are common causes in all western societies that explain the degradation of democracies.
The exasperation of individualism is the first cause. A simple glance at our streets shows us a society that does not know the common good: graffiti that destroys facades and trains, laziness and dirt around garbage containers, the behavior of most dog owners, cans, plastics , papers and debris that degrade forest paths. Politicians, often so criticized, are nothing but our mirror. We are very similar: they also mostly go their own way. As Baudelaire would say, they are as hypocritical as you, reader; like me.