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Catalan parliament declares independence from Spain

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Catalan parliament declares independence from Spain

#671

Post by alexandrerond »

philwelch wrote: post #665
alexandrerond wrote: post #202

It's very hard to see a discussion on this topic that does not miss the true point: This "conflict" is the fight between nationalist movements (Spanish and Catalan) which re-enforce each other in every turn for the worse of the majority and of the European Union. On the Catalan side, the Nationalist movement is used by dubious politicians which belong to the richer statements of Catalan society to grab power and "mak…

As a general principle, I think Catalan independence is a question for the Catalans to decide. As a foreigner, it's not my place to have an opinion on another country's self-determination. I am troubled that Spain suppressed the referendum, because it seems out of step with the behavior of other liberal, democratic, Western states. For example, Scotland and Quebec were both allowed to have referendums, and while the…

I'm not very sold on saying that Catalonia is an "ethnic nation" (or comparable to Kosovo like some claim), but I mostly agree.

I wish the referendum would have been legal, and that independence, with a support from the majority of the Catalan population, could happen orderly if need be, with Catalonia staying as a EU member state.

However, with a right-wing government in Spain, this path is not possible. More autonomy: possibly (now I'm not sure anymore), but independence? Not with this government.

A cool-headed approach would have waited longer, paved the way for the return of the left to power, forging the right alliances with the national parties in the left-spectrum in order to get an official referendum in a new Constitutional frame, rather than throw the Catalan and Spanish society into this spiral of non-sense.

The way the Spanish parliament works (with over-represented regional parties) and the raise of Podemos would certainly have provided considerable allies for this sooner or later. Right now, the government is re-inforced, and the Socialists (!) are in the end supporting it, after having been pushed into a corner by the Catalonian goverment actions.

Re: Catalan parliament declares independence from Spain

#672

Post by ben_w »

CaptSpify wrote: post #552
ben_w wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those who wanted to stay would (I suspect) also believe that the referendum was illegal, as per the court order saying so. Why bother showing up to an illegal referendum, especially when the very fact of it being illegal means no result can be trusted as accurate?

Because the referendum still took place means that some people don't care about it being illegal. Politics affects you whether you find it "illegal" or not

I am aware many don’t care that it was illegal, I was suggesting a reason why people might care.

Re: Catalan parliament declares independence from Spain

#673

Post by ben_w »

dragonwriter wrote: post #622
ben_w wrote: post #422

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I am. While people displaced by a colony are obviously disadvantaged, the colony itself and its residents are not.

> While people displaced by a colony are obviously disadvantaged, the colony itself and its residents are not. I think you may be confusing the pattern of colonization in British North America with colonization more generally; the pattern elsewhere was more often of subordination to an imported elite rather than displacement.

Good answer, but you’ve made me realise I made an even deeper error — I was thinking like Civilization: cities as the fundamental unit, not the productive capacity of the nearby land they control.

Re: Catalan parliament declares independence from Spain

#674

Post by justinclift »

dmichulke wrote: post #527
alexandrerond wrote: post #202

It's very hard to see a discussion on this topic that does not miss the true point: This "conflict" is the fight between nationalist movements (Spanish and Catalan) which re-enforce each other in every turn for the worse of the majority and of the European Union. On the Catalan side, the Nationalist movement is used by dubious politicians which belong to the richer statements of Catalan society to grab power and "mak…

> Politicians are not focused on crushing poverty, judges are not working to end corruption, police is not busy catching terrorists. Smaller states have fewer levels of hierarchy and are usually more efficient at what they're doing and less corrupt. Also, people have it easier to exert pressure on their representatives, be it by throwing stones in their windows, not serving the prime minister at the local bakery or j…

As an observation, a fairly standard predator/military/combat tactic is to separate your prey/target from its protective group. eg isolate it so it's easier to overcome

Catalonia doesn't seem to be directly bordered (by land) to any hostile countries though, so that's probably not a worry.

Re: Catalan parliament declares independence from Spain

#675

Post by ben_w »

microcolonel wrote: post #621
coryfklein wrote: post #599

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both of which can get magically disappeared in hours with the superior weaponry and numbers in the hands of the federal government.

Yeah, it'll work out really well when the U.S. military uses their General Dynamics Mission Systems radios to order their General Dynamics Mission Systems drones to fire General Dynamics missiles at General Dynamics. While their General Dynamics M1 Abrams tanks and General Dynamics Stryker AFVs roll through the streets to kill the civilians. This is not the way things would play out. The federal government would twid…

I thought the implication was the tanks rolling up at General Dynamics offices and factories to “protect national security assets from terrorists”, and the General Dynamics CEO welcoming them with the closest one can get to open arms when you’re wearing heavy body armour.

“Disappeared” isn’t just destroying, it’s capturing, too.

Re: Catalan parliament declares independence from Spain

#676

Post by alehul »

Grustaf wrote: post #634
alehul wrote: post #575

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Whoever the winner of this fight is, it will be a sad day for Europe, because nationalism and national borders will have prevailed and this goes against everything we need to build a stronger and better EU. I presume it was also a 'sad day for Europe' when 'nationalism prevailed' and the Baltic states gained independence from the Soviet Union? Catalonia, more so than Estonia, has a distinct culture, including a lan…

>Catalonia, more so than Estonia, has a distinct culture What makes you say that? Estonia is a protestant country of Finnic people speaking a Finno-Ugric language that is completely unrelated to even the Indo-European language family. Soviet, like Russia now, was a Eurasian empire mostly made up of Orthodox Slavs speaking a Slavic language. These are quite distinct cultures, at least as different as Germany and Franc…

You're right that Estonia was not the best possible example in terms of lingual similarity, and Lithuania would've served the purpose better in terms of recent history.

Sweden and Denmark are a great choice, but I think the Swedish War of Liberation is too far back in history to be acknowledged as a relevant example today.

I was mostly attempting to point out our inconsistencies in supporting the independence of so many regions from world powers that we in the West dislike, but we seem very dismissive of cries for independence from within our own borders that seem to hold equal validity.

Re: Catalan parliament declares independence from Spain

#677

Post by tom_mellior »

ben_w wrote: post #668
tom_mellior wrote: post #537

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure what you mean by "after Brexit", but the UK is a full member of the European Union. If the EU has current obligations to finance that road project, whatever that may be, then of course it has to fulfill them.

That would be far too sensible. I mean this: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-38153180 Which seems to refer to this: http://gov.wales/topics/transport/roads/schemes/m4/corridor-... Which is currently “planned” and won’t start until next summer at the earliest.

Ha, thanks. To give the guy the benefit of the doubt, he did seem to be talking about Ireland more specifically, and about basically defrauding the EU (which he presumably doesn't like much). But yes, more likely he's just an idiot.

Re: Catalan parliament declares independence from Spain

#678

Post by ben_w »

StreamBright wrote: post #601
ben_w wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect the only reason the US government lets Americans think the second amendment would enable the population to forcibly remove an undesirable government, is because the weapons and strategic/tactical/leadership skills of the population are vastly out-classed by the armed forces. What good is a semi-automatic against a supersonic jet that just fired an air-to-ground missile in your direction? Plenty of AK-47s in…

US army is not authorized to operate on US soil. I like how you want to drag this conversation into something totally else.

I’m not American, I didn’t know that, and given this is a hypothetical anyway I don’t really think that restriction matters.

Re: Catalan parliament declares independence from Spain

#679

Post by Grustaf »

VeejayRampay wrote: post #662
Grustaf wrote: post #629

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No matter what you think Europe needs, how would you argue that the Catalonians shouldn't have a right to self determination? If, for the sake of argument, a clear majority of them want to be (fully) sovereign from Spain, do you think Madrid has a right to suppress that? And one step up, do you think Brussels has? Do you have the same opinion about Kosovo?

Let's just take it a step further. Now East Catalonia thinks they'd be better off as an independent state, and wait now Barcelona wants to be its own city state. I understand the thirst for democracy, but there's a reason we're collectively moving towards integration as Europeans, it does make us stronger in the long run and helps bring peace and stability.

I wouldn’t say it’s more or leas democratic to let Catalonia leave, since Spain as a whole would vote no.

But with regards to integration, Soviet fell apart. So did Jugoslavia, and then Serbia fractured further. The UK almost fell apart, and they did vote to leave the EU. Many countries in Central Europe are very sceptical of Brussels, and I would say that decentralization is at least as strong a trend as “integration”.

In any event it definitely wasn’t “we as Europeans” that demanded integration, enormous amounts of money were spent by governments to get their respective populaces to vote yes to EU. It’s very much a top down thing, and I’m not so as convinced as you that it will last.

Especially a monetary union that includes both countries like Portugal and Greece on the one hand, and Finland and Germany on the other, seems pretty brittle.

Re: Catalan parliament declares independence from Spain

#680

Post by blibble »

jerf wrote: post #259
platz wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So then, what tactics does civilization require in order to hold together?

Well, that sounds like a book. But despite the failure, I'd point to Brexit as an example where there was a conflict that was still broadly speaking handled in a civilized manner. If I recall correctly, the EU never said that if the UK left, they would take steps to liquidate Parliament. It was (and is!) an acrimonious debate, but still a civilized one (contrary to apparently popular belief, "nice" and "civilized" ar…

> If I recall correctly, the EU never said that if the UK left, they would take steps to liquidate Parliament.

it had no ability to, and never has

even without Article 50 the UK could have unilaterally withdrawn from the treaties, and the EU would have no recourse whatsoever

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