Catalan Vote: Disturbance in the Farce

Part III of Dispatches from the Catalan Front.

Politics: a farce or elaborate game of “parties” that “celebrate” elections and steal the silverware while everyone’s high on flag porn. In Spain, a neo-feudal constitutional monarchy whitewashed with a thin veneer of illusory representative democracy, the farce has become so thick that the ongoing litany of corruption scandals hardly cause any waves anymore. But by going out to vote last Sunday, the surly Catalans have caused a disturbance in the Farce that has been felt as far as the Deaf Star in Madrid and throughout the Spanish politico circus, where the lions are stone, the acrobats are trannies and the clowns make grown men cry.

Spurred on by the dire threats of the central Spanish gummint and the unionist forces against it, Catalans congregated at the ballot boxes and voted last Sunday 11-9 (maybe to break the 9-11 spell?) in a “citizen participation” exercise of wholly symbolic value. A truly festive occasion for the more than two million three hundred thousand citizens that voted in Catalonia and its 19 commercial delegations worldwide… at least for the 80,76 percent that voted Yes-Yes for full independence. The photos on the Twitter feed hashtags such as #jojahevotat (“I’ve already voted”) that were worldwide trending topics on Sunday show so many happy faces that local pundits have already dubbed the vote as “the Revolution of the Smiles”, and truth is the feels were strong despite the symbolic nature of the act. The results are also largely symbolic as most voters were independence supporters, but their majority would probably hold by a small margin even with a high turnout.

11-9 Catalan vote results. Source El Periodico de Catalunya

The smiles did not extend to Madrid, where until the very moment the ballots opened they were still thinking the Catalans would not have the collons to defy god, king and country. In fact, on Sunday morning at 9AM the crypto fascist party UPyD requested the Barcelona weekend judge to stop the vote, confiscate the ballots and arrest the table officers and political instigators using force if necessary. The judge delicately told them to shove off, saying that the proposed measures were disproportionate to the situation. And so the vote was held in peace, with the only exception of Girona, where a group of skinheads bumrushed a voting point, kicked the ballot box to the ground and, in a textbook case of instant karma, were smote by the violent gentlemen of a local rugby team which just happened to be there voting. Never had a gaggle of skinheads been happier to see the police arrive to arrest them.

The Catalans that voted, one-third of eligible voters, awoke Monday morning with the sensation of having done something, even if comes to nothing. Not so the unionist forces, which have emerged gnashing and wailing at everything and everyone, most notably Catalan president Mas (who they want arrested for sedition) and, more surprisingly, central president Ratjoy, who they accuse of allowing the provinces to vote by his inaction. Their reasoning is that the Ratjoy should have sent in the tanks to protect “democracy” from the “antidemocratic Catalan vote”, which is the kind of cognitive dissonance that emerges when fascists confuse “democracy” with “motherland” in their brainbones. So not only did the surly Catalans get away with their dirty little erstatz vote, but Mr. No the Ratjoy is responsible for not being “no” enough to prevent it. Which would be funny if it weren’t so real and the reason this country bled itself in a fraticidal civil war eight decades ago.

So far, the Ratjoy has made no comment regarding the vote, nor does he have any public appearances scheduled this week, in line with his policy of downplaying the entire issue as inconsequential and meaningless. In this vaccum, Mas has set a two-week deadline for Madrid to sit down and negotiate, because nothing tickles the regime nostalgics in Madrid like being given ultimatums by the uppity Catalans. Unionist forces are flapping around in headless chicken mode and have filed at least two different lawsuits against the Ratjoy for failing to defend the territorial integrity of Spain. But if he tries to punish the instigators of the Catalan vote, the tinderbox called Catalonia will burn bright enough for the whole world to see, which will make the international financial gangbangers shrivel and pull out. Meanwhile, the socialist opposition is making noises about wanting to talk about their “federalist option” which is but the Republic in disguise. So the Ratjoy can ignore the Catalans as long as he wants, but he will not survive the roses from his fiends.

Beyond all the sound and fury of the Catalan vote, students of the Way can step back and observe the Tao laying down its law in the realm of duality, where everything carries within the seed of its own nemesis, the “eyes” of the Yin Yang symbol. The act of voting in democracy was designed as a symbolic ritual to lull the taxpayer into the illusion of representation by a single corporate body with left and right extremities. But as with all things, it also carries within the seed of change that will eventually break the chains and turn on its creators. Sunday’s vote was the first small-scale pilot test in preparation for the first real deployment. ¿Podemos? Veremos.