From El Ejido in Torre Pacheco
These are not pleasant times, when reality seems to align with the most dystopian scenarios of science fiction. Uninhabitable worlds in which we reproduce the worst episodes in the history of humanity, including genocide and the persecution of certain racial groups. Someone always needs to be blamed for the things that happen to us and that we don't like, and it will always be easier to blame immigrants than billionaires, because the latter have the economic power, propaganda, and the purchase of goodwill, which is no small feat.
In this context, what Mauro Entrialgo calls the 'evilism' In his latest book, published by Capitan Swing: "Getting bad people to say things that until very recently were completely reprehensible, such as questioning social consensus as basic as respect for human rights… The boasting of evil as political propaganda. On the contrary, those of us who maintain a position not just leftist, but simply humanist; or defend dialogue as the way to address conflicts; or the need to act against climate change… are"bondholders', the equivalent of a position as innocent as it is useless, according to the ethical code of the ''malists'.
This context explains the persecution of the Latino community in Los Angeles, taken over by Trump's pseudo-army. And also the racist attacks in Torre Pacheco, with Vox extremists fanning the flames of persecution of immigrants, especially North Africans, even though they are the ones who sustain the town's intense agricultural activity. This is also the case in Sa Pobla and other Mallorcan municipalities where some traces of primary activity remain. The same week this happened, President Prohens dismissed Catalina Cirer—the last Christian Democrat of the Balearic PP and the only one from her party to defend human rights in Parliament in the face of the extremists' outbursts—and appointed a national police officer to head the General Directorate of Immigration. A man who defends the idea that a paramilitary organization like Desokupa, which does business illegally, provides training courses for police officers, who says that the majority of people who migrate are criminals... We can already imagine what policy this guy is going to pursue.
The episodes of these days have created a substantial stir in relation to what happened exactly twenty-five years ago in El Ejido, in the province of Almería. Then, as now, any excuse was used to launch a veritable hunt against the North African population, which at that time already represented a third of the population of the Almería municipality. A violent mob dedicated itself to persecuting (it has not yet been clarified how hundreds of baseball bats coincidentally appeared in that town) anyone with a "non-white" skin tone, as well as individuals, NGOs, and political parties that defended human rights, or simply possessed a modicum of sanity. Women in Torre Pacheco with North African partners have now also been stigmatized and threatened. There are two major differences between these episodes: first, the extremists who fueled racist violence back then were few and far between; now, however, they are a governing party in the Balearic Islands and other regions, and have alarmingly infiltrated the security forces and unions. Second, the viral nature of hatred facilitated by social media with increasingly less content regulation, because their owners are also fascists. In fact, a few days later, and although it hasn't been widely discussed, other extremists set fire to a mosque in Piera (Barcelona) before its inauguration.
All of this places coexistence, one of the most precious assets of any society, in a very fragile situation. The only consolation is that although this 'evilism' It permeates everything; in reality, when you go out on the street, nothing is as dramatic as it's portrayed on social media, in the media, and by extremists. In other words, we coexist (and many survive) despite the efforts of some irresponsible politicians to pit us against each other and the historical lack of an integration policy aimed at everyone: at newcomers so they can understand and appreciate the reference society they've come to live in, including the language spoken here; but also at those who were already here, because we must all learn to live and coexist in an increasingly diverse and plural society.
It would be interesting to find common ground among residents, regardless of where we were born, to defend ourselves from those who fuel and benefit from various social ills, starting with housing. Some even blame migrants for this, even though they have to pay 600 euros for a single room to accommodate the entire family, or you, the reader, have to spend almost your entire salary to buy a two-bedroom apartment from some clever landlord. As the old saying goes: while the wise man pointed at the moon, the fools just looked at the finger. And so we continue.
