And freedom will not make us free either.

Contrary to popular belief, most urban artists are completely harmless. Some, however, are exceptions, such as the person or people who have dedicated themselves to stamping facades and walls in Palma with this graffiti seen in the photo: "Tourism makes free", say the three words that make it up. It is a play on words –macabre, it must be admitted– with another inscription, sadly famous, which is displayed on a wrought iron sign at the entrance to the Auschwitz Nazi camp:"Work makes free", say the words that can be read there. That is, "Work will make you free." Placed on the gate of a camp that was officially a forced labor camp, and in practice an extermination camp (especially its associated camp of Birkenau, also called Auschwitz II), this phrase is a cross of atrocious sarcasm towards the thousands of people who entered there as prisoners and who no longer had to leave alive. by groups of schoolchildren and tourists, with the aim that the preservation and transmission of the memory of horror helps us all to not allow it to be repeated. or of democratic memory, have not been as effective as we would like. Human stupidity, and pure and simple evil, exist and are more powerful than we are often willing to believe.

Returning to the graffiti depicting Isaac Buj's photograph, it would be sarcasm about sarcasm. "Tourism will set you free" would be the translation, and suspicions can immediately arise: is it a tourist-phobic graffiti? Is it permissible to paint graffiti in German on the walls of Palma (a city literally surrendered to German tourism) that somehow links tourism to the Holocaust and Nazi war crimes? Who is the graffiti directed at, tourists or residents? Who will be freer thanks to tourism, according to the sense of humor of this urban artist or artists? The graffiti brings us back to the endless debate about whether or not it is necessary to set limits on humor and freedom of expression, what is considered in bad taste, what is offensive, and what is not, etc.

Passive-aggressive threat

Perhaps, rather than reading it as a manifestation of supposed tourismophobia, we should read it from the parameters of tourismophilia. Supporters of mass tourism often insist on an argument based on the passive-aggressive threat, which can be summarized as follows: if it weren't for tourism, what would you do? Tourism is, by far, the most important economic activity in the Balearic Islands, and, therefore, many direct jobs depend on it, and many indirect ones as well. For the vast majority of people, a job is the only source of income available, and each person's income (today, largely meager and precarious) is what allows for a certain degree of personal autonomy in a capitalist society like ours: what we usually call freedom. Therefore, according to the passive-aggressive threat argument, tourism gives us work that gives us income that gives us freedom. We would then reach the conclusion that, for these people, our freedom depends on tourism. It directly depends. In fact, according to them, the raison d'être of these islands is to be a tourist destination: this is no exaggeration; we've heard it on many occasions, not only from businesspeople in the sector, but also from many of our public representatives, and also from a considerable number of fellow citizens who agree, horses.

Six or seven years ago, a Spanish attorney general was heard saying in a speech that it wasn't freedom that makes citizens free, but the law. No one demanded her resignation or dismissal, and she was seriously mistaken: it wasn't the law that should make us free either. Tourism should free us.