Stanley Payne, one of the greatest scholars of Spanish history, writes about the disturbing developments in the country’s current policies towards the discussion of history:
The proposed law in Spain, however, marks a new tendency to weaponize history on behalf of demonstrably distorted and falsified interpretations that are politically useful rather than intellectually credible. This tendency is the product not of ignorance but of intense partisanship. It reflects a millenarian mentality that seeks to purge society of influences and attitudes stemming from the past in order to achieve a kind of purified utopia. Fundamental to this quest is the unrecognized search for a substitute to religious faith. This new political faith seeks to build a world of perfect equality and harmonized values. It imagines that progress can be made toward this immaculate world by presenting politically correct figures as martyrs who died for the coming utopia. This requires, in turn, scapegoating and driving out their supposed victimizers, who are alleged to be authors of the evils that assail society in its present, unredeemed state.
The government completely mishandled COVID, tanked the economy, embraced austerity, and is busily trying to distract everybody from all this by demanding ideological purity. Note, however, how identical these policies are everywhere. Remove the word “Spain,” and this could be easily said about US, Canada, UK, etc. And still people take the bait instead of laughing in these bastards’ lying faces.
“progress can be made toward this immaculate world by presenting politically correct figures as martyrs who died for the coming utopia”
A few months ago I was looking at some sources for some specific African American musical forms (mostly pre WWII). This is a subject I’ve informally read tons about before (and spent many hours listening to) so I know the outlines but I was trying to hunt down some specifics and every single thing I could find has recast this music as ‘resistance’ which (from the words of the musicians themselves) was hardly the first (or third or eighth) thing on their minds.
This is far from an isolated example lots of elements of popular culture are being reframed in terms of ‘resistance’.
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