Catalonia Independence Referendum

[AlwaysExcited]

Thought this deserves a thread. Things looks crazy right now. 

http://edition.cnn.com/2017/10/01/europe/catalonia-spain-independence-referendum-vote/index.html

[unsafetydancer]

Glad I checked before I started a thread on this. Been seeing awful pictures/video on facebook all day. People are getting beaten to a pulp by armed police when they are at the polling stations. I'm sorry to say that the news channels in my country have been pretty biased towards the Spanish government.

[AlwaysExcited]

In my country media seems to be on Catalonian side, but we have our own history with independence movements and referendums. Comments on news sites are terrible, death wishes to all Spanish people and shit like that. 

[unsafetydancer]

Scotland has a history with this as well. To be honest most of what I've seen on facebook is just people condemning the actions of the police attacking civilians. A lot of horrible photos of people covered in blood or old folks being dragged off by guys in riot gear. I saw a video earlier of some guys in black balaclavas singing fascist Franco songs. I never realised there was this level of unrest in Spain. I do think they should be allowed to vote though.

[samurai_sarah]

My thoughts and good wishes are with the people in Catalonia, who got hurt today.

[Fundie Bunny]

As a spanish person, i think i may have a clearer image of what has happened. It was not a referéndum, it was a big joke, there are images of people voting up to five times in different places. People were throwing rocks at police cars and threatening their family members for weeks. 

The central goverment response has been shit on a stick. Instead of opening a dialogue, they decided that behaving like a little kid that doesn't want to share his ball is the fucking way to go. The police response has been way too harsh and apparently, they sent a bunch of people that lack any Human decency.

To sum up, this has been handeled like shit by our useless central goverment, and the promoters of the referéndum do not give a shit about the people they are suposedly working for.

This is just so fucking frustrating.

[fraurosena]

I read recently (and for the life of me, I can't remember where, or I would have quoted) that the Russian social media propaganda machine was found to be extremely active amongst Catalonians. Lots of bots and trolls promoting the referendum and stirring up conflict.

Putin is really amping up his 'divide and conquer' tactics, it seems.

[AlwaysExcited]

7 hours ago, Fundie Bunny said:

As a spanish person, i think i may have a clearer image of what has happened. It was not a referéndum, it was a big joke, there are images of people voting up to five times in different places. People were throwing rocks at police cars and threatening their family members for weeks. 

The central goverment response has been shit on a stick. Instead of opening a dialogue, they decided that behaving like a little kid that doesn't want to share his ball is the fucking way to go. The police response has been way too harsh and apparently, they sent a bunch of people that lack any Human decency.

To sum up, this has been handeled like shit by our useless central goverment, and the promoters of the referéndum do not give a shit about the people they are suposedly working for.

This is just so fucking frustrating.

I have so many questions now. I must admit, I have mostly relied on my country's media when it comes to this. Apparently they've done even poorer work than I thought. 

Generally, many people here seem to be projecting our own past on Catalonia. Which is nonsense, because Spain is obviously not USSR. But I'm afraid this will be a pet subject among anti-EU activists for months to come.  

[fraurosena]

48 minutes ago, AlwaysExcited said:

But I'm afraid this will be a pet subject among anti-EU activists for months to come.  

Oh yes, this is already happening. Anything will be latched onto if it looks like it could be used as an anti-EU argument. There was a rather heated discussion at my son's birthday party yesterday. It started with the Catalonia situation and quickly devolved into moaning about how the 'southern and eastern European countries' are profitering off of our hard-earned money. 'Do you know how much of our money the EU has given to Greece already?' they asked indignantly.

They quickly changed the subject when I asked them if they would rather be a Greek right now... 

[AlwaysExcited]

45 minutes ago, fraurosena said:

Oh yes, this is already happening. Anything will be latched onto if it looks like it could be used as an anti-EU argument. There was a rather heated discussion at my son's birthday party yesterday. It started with the Catalonia situation and quickly devolved into moaning about how the 'southern and eastern European countries' are profitering off of our hard-earned money. 'Do you know how much of our money the EU has given to Greece already?' they asked indignantly.

They quickly changed the subject when I asked them if they would rather be a Greek right now... 

We ARE that Easter European country profiting from your hard-earned money.  But, trust me, you don't want to be here. Most days I'm not sure if I want be here, and this is my home. 
According to anti-EU bunch, though, EU and USA are poisoning us with liberal ideology, death culture and the Gay Agenda. The long term goal is to clean territory from white people so they can send here refugees, brown people and Chinese immigrants.