Yet Spain has not witnessed the same level of outrage and alarmist anti-immigration rhetoric we see in the UK, where politicians across the political spectrum and even journalists embrace the slogan “stop the boats’’ as a casual way to speak about desperate people trying to escape hardship. Unlike in the UK, in Spain net migration numbers are usually reported not as a negative, but as a welcome source of growth in a country with an ageing population.
I’d suggest – from Portuguese experience – that that’s more about the projection of bien pensant thinking than actual on the ground opinion. Iberia tends not to pay all that much attention to the people and their opinions on anything.
What does it mean to erase a people – a nation, culture, identity? In Europe, we are finding out.
the population is actually growing due to waves of new immigrants, mostly from Colombia, Morocco and Venezuela.
I think I see a problem with her argument. Or at least two thirds of it.
Ottokring has it
And to be honest if it was people coming in from Morocco alone I’d be less panicked than by some other Majority Islamist countries. I doubt even the most rabid anti-immigration campaigner is that exercised about Aussies, White South Africans and New Zealanders as opposed to endless waves from the RoP homelands…
Steve
I’d go through a paywall to read your longer version of an article with that title…
The money (clot) shot:
Harsh rhetoric against migrants and foreigners is not really paying off in Spain. It is a matter of public responsibility for politicians and journalists to keep it this way.
Translation: when politicians and journalists collude, they can give away your country to foreign invaders with less fuss.
VP – I just reused the subtitle of today’s missal by Sudanese Nesquik and changed “Gaza” to “Europe”.
As we know, journalists are our enemies and would happily dance on our graves.
Not easy posting comments about this.
Steve
Apologies – I did realize it was the headline from the pro – ISIS Guardian journalist in Tim’s previous link – my point was I think you’d be able to give a very humorous and entertaining rebuttal to her work of fiction which illustrated why the Europe we knew is likely to become a distant memory within probably a century…
I’ll try a third time. If Spain is so positive about migration as a welcome source of growth surely we can help them out? Much safer (and hopefully cheaper) than Rwanda plus the ECHR can hardly object.
Immigration has not become a central issue in Spain’s political debate, and the weaponised rhetoric of “invasion” is marginal, used primarily by the far-right party Vox. Vox has very limited power, with 12% of the vote in the most recent general election.
And the equivalent party in the UK has what percentage of the vote?
VP – Thanks, I hope one day to have the opportunity to write about something good for a change.
Anyway, contra Lady We’re-not-full:
Sexual crimes committed by minors in Spain and Italy are soaring, but why?
Spain has the highest number of minors convicted of sexual offences since records began and in Italy the number rose by 15.7%, but why?
Euronews – 09/10/2023
Just a few months ago, police were investigating four gang rapes in a shopping centre in the Spanish city of Badalona.
The alarm was raised by the mother of one of the girls. Her 11-year-old daughter had been raped by six minors in the toilets of the shopping centre. Three of them were under 14 and therefore not criminally liable, and another was never identified.
The judge sentenced two of them – one of whom had threatened the victim’s brother – to juvenile detention. The last was given a suspended sentence.
The Badalona case, which shocked the country because of the impunity of the minors, is just one example of the thousands of sexual crimes that reach the juvenile courts.
Both Spain and Italy are concerned by these cases and, in particular, by the phenomenon of gang rape, which has caused social alarm.
Spain has the highest number of minors convicted of sexual offences since records began.
You will be unsurprised to learn that the rest of the article does not explain why “Spanish” and “Italian” youngsters suddenly can’t stop raping little girls.
“Hi, it’s Katherine here. Look, can you get me a European journalist who can do a piece on how English racists are far worse than those elsewhere? …….No, obviously not Polish or Hungarian, don’t be silly…. and best stay away from the Dutch for a while….Oh, Spain, you say? Yes, nothing with stats or anything, just the usual unverifiable opinions. ….Yes, yes, lunch would be lovely. We’ll wait until after Christmas, but I’ll get back to you. Ciao! “
I suppose you can get forgetful after ten centuries and fail to notice the olifant in the room.
Steve – Nesquik – cheers 🙂
GDP growth 0.3%. Hooray, we’ve avoided recession.
Population growth from immigration 1%.
Errr….
When will this Micawberish nonsense stop? I am betting on the bond markets around the time of Rachel Reeves’s first budget.
She’d probably have said the same about Ireland six weeks ago.
>“stop the boats’’ as a casual way to speak about desperate people trying to escape hardship.
I’ve been to France, I too would be desperate to escape the land of unshaved pits and stale bread. What hardships life in France brings I can only imagine, but I have seen horrors in Toulon.
Looking at those boats it appears obvious that women and children don’t mind “hardship”, seeing as there are none of them on board, ever. Anyone believing that 80IQ dinghy jockeys are going to be a net benefit to any economy needs to be sectioned.
“…desperate people trying to escape hardship *in France*”
FTFY.
Oh wait, I see Agamemnon beat me to it.
I assume part of the dumbing down and ‘decolonisation’ of the education system these days means Spanish youth aren’t taught about the historical Muslim presence in the area
@BniC
As far as I’m aware, they’re still taught about the Reconquista & 1492. It’d be hard to get away from it in Spanish culture. The Muslim hordes were definitively beaten. Although most seem unaware there was a Moorish state In the Alpujarra valley as late as the mid-C16th. Ceded to the Emir of Granada as part of the terms of surrender of the city & genocidally purged after the second insurrection.*
The Spanish do seem to have an odd relationship with Morocco. In the sense that, despite being able to see it on a clear day, they prefer to pretend it doesn’t exist. Just the two Spanish enclaves.. For two countries so close together, you rarely see anything of the culture here. Apart from the Moroccans. (Which there seem to be a lot more of, the past few years) Doesn’t mean that Spanish culture & language isn’t run through with its Moorish inheritance. Just they regard it as Spanish. It’s much the same with Portugal. Spanish maps of the Peninsular just have a blank bit to the west.
*Not saying they did a particularly good job. I own a bit of land there. Some of the people you meet up in the high pueblos are obviously not of Spanish stock. But then I’ve been much of a fan of the heads on coins view of history. Rulers may change but the people generally don’t.
Q: What will be the first Muslim theocracy to have a permanent seat on the UN Security Council?
A: The Islamic Republic of France.
ZT: Perhaps Michel Houellebecq is a visionary.