#francoism

[beautiful-basque-country]

Whenever I hear fatxas saying that in Franco's time everybody had good food on their table my blood boils.

Being around 7, granny had to survive solely on turnips for a whole year. She hated them with her soul.

The other gran used to recieve an orange as a Xmas gift.

Granpa had a relative who would go house by house offering a tiny ham bone so the housewife could give her pot of water some flavor. He charged by the time the bone was inside the water, then took it and went onto the next client.

There was rationing.

People would eat leather belts and shoes.

Who exactly had food on their table?

[useless-catalanfacts]

Fine that the Francoist dictatorship authorities made the director of Sant Jordi choir pay for having sung an unauthorized Catalan song on April 23rd 1964. This fine is kept as a historical document in the archive of the University of Barcelona.

General Francisco Franco's fascist dictatorship of Spain (1939-1975) banned and persecuted the use of the Catalan language for many years, allowing it towards the end of the dictatorship only in certain settings and under strict supervision of the police and censorship authorities. The dictatorship had the objective of eliminating the Catalan language, culture, and identity, and making all Catalan people become Spanish people. Cultural elements of Catalan culture were forbidden, such as certain songs, dances, and celebrations of traditional holidays, and people were imprisoned, tortured, and even sentenced to death for defending the right to exist of the Catalan people. The same persecution was suffered by the other nationalities under Spanish rule (mostly Basques and Galicians).

The choir Coral Sant Jordi, named after Catalonia's patron saint (Saint George), was founded in 1947 by Oriol Martorell. Its objective was to sing choir music with a focus on traditional Catalan music. The choir toured around Catalonia singing these songs with a great vocal quality, and became a symbol of cultural resistance against the dictatorship's attempt of ethnocide.

In the 1960s, the dictatorship wanted to become a normalized part of Europe and the international community. The regime opened Spain's borders to survive as a fascist stronghold, and thanks to the help from the USA (who was promoting fascist governments around the world), fascist Spain was accepted in the UN, normalized its relations with many countries, and opened its borders to tourism. To look more acceptable, it did some reforms among which they allowed speaking the local languages (Catalan, Aranese Occitan, Basque, Galician, etc) in public in some acts, as long as the person who was going to do it applied for official permission and turned in everything they were going to say or, in the case of a concert, the track list of all the songs that they were going to sing and all their lyrics as well as if they were going to speak between songs. The censorship authorities could accept or deny this application, and very often they censored parts of what was going to be said or sung, or whole songs.

On April 23rd 1964, the choir Sant Jordi sang in a fundraising event to raise money for a church. Like all Catholic churches, this church is under the title of a saint, virgin, or similar. In this case, the church is dedicated to Saint George, who their choir is also named after. In the concert, the choir sang an extra song that wasn't on the tracklist that they had submitted to be approved by the censorship authorities. This extra song was the "Goigs de Sant Jordi" (goigs are a traditional Catalan music genre of songs dedicated to exalting a particular saint or Virgin). This is a goigs song composed in the year 1885 in the Catalan language, which explains the saint's story and asks: "patron of knighthood, watch over my homeland and for its rebirth".

For having sung this, the Spanish government made Oriol Martorell (conductor of the choir) pay a fine of 10,000 pesetas, a huge amount at the time. Oriol appealed the resolution many times, even reaching the Supreme Court, but as was expected they did not repeal it, and he (with support from the rest of the choir) had to pay the fine.

Under the cut I've included the whole lyrics of the unauthorized song translated to English.

This is a print of goigs song they sang. This one is from an act in 1990, kept in the archive of Jaume I University. These are the translated lyrics:

GOIGS OF SAINT GEORGE. Patron saint of Catalonia.

Since the heaven entrusted you the most excellent mission: Patron of knighthood, watch over my homeland and for its rebirth.

Art, history, and legend have embroidered your mantle and have given you the best offering with the quill and the chisel. From the north to the south, from the east to the west: Patron...

You were born in Cappadocia of a palatial lineage, honoured patrician, you were Diocletian’s knight; your illustrious hierarchy gave you great demeanour: Patron...

You follow the blessed law of crucified Jesus, which was persecuted in Rome as the most depraved crime. You, with all the courage, resolutely embrace it: Patron...

Like a willow, if it’s stripped off its branches, it grows more branches and lushness, new Christians aren’t missing either when there’s more rigour for them. One day you spoke in the council and they destined you to torment: Patron…

You were tied to a wheel, your flesh teared out; when they left you for dead, they found you well healed. Such a miracle soon converted many people: Patron…

The emperor, then, wants to convince you, sweetly, and gives you seductive offers, but he doesn’t get anything from you. Refusing idolatry you defect the Caesar: Patron…

He doesn’t receive the affront freely and immediately orders you be beheaded; seven gold-winged angels take you up to heaven. Jesus, Joseph, and Mary welcome you smiling: Patron…

Up in heaven they proclaim you patron of the good knights; the sword they gave you there is Lucifer’s fright. On your Shield was printed the red cross on a silver field: Patron…

There was a gentle princess, stealer of love, and a ferocious monster wants to capture her, traitor; but you, with bravery, turn up to attack: Patron…

On the first lance stroke the monster falls down pierced; the virgin, already released, takes him away well tied up; all the town, with happiness, branches and palms beat: Patron…

Clovis’s wife builds sumptuous temples for you, and you have pious altars from Calp to the Pyrenees; Sir Ramir also erected for you a monument near Viana: Patron…

You help, near Girona, the undefeated emperor, and you give back the golden sceptre to Borrell of Barcelona; your shining image used to appear to king Peter: Patron…

When April comes and is crowned with the roses from the gardens, Barcelona celebrates you more than all the paladins. People of all hierarchies sings to you devoutly: Patron…

Look over the loved homeland, for its freedom, for the well-rooted faith, for the holy brotherhood. And if the great day came to save it in combat: Patron of knighthood, watch over my homeland and for its rebirth.

Since the heaven entrusted you to free the good believer: Patron of knighthood, watch over my homeland and for its rebirth.

[panicinthestudio]

The Skeletons of Spain’s Fascist Past, July 1, 2023

During and after the Spanish Civil War, Fascist forces under Francisco Franco murdered tens of thousands of Republicans and buried them in anonymous graves throughout the country. Almost a century later, those bodies are still being exhumed — and the question of how to deal with Franco’s brutal legacy is more sensitive than ever. VICE News

[straynoahide]

I'm a Roman Catholic, anti-reactionary (kinda anti-progressive, too, definitely anti-marxist and anti-leftist).

Democracy only works if every voter is wise and virtuous

Fair, democracy will always be flawed because people are flawed, however, I have only found one alternative to liberal democracy: tyranny.

I prefer a faithful Catholic monarchy to any pretense at self-governance

Every rule of one, every autocracy, makes a tyrant in practice. There is no sharp distinction between them, but perspective. To Americans, the British monarch was not the anointed, he was a tyrant. To the French, even to the later Emperor, the French monarch was not the anointed, he was a tyrant.

To us, Spaniards, the French Emperor was not the bringer of Enlightenment- he was a tyrant. Good Kings are fairytales.

For example, right now, who would this faithful man be? Pope Francis? Would you submit to his anti-reactionary views just because he is one? I doubt that, because you seem to think for yourself. You're definitely not following the main current that has rejected theocracy in favor of social teaching and Christian Democracy.

Every ruler is human, thus fallible. Putting your hope in the few, in the "princes", and not in the 'plebeians', seems not particularly christlike, but more in the spirit of a patrician pre-Christian tradition.

In my opinion, there is no alternative to democracy that gets rid of the human flaws of, well, humans. What democracy does is allow you to have an external check on humans before those flaws become disproportionately blown from pettiness to political purges, genocides and genuine liberticide. A society without freedom is by definition faithless, because faith requires meaningful choice.

Am I a fascist? Well, if that's what they call someone who stands for strong borders, a strong working class, a strong economy and strong faith-centered families, then okay.

You're describing nationalism (can't say if nativism, possibly), populism, maybe theocracy. It is a right-wing populism, and it is illiberal; theocracy is always anti-democratic, because not all the people are religious or from your own religion.

Fascism is a specific form of right-wing revolutionary ideology. You would be a fascist if you believe in palingenetic ultranationalism and advocate for revolutionary overthrow of the government in a rightist revolution. Otherwise not really, not all illiberals are fascists, although I think both are equally politically flawed just to be clear.

Reactionarism is often incompatible with fascism. Weimar reactionaries, religious conservatives were among the first to be purged by Nazis and the monarchy, the burial of the Kaiser became a point of symbolism and controversy to diss the Nazis.

In my own study of history, I found the "fascist" regimes of Francoist Spain and the Salazar regime of 1930s Portugal to be preferable to the Leftist notions of "freedom" that abound today. But, I am no expert. What I liked was that in each case, as was in many of the other so-called "fascist" regimes were the stated aims to reinstate monarchies where republican governments had driven them out, their manly resistance to communism and their adherence to their Catholic faith.

My parents were raised in Francoist Spain, as were my grandparents. All Catholics, like I am. Spanish democracy has only existed for 40-ish years after factions and the emeritus King oversaw a pact and transition to democracy between right-wing and left-wing spaniards -including communists- and prevented a reactionary coup in 1981.

Francoist Spain was many things, undoubtedly fascist-like, though Hispanicist historians also have made some annotations to that (i reckon you have read Stanley Payne), but it is very important to know that it was not a monolith and it had a lot of contradictions.

Even Franco did not nominally decry democracy, like the Nazis.

He saw his dictatorship as something called "organic democracy", with the 'organic' meaning he saw it as natural law in a philosophical sense. It was composed of syndicates or vertical unions between employers and employees, so it thwarted marxist class interests.

The problem with this, of course, was that labor exploitation occurred all the time. Labor improvements have happened in democracy, not so much before. Originally his party, which many saw Franco as a traitor to, was a labor party, a workers' party, anti-marxist but the founder literally said, that "marxists were right about capitalism"- it was every bit as anti-capitalist, thirdwayist.

The Francoist party, the Falange (FET y de las JONS, a merger of things), brought together all the right-wing factions of Spain at the time. I think they're better understood as two currents, one was the national-syndicalist faction, more like the Nazi's "national-socialist" ideology, the pro-workers one; the other was the national-catholic faction. Franco gave nominal power to this faction because it was the one that advocated for a milito-clerical aristocracy and ruling class he could be a part of.

He ennobled many of the generals that had helped him gain power within the civil war cliques while he purged those who had not, arbitrarily. There was an aesthetic of holiness to Francoist Spain, but it was simply a military dictatorship in which the Church was "given" things by the ones who were really in power.

The downside ot this, was atrocious crimes because there was an actual neo-aristocracy with no accountability. And I'm not speaking of war crimes. I'm speaking of like, stealing infants from poor families to "reeducate them" because their parents were from the wrong town, and done so because the Church ran nurseries, schools.

Franco did want to restore the monarchy, and in a way he did, but the person who came to occupy the monarchy, was pro-democratic, and his legacy was thus ended- is this another monarch you would submit to? The Nazi leaders actually said Franco was aggravating because they saw themselves as revolutionary and Franco as reactionary who favored the rule of the Church.

This was not the case, but Franco did want to use the Church while they wanted to supersede it to put instead a cult of the state with a cross on top sometimes (Positive Christianity). Fascism and theocracy are never compatible, in practice. If you want a theocracy in practice, what you have to look at is Iran, not Spain.

Ultimately, national-syndicalism and national-catholicism were fundamentally opposed worldviews, one revolutionary and one reactionary, and Franco used the revolution to make a military dictatorship and then ruled by the principles of neither- as all autocrats. There were also many contradictions: antisemitic canards, blaming judeo-bolshevism, but then he rescinded the Alhambra Decree; economic autarky at first, but then neoliberal opening-up...

Franco did use the whole 'anti-marxist, pro-civilization crusade' rhetoric, but that didn't change what the country was, and it was a shithole dictatorship with horrible leaders and cruel people taking advantage of our Lord's symbols and words to further their own goals and hurt adults and children all across our national territory. In the very tradition of Spanish stubbornness, "lagging behind" the internat community, one of the last (western) European dictatorships.

Democracy is the only thing that allowed Spaniards to live in freedom; not 'leftist' freedom, real freedom. I am also a monarchist, but within liberal democracy. I defend the current Spanish monarchy -a constitutional one, in which the head of state is basically another role as in a republic, and even more ceremonial- because the current alternative *is* a leftist republic and I know what that would be like in our political culture, one just has to look at Bolivarianism.

This is my second run at I Might Be a Fascist. I initially started it as it says i the description because I am a Catholic, a Reactionary and a Monarchist. As I write this, the 2024 elections are less than 2 weeks away. And for those who claim Trump is a threat to Democracy, I say good riddance to it! Democracy only works if every voter is wise and virtuous. And all we have to do is look around to see we are to paraphrase Starset abused by Dunning and Kreuger.

As a Catholic and as an informed human being, I prefer a faithful Catholic monarchy to any pretense at self-governance. Faithful and Catholic being the operative words. Until then, I am as Charles Coulomb put it, "happy to have my snout counted" as long as they are counting snouts.

In my own study of history, I found the "fascist" regimes of Francoist Spain and the Salazar regime of 1930s Portugal to be preferable to the Leftist notions of "freedom" that abound today. But, I am no expert. What I liked was that in each case, as was in many of the other so-called "fascist" regimes were the stated aims to reinstate monarchies where republican governments had driven them out, their manly resistance to communism and their adherence to their Catholic faith.

Yet, I find like everything else I have divergences with some of those so-called "fascists".

Am I a fascist? Well, if that's what they call someone who stands for strong borders, a strong working class, a strong economy and strong faith-centered families, then okay.

[hadesisqueer]

I had to redo a year at school and I had to drop out twice due to personal issues, so when I returned I was older than everyone in my class in my Baccauleauret. The last Men's Football World Cup was in December a couple of years ago. A lot of kids were carrying t-shirts and a couple of flags to keep the spirit, that was cool. And I was at class with a few other students. The teacher hadn't gone to class that day, so we had a substitute and we were supposed to do nothing, basically. Since I was over eighteen and it was the second to last period and the next one was gonna be a makeup test I didn't have to take because I passed the first time, I decided I was gonna leave instead of staying there for two hours doing nothing with three boys and two girls I wasn't even friends with or knew at all. But it was raining a little bit, so I had to wait for ten minutes to leave until it stopped. Some of the kids decided to pull out their Spanish History books because they had a makeup test the next day.

Anyway, the teacher? Didn't know the guy. I think he was a Biology teacher and I didn't even take Biology anymore. He started talking to some of the others while I checked my phone. They talked about the World Cup, about some of the ESO kids wearing the Spanish nt t-shirts and celebrating all. Then he goes, “I actually just heard another teacher complaining about it. Can you believe it?" and we were like "Complaining?" And he goes "Over some students. She said they were around throwing 'fascist expressions' because they were saying 'Arriba España'. Seriously." And the other students were like, giggling, and then I said "I mean, then she is right, because it is a fascist expression." And he and the students were like "No, it isn't," and I was like "Yes, it is. I'm not saying the kids are fascists because they're like 12 and they probably just heard it somewhere and don't know the background, but Arriba España is a nationalistic expression used by the fascists. It was one of the mottos of francoism, and even the name of the movement's newspaper." And then they went "Oh, so just because the francoists used it then it's fascist?" and I stared at all of them blankly and said "Yeah." Best part is that they continued to shake their heads.

Anyway it stopped raining and I got up and they were like "Oh, you're living now?" mockingly and I said "Yeah, I got nothing to do here anyway. See you tomorrow. Y'all keep studying because I can tell why you all of you guys failed Spanish History now" and then they stayed really quiet as I left lmao. Anyway I commented that the next day at another class, and this teacher and other classmates were like "Are they fucking stupid?" Felt gratifying to see not everyone around you is fucking ignorant.

[workingclasshistory]

On this day, 15 July 1954, the right-wing dictatorship of general Francisco Franco amended the 1933 vagrancy law to criminalise homosexuality. The amendment also authorised the detention of all those convicted under the law in labour and concentration camps (content note: sexual violence). Over the next 25 years, around 5,000 LGBT+ people would be imprisoned – mostly gay and bisexual men and trans women. They were housed in specialist prisons in Huelva and Badajoz, and in a camp in Fuerteventura, Canary Islands, and many were subjected to brutal sexual violence, and medical abuse like electric shock treatment. Most of those prosecuted for breaching the law were working class, and historian Pablo Fuentes told the Guardian that it was "not uncommon to hear homosexuals from the upper classes and the aristocracy speak about the Franco period as a great time." After Franco's death in 1975 and the subsequent fall of the dictatorship, political prisoners were released, but LGBT+ prisoners were not. The homophobic law was eventually overturned in 1979, although those imprisoned because of it were not recognised as victims of Francoism and awarded compensation until 2009. Learn more about how Franco seized power in our podcast episodes 39-40 about the Spanish civil war: https://workingclasshistory.com/podcast/e39-the-spanish-civil-war-an-introduction/ Pictured: Silvia Reyes, a trans woman who was imprisoned over 50 times. https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=662230282616857&set=a.602588028581083&type=3

[coochiequeens]

By Nuria Muíña García September 10, 2024

A prominent trans activist organization in Spain has put forward a proposal for legislation that would guarantee transgender people pensions upon reaching 65. The pensions would be issued regardless of whether the transgender applicant had ever paid into the pension throughout their life.

The proposal was put forward by Federation Platform for Trans Rights, who presented it last week to the parliamentary groups of the Congress of Deputies. The group, known colloquially as Plataforma Trans, was founded in 2015 “with the aim of uniting specifically trans collectives and entities and to fight for a new trans law that recognizes gender self-determination and depathologises trans identities.” During the meeting, all parties sent representatives except the right-wing Popular Party and Vox Party.

Calling it the “Trans Memory Law,” the policy would grant people who identify as transgender a lifetime pension, along with priority access to public housing and housing assistance programs.

This was the second meeting involving the Federation Platform for Trans Rights and top Spanish politicians, indicating the group may soon see their plans realized.

During the previous meeting, the Federation Platform met with representatives from the governing Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party, the SUMAR Coalition, the United We Can Change Europe Party, the Basque Nationalist Party, among others, and asked them to jointly register the Trans Memory Law.

The “historic need” for the law was discussed during the meeting, to provide a form of reparations for “the violence suffered by trans and gender-dissident people during the dictatorship and post-Franco regime.”

The president of the Federation Platform, a trans-identified male named Mar Cambrollé, declared at the time that “the Franco dictatorship and post-Francoism violated the most fundamental rights of trans and gender-diverse people, who not only suffered the worst effects of Franco and post-Francoism with deprivation of freedom, but also suffered [exile].” Cambrollé claimed that trans-identified people were suffering from “extreme poverty” as a result of the legacy of Francisco Franco, a fascist leader who ruled Spain until 1975.

Cambrollé added that “an advanced and democratic society has to repair this systematic violation of a forgotten population, who put their bodies and who, with their visibility, also contributed to bring democracy, widening it with plurality and diversity.”

The lifetime pension proposed by the Federation Platform demands the value represent an economic benefit of the same amount “as the minimum Social Security pension for pensioners over the age of 65 without family responsibilities,” alleging that “the situation experienced by trans, gay and lesbian people who did not conform to the normative roles imposed on men and women during the Franco regime unleashed persecution, imprisonment, stigma and denial of fundamental rights.”

The pension would be able to be collected in addition to any other benefits, employment income, personal or corporate assets, or commercial activities, and would be increased by 50% for those who had previously been imprisoned under the Vagrants and Criminals Act, which targeted “habitual vagrants,” pimps, prostitutes, drunks, drug addicts, and those who supplied alcohol to minors.

Initially introduced in 1933, the law remained in force during Franco’s dictatorship, but made no reference to homosexuals until a reform introduced in 1954. The term “transgender,” however, is not referenced in the law.

The group tells The Objective that people who identified as trans were “discriminated against, pushed aside and for a long time forgotten, and thus consigned to oblivion” during this time.

“These conditions, which were structural in nature, prevented them from having the same opportunities as the rest of the population, pushing them to the margins of society and social exclusion, with a major impact on their physical and mental health. Today, in the twilight of their lives, they are once again hit by the extreme precariousness resulting from a dictatorial regime that was merciless and the neglect of democracy,” it said in a statement.

The proposal caused quite a stir on social media, with many Spanish X users denouncing the apparent preferential treatment trans-identified individuals were set to receive from politicians.

Calling it a “salary for being trans,” one X user added: “And to top it all, priority in public housing, because there is no one more vulnerable than “they/them.”

“Special pensions for trans* people just because they are trans*. And regardless of their income. Priority access for transgender people to public housing and support programmes. What Plataforma Trans are asking for is called privileges,” another remarked.

[little-bloodied-angel]

My country was submitted to a dictatorship for FORTY YEARS that the Catholic Church endorsed and ratified. My mother was 14 years old when the dude died, this was literally yesterday.

My Italian Sephardic family were slaughtered in HaShoah bar the one person who had immigrated into Morocco before Mussolini rose to power. I wouldn't be alive if she hadn't left. And still, one of her children was murdered and the other enlisted at 17 and was lucky to come back alive.

That word up there, Sephardic, means that my father's family had to pack up and leave their homeland with nothing but the clothes on their backs under threat of being tortured and murdered by the Catholic Church in 1492 and they could never return, and they still got slaughtered by some whack job sponsored by the Catholic Church almost 500 years later.

"there are atheist killers" is REALLY not the gotcha this guy thinks it is. Institutional power will never be the same as random individual evil people.

I don't normally reblog these ones even though I usually agree with at least 90% of what thedeconstrussy is saying, but this one really ground my gears.

(@airasora as per your tags, imagine the terror of being a mixed child in a Catholic school being told this in a manner that justified it and knowing that a lot of your classmates would still harm you in that way if they could, because of what your father is)

Video link

[lakesbian]

i love when im like i donteven know that much about nationstates. well except for the gc mowaa scandal...ah yes and i was there for the frontier/stronghold release...and i know a lot about r/d...and the last couple of n-days...and nsgp culture...and all of europeias other spying scandals...and i did sort of cause the tnp del bump...and i know a bit about francoism and the predator scandal...oh yeah and the furry 9/11 wintreath situation...

[strangestcase]

My concepts for fem!BLU TF2

I absolutely love that the fandom treats the RED and BLU teams as different casts and that this is often paired with making the BLU team the fem!fortress cast so uh

Here

Sniper (Martha) is Canadian, brash, abrasive, petty, and pretty rude. Treats her job like it's a hobby she's really good at. Sees herself as a hunter of men, treats her kills as if they're game, though rumours of cannibalism are unfounded and in fact she considers it the only crime she'd never commit. Lives in a camping tent. Since she's spent most of her life in the cold Canadian wilderness, she finds New Mexico unberable and spends most of her time half naked... or in a sleeveless shirt. Smokes a lot. Despite her roughness, she has a good heart, but to see it you'd have to give her so, so many drinks, and maybe bribe her with food.

Medic (Basya) is Polish, Jewish, and angry, and grew up in a bucolic little village with a dark secret... She's very serious and no-nonsense, and has very little patience for horseplay and, well, most of her teammates really. Insists on not using anaesthesics in her interventions because "pain makes you strong" and while she has extensive medical knowledge she will not hesitate to cut corners or operate on you with dirty equipment out of pure pragmatism. Used to keep rats to experiment on but grew attached to them, particularly one called Pithagoras. Always keeps her hair braided and out of her face.

Heavy (Mi-yeong) is (North) Korean. Her family is one of intellectuals and she grew up enamored with poetry. After they had to flee the war, she stablished herself in America. Has a PhD in Korean literature and writes her own poetry in her free time. Due to her limited grasp in English, she tends to overcomplicate her sentences when she speaks, coming off as snobbish, but that couldn't be any further from the truth! She's very down to earth, albeit that doesn't make her any less trigger happy. Overly proud of her kill count. Loves her minigun, Su-bin, and, of course, Corn Doags.

Scout (Stacy) is a bit of an air-headed Valley Girl that grew up in an affluent borough of San Francisco. While her family would like for her to be a housewife, she said, "bet", and hopped on the first bus she saw. Very feminine in a cutesy Barbie way, pigtails and all, but has a huge aggression problem and anger issues (...and an itchy trigger finger). Likes reading fashion magazines, bashing skulls with her bat that she personally covered in rusty nails, and flirting with girls. Enjoys roughhousing and picking on her teammates as much as she hates breaking her nails. Can down a can of beer in 5 seconds.

Demo (Eduvixe) comes from a little village in Galicia, Spain. She is (currently) a peaceful tree-hugging flower power hippie- but she's no pacifist herself. During her youth as a radical anarchist, she single-handedly ran the Sublevado troops out of her village with sticks, stones, and explosives of her own making, and spent a good ten years fighting Francoism armed with homemade bombs, which cost her her right eye. Now she's in her 70s and still rocking, and if you speak to her for more than ten minutes she already has signed you up for the mercenary union. Smokes weed, like a lot of it. Is stoned on the clock. Can cook a mean stew.

Spy (Giulia) is Italian and has a reputation as a ladykiller. She often boasts about how many bitches she has, and... she exaggerates, big time. Likes to keep the image of a cosmopolitan modern woman that wears trousers. Covers her hair with a stylish scarf, wears sunglasses, and uses a cigarette holder. As much as she's professional and efficient, she's also a huge jokester and uses her mastery of disguise and voice mimicking to play dumb pranks. She wants you to see her as cool, but is actually goofy. Her nonna sends her tupperwares full of pasta in the regular.

Engineer (Monique) is a young African-American girl born and raised in Louisiana. Growing up with her grandparents in the swamp, she became an expert at salvaging scraps and McGyvering basically anything, which set her up to become an inventor and graduate university with a bunch of PhDs in different types of engineering when she was only 16. Spunky and optimistic, she's chill and laid back... or so she seems. She's a huge perfectionist and has a "fuck around, fing out" attitude. Hacked off one of her legs at the knee to replace it with a prosthetic of her own invention. Regarded as a bit "qwirky" by her older peers.

Soldier (John Doe) doesn't remember much of her past. She's snarky, sarcastic, quippy, and overconfident, but has an angry streak. Yells everything she says because she's mostly deaf from all the explosions. Has no regard for personal hygiene and has had to be forced to get her head shaved on account of all the matting hair. Often says the most out of pocket shit and nobody bats an eye. Is a butch lesbian, but doesn't know what a lesbian is. Hates men but particularly hates men that wear sandals. Likes watching American football even though she understands jack shit of it.

Pyro is Pyro. Literally just the same as Red!Pyro. In fact, some suspect they're the same person.

As for relationships:

-Giulia might or might not be Stacy's mom. (Insert Stacy's Mom joke here).

-Basya can't stand most people but has a soft spot for her teammates, even if they drive her up the wall.

-Stacy doesn't respect any person any older than her except for Basya, because she's cool in her books.

-Eduvixe has kind of grandma-adopted everyone, particularly Monique, who really misses her gamgam, and Pyro, who loves her cooking more than they love setting shit on fire.

-John and Monique are friends and they often drag each other to the local dance hall, where they are the terror of the party.

-Mi-yeong and Martha can sit down in silence for hours at the time. They basically communicate with "hmmm" "hmmm?" "hm-hmmm" and it's magical.

-Martha and Giulia are friends with benefits. The benefit is sex.

-Eduvixe and Basya are friends with benefits. The benefit is laboratory equipment. And edibles.

-Pyro often pesters Mi-yeong for food.

-Martha, John, and Stacy like gathering together to gossip about their teammates and smoke.

-John never ever calls Giulia by her name, only "spaghetti", "lasagna", "linguini", "tortellini", or "stracciatella". She is also convinced she's a mobster.

[beautiful-basque-country]

I’ve read your recent post like six times but I still can’t wrap my head around it. There are masses for Franco? MASSES?

I know the Catholic Church can be a real mess, but how on Earth is this allowed? Isn’t there a bishop or someone at the Vatican that can stop this?

How do all the various communities let these gatherings and masses happen?

I’m Italian and Irish, so the lose equivalent of this Franco worship would be gatherings and masses for Mussolini and Cromwell, which I could never see happening. There would be a revolts in the streets! I mean sure, there’s always a handful of fascist ass lickers in every community, but usually it’s not blatant and their actions aren’t accepted let alone celebrated?

What is the general education regarding Franco like in Spain? Is there a lot of revisionist theory trying to paint him out to be something other than a psychopathic murderer?

Sorry if these questions are stupid, I’m just shocked this is like a normal and widespread thing. I’ve been to Spain once, and I guess I missed this aspect of the culture?

Kaixo anon!

They're not stupid questions, and I'll try my best to answer in an understandable way.

I'm sorry you're shocked about the masses thing, but it becomes a bit less weird if you take into account that one of the keys to the success of Franco's regime was Catholicism and the Catholic Church. Not for nothing his political ideas were called "national-Catholicism". The Church gave its full support to Franco and the dictatorship, and worked hard indoctrinating people to first accept and then passionately defend it. We can't understand Francoism without the Catholic religion.

You ask why this is allowed. Easy!! I'm not sure how Christian masses work in other parts of the world, but in Spain and EH, you pay and the church delivers: it can be a mention of the name of a deceased person the family wants to honor on the Sunday mass, or a full mass for said person any day you want. That's why there are masses for Franco eeeeeeeevery Nov 20. Because somebody - Franco Foundation, fascist associations or parties, just somebody - pays for them to exist. Of course the Catholic church defends it's just a mass of remembrance for a deceased person and not a glorification of a fascist dictator. Okay, if they say so.

Just this year there have been 18 masses throughout the Spanish state: in Madrid, Valladolid, Zaragoza, Málaga, Toledo, Alicante, Santander, Granada, Uesca, València, Zamora, Ceuta, Teruel, Sevilla, and Santa Cruz de Tenerife.

I'd like to think that Francoism isn't part of the Spanish culture as you mention, but sadly 40 years of a fascist dictatorship do some things to people. 40 years of lefties escaping the country or being executed, 40 years of brainwashing, 40 years of turbo Catholic fascism. You don't leave all that behind just overnight. There are still monuments to the dictator or the coup (Crusade, in fascist language), streets devoted to fascist elite members and criminals, and the f*cking king is the son of the king Franco personally chose for the Spanish state. There are Francoism remnants in every single Spanish institution, from the Congress to the Supreme Court (especially there). Everything is still tainted by Franco, his political ideas, and his corrupt political ways, even now, yes. Franco himself said the infamous words maaaany still remember: everything is tied and tied well. He meant that everything was throughly planned and established to function as he wanted when he passed. And it really was tied well.

So it may be not blatant for anyone visiting, but it's there, and it's definitely apparent. There's this sociological Francoism that was somewhat hidden from the 90s to the 10s, but now with the rise of the far right / neonazi movements has taken the mask off and fascists are calling themselves fascists with pride. There have always been some nostalgic people that were considered fanatic freaks up until now, but now they're more and more since very young men - mainly - are joining them.

[useless-catalanfacts]

I assume you heard of what the Real Madrid twitter account posted, how Franco was a supported of Barça? Amazing historical revisionism, as if Catalans weren't tortured or murdered for daring to speak their language, or how even one of the directors of Barça was murdered after being accused of defending the independence of Catalonia.

I'm sure they are aware they're lying, I don't believe someone would be so ignorant to make up something like that and somehow convince themselves of it.

Basically, if someone's not aware of what happened, Real Madrid published a video saying that FC Barcelona (Barça) was favoured by the Spanish fascist dictator Franco, which is false. The team that has always been associated with Francoist beliefs is Real Madrid, so I assume they want to distance themselves from that by accusing their main rival (Barça), who also happens to be a symbol of a minority (Catalans) that was one of the main groups targeted by Spanish fascism.

Some actual historical information about Franco and Barça:

1. In 1939, all football clubs that were federated in the Catalan Federation were banned from playing. All the players' contracts were cancelled. That includes Barça. Some months later, they were reformed and could continue existing with a completely different directors/administration board accepted by the regime. (Women are banned from this position, when Barça had la Sagi.) Copying the model of Mussolini's Italy, the Francoist dictatorship gave control of sports to the Falange (the fascist party, the only party allowed) who controlled everything from the Delegación Nacional de Deportes (National Sports Delegation).

2. For the previous resolution, all of Barça's administratives are ceases and their names and files are given to the military police to control them. The board and administration of all the club was purged.

3. The regime sentenced to death and killed the president of Barça at the time (Josep Sunyol i Garriga) for being pro-Catalan.

The president of Real Madrid (Antonio Ortega) was also killed for being a communist. The difference is that nowadays, since the end of the dictatorship, Barça honours Josep Sunyol, while Madrid acts as if Antonio Ortega had never existed and doesn't have any space dedicated to him. Not only that, but if you look at Real Madrid's website, they leave an empty spot during the years that Antonio Ortega was president (1936-1939), pretending he never was and there simply was no president during those years.

All the opposite, Real Madrid honours Santiago Bernabéu (the team's stadium is named after him), who worked to bring Real Madrid closer to the dictatorship. Even before Franco gained power, in the 1920s, he said that Real Madrid defends "the Spanish pride and cause". He later enlisted in the Spanish army and joined the fascists in their coup d'etat that led to the Spanish Civil War.

4. Barça had to change their entrance tickets and their name to Spanish following Franco's illegalization of the Catalan language. It stoped being called "Futbol Club Barcelona" (Catalan) and had to be called "Club de Fútbol Barcelona" (Spanish). Consequently, the letters in the club's shield were consequently changed from F.C.B. to C.F.B. The club wouldn't get their original Catalan name back until 1973.

5. Removed the Catalan flag from Barça's shield. They had to have 2 red bars instead of the 4 bars of the Catalan flag. Later they could get it back because Barça's shield is based on the shield of the city of Barcelona, so they alleged it's just a symbol of the city.

6. Instrumentalized Barça and Athletic de Bilbao against Catalan and Basque people, since the regime identified Barça and Athletic de Bilbao as the teams that symbolise these two minority nations and their independentism. Their first match after the war was scheduled by the regime, a Barça vs Athletic de Bilbao where the whole stadium was wrapped in huge Spanish flags and were various fascist gave speeches in favour of Franco and Spanish unity, including the general Álvarez-Arenas who talked about the purges by saying he praised Barça for "having thrown away forever the anti-Spanish seed, exposing their idea of what sport entities must be patriotically, the true healthy sport to educate the masses" ("que ha sabido arrojar para siempre la semilla de los antiespañoles, exponiendo su idea de lo que patrióticamente han de ser las entidades deportivas, el verdadero n del deporte sano y educativo de multitudes").

7. The regime abolished the Catalonia League, where Barça played.

8. More purges in Barça followed after that first one. The dictatorship carried out in-depth investigations into Barça's directives and members to find people who fought for Catalan rights. Some people were accused for being in the Barça directive. Here's some extracts from the letter where the leader of the fascist police in Barcelona, Luis Martí Olivares, sent to order the arrest of some Barça directives and to order them to be taken to Madrid for trial:

In front of the statue of Casanovas, they used to celebrate acts of separatist affirmation [...]. All the directives, players and members [of Futbol Club Barcelona] have always attended it with flower crowns, offerings with the shield of the "F.C. BARCELONA"

Another one by him:

It's publicly known that the "F.C. BARCELONA" has always been political, at the beginning pro-Catalan and since a long time ago frankly separatist and for this reason they have exploited their rivalry with R.C.D. ESPAÑOL, which has been precisely the only Football Club in Catalonia that has signified themselves as a true pro-Spanish. In the matches between these two Clubs, the Barcelona fans considered the Spanishists to be foreigners, because they spoke in Spanish.

After the purges, the new dictatorship-approved directive board of Barça was made (for the 1st time in the club's history) of people who were not even members of the club. Many of them were fervent Espanyol fans, not Barça fans.

Most of their first decisions were political, including the fact that they removed the club's founder Joan Gamper as honorary president and declared the new honorary president to be the Spanish fascist general Múgica.

They also made the players taka a flower crown to the founder of Spanish fascism José Antonio Primo de Rivera, which had the Spanish flag and the Barça flag and inscription "F.C. Barcelona to José Antonio".

One of Barça's directors during the dictatorship was actually a paying Espanyol member during his time as Barça president, another director was an army general that was appointed directed by the higher spheres of the dictatorship and who openly said he was directing Barça simply because "as soldier with discipline I'm following orders".

9. Finally, in June 1946, the members of the Barça board who were actually Barça fans and cared for the club mass resigned and pressured the director to stop being a club under direct control of the dictatorship's government. Their protest resulted in the end of the regime's direct intervention, and after 10 years Barça could go back to having a new directive board, this time mostly made up of people who had always been Barça fans, though the regime still only allowed people who were officially approved.

So while Barça was directed by people who didn't care about the club and who were very badly coordinated and later was starting to re-order itself (still only with approved people), Real Madrid had its golden age, under the director Santiago Bernabéu (who was defined as "he's what Philip II was to Spain: its best king" and as we've explained before was a fascist) and a director board that had close ties to the fascist government.

The club that was most favoured by the regime during its first years was Atlético de Madrid (at the time called Atlético Aviación) which was related to the Army. But the president of Real Madrid Santiago Bernabéu got the club closer to the dictatorship and made it become the regime's favourite from the late 1950s on. Real Madrid played a very important role in fascist Spain's public relations, because that's the historical period that ended the autarchy and when fascist Spain was accepted in the UN and kept the dictatorship with the agreement of the other countries. Real Madrid acted as a political and cultural ambassador of fascist Spain in other countries. In return it received favours from the dictatorship. For example, the regime changed the sports clubs' status so that Madrid could hire Alfredo Di Stefano instead of Barça in 1953. Barça had already closed the case and the club and the player were ready to sign, but the dictatorship's direct intervention stopped it.

10. Since speaking Catalan was banned, some Catalan traditions were banned, even some Catalan songs were banned, and everyone was forced to be Spanish and a Spanish nationalist, with the National-Catholic morale imposed in every aspect of life, Barça became the place to express Catalanity. People used to go cheer for Barça as the "allowed"/hidden way of cheering against Francoism and in favour of Catalonia. This sentiment was well represented by the song "Botifarra de pagès" by the Catalan humour band La Trinca, which they released in 1974:

If you don't speak Catalan, the whole song is about how Catalans cheer for Barça as a representation of cheering for Catalan rights and link how well Barça is doing at the time with Catalanism ("l'any que ve no farem riure, visca Catalunya ------" = "next year we [Barça] won't be laughable, long live free Catalonia!" with a peeeeeep over where the word "free" woul have been) with cultural references. For example, they sing the tempo of sardanes with the name Cruyff, and change the famous quote "som i serem gent catalana, tant si es vol com si no es vol" (we are and we will be Catalan people, wether they want it or not) from the song La santa espina (song forbidden during Franco's dictatorship) with "som i serem socis del Barça, tan si es vol com si no es vol" (we are and we will be Barça fans, wether they want it or not).

11. Regardless of the club's significance to the population (because, let's be honest, everyone knew what Barça meant), it was still a club that existed under a fascist dictatorship. During the dictatorship, only approved or appointed people held office and had the power to take decisions. And if you were in that position were you had been approved, even if you had your secret political beliefs and actions, there was only so much you could do in public before getting fired, arrested, banned for life from your job, get you and your family on a watchlist and likely get tortured.

One of the "unwritten rules" during the dictatorship was that anyone who created a prize or medal had to give the 1st to Franco. Barça did that too, but they have later addressed it and taken it back.

12. In the semifinals of 1942-1943 season, Barça won against Real Madrid by 3-0. On the return match, the dictatorship's police went down to the dressing rooms to intimidate the Barça players so they would let Madrid win. The result was 11-1 (Madrid victory), which effectively gave victory of the league to Real Madrid.

13. Dictator Franco, personally, was a follower of Real Madrid. It's known that he used to comment the lineups with his officers.

---------

Since Real Madrid published that video some days ago, so many Spanish newspapers, magazines and TV channels have talked at length about how Barça actually helped Franco. They use as excuse the fact that the Barça under the dictatorship's control (because remember that the dictatorship chose who would lead the team, even when these people weren't Barça fans it only mattered that they were fascists) gave condecorations to the regime officials. This is worth remembering and worth criticizing, but this says more about the dictatorship than it says about Barça, especially if they want it to represent nowadays Barça. Because the thing is that this is no secret, and Barça has already addressed it in the past: in 2019, Barça officially withdrew all the medals given to Franco officials. Real Madrid still honours fascists and erases their antifascist director, and knows that they're a symbol of Spanish nationalism.

However, it seems like the people who so quickly want to run to talk shit about anything that has to do with Catalonia don't usually keep the same energy to criticize the dictatorship itself and how it intervened every aspect of life, crushing dissidence and national minorities in everything, even their hobbies, nor to make the same criticisms of Real Madrid, because it's not just about Barça but a way to attack Catalan society.

[a-tale-never-told]

I’m afraid it’s a very, very real thing. Under Franco's Dictatorship, people who were consider enemies of the state, when they gave birth were told their children died at birth. In reality these babies were stolen from them and given to ideologically confirming households to make sure those ideas are stamped out. These people are known as the ‘Lost children of Francoism’. The worst part is that this didn’t get uncovered until 2011. As for the retributions, they’re still ongoing.

Jesus... That might be one of the most tragic and disturbing things I've ever heard.

[cin-cant-donate-blood]

Okay, so two fun facts about this assassination.

First, unfortunately those pictures are from a movie, there is no camera footage of the assassination. Oh well.

Secondly, this assassination isn't just "haha he deserved it" or whatever, it may have actually single-handedly saved Spain from fascism. In 1973, Spain had suffered under Francisco Franco's tyranny for more than three decades since his victory in the Spanish Civil War (1936–9).

Franco was eighty years old at this point, and so he was reasonably worried about dying soon. Of course, he was grooming an heir, and that heir was Luis Carrero Blanco.

He wasn't the official heir by any means – in fact, Franco, being a monarchist bootlicker, had appointed Juan Carlos, descendant of a previous King of Spain as his heir – but Carrero Blanco was the heir to Francoism, if that makes sense.

When Franco died at 82 in 1975, Juan Carlos ascended to the throne as planned and became Juan Carlos I, so one might assume that there was no difference, but bear with me here. It turns out that Juan Carlos I was not the fascist that Franco had hoped, and almost immediately started a transition towards democracy, something that made him one of the most popular heads of state in the entire Spanish speaking world (now, to be fair, the guy has been criticized as well: he has some funny ties to Saudi Arabia and is a billionaire).

The key turning point is the fascist coup attempt of 1981, which was a rather anemic affair with no fatalities, and though I can't say so for certain, I think it would have had far more strength if Carrero Blanco had still been alive. As it were, some 2000-ish soldiers along with a couple of piece of shit generals tried to hold the lower house of the legislature and the cabinet hostage, in part because they were about to swear in Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo as prime minister, who was a vocal advocate for the complete restoration of democracy.

When King Juan Carlos went on national TV and denounced the coup attempt, the putschists surrendered almost immediately. Can you imagine how embarrassing that must have been? Being a fascist bonehead, charging into parliament and holding the prime minister hostage only for your daddy the king, the one you're supposedly doing this for, having to go on TV and call you a fucking moron and to tell you to stop what you're doing?

Whether or not the coup would have succeeded if Carrero Blanco was still alive, the democratization continued, and in the 2000s Spain started making some efforts to investigate the crimes of the Franco regime and the legacy of the Spanish Civil war.

Juan Carlos abdicated in 2014 and his son is now monarch, though he is still alive, and will turn 86 in January. After corruption investigations started and intensified around 2019–2020 he retired from public life and left Spain. He currently lives in the UAE.

Anyway this is a funny car bomb prank and even if we can't know for sure how much of a difference it made, I hope it broke Franco's rotten heart. Imagine being 80, having worked with this guy for decades and kept giving him important and ever higher-ranking jobs, hoping that even if the king isn't your biggest fan, at least you'll have this guy to stand for what you stood for after you're gone, and then having to go to his funeral as one of the very last public appearances you ever make.

At least you'll see him soon in hell.

shinzo abe day was incredible. still not over seeing all the rumours about what happened, joining everyone in wondering how the fuck a shotgun assassination could have happened in japan, and then seeing the first photo of the doohickey

[sefaradweb]

Abrasha Rotenberg: “Esencialmente, me siento un judío argentino”

🇦🇷✡️ Abrasha Rotenberg (nacido en 1926 en Ucrania) es un hombre cuya vida abarca varias décadas y continentes. Habiendo vivido en un shtetl (aldea judía) en su infancia, luego se trasladó a Magnitogorsk y a Moscú durante el régimen de Stalin. En 1933, su familia emigró a Argentina, donde se formó como persona y como parte de la comunidad judía. Fue sociólogo, editor y escritor, además de trabajar al lado de Jacobo Timerman en proyectos como las revistas Primera Plana y Confirmado y el diario La Opinión. A raíz de su trabajo, sufrió persecuciones políticas, lo que lo llevó a exiliarse en España, donde fue testigo de la caída del franquismo. En su vida personal, se casó con la cantante Dina Rot y tuvo dos hijos: la actriz Cecilia Roth y el músico Ariel Rot. A sus 84 años, Abrasha se considera un judío argentino, enfatizando la pluralidad del judaísmo y cómo las experiencias de exilio han moldeado su identidad. Reflexiona sobre la vida política en Israel y la diáspora, destacando las diferencias en la integración y las tensiones que se viven hoy en el país. Su obra literaria, como su libro Última carta de Moscú, aborda temas de identidad, exilio y la ética judía.

🇺🇸 Abrasha Rotenberg (born in 1926 in Ukraine) is a man whose life spans several decades and continents. Having lived in a shtetl (Jewish village) in his childhood, he later moved to Magnitogorsk and Moscow during Stalin's regime. In 1933, his family emigrated to Argentina, where he formed his identity and became part of the Jewish community. He worked as a sociologist, editor, and writer, collaborating with Jacobo Timerman on projects such as the magazines Primera Plana and Confirmado, and the newspaper La Opinión. Due to his work, he faced political persecution, leading to his exile in Spain, where he witnessed the fall of Francoism. Personally, he married singer Dina Rot and had two children: actress Cecilia Roth and musician Ariel Rot. At 84 years old, Abrasha considers himself a Jewish Argentine, emphasizing the plurality of Judaism and how exile experiences shaped his identity. He reflects on the political life in Israel and the diaspora, highlighting differences in integration and the tensions faced by the country today. His literary work, like his book Última carta de Moscú, tackles themes of identity, exile, and Jewish ethics.