I just don’t get it. While one bunch of nutters has finally managed to destroy Catalunya’s last Osborne bull for being too Spanish, another bunch of crazies is going round putting up things that look pretty damn Gallic to me:

OK, now here’s a challenge: discuss this solely with reference to the aesthetic merits of the beasts involved.

Tags: bull, Catalonia, cataloonia, cock, nationalism, Osborne, picture
Categories: Of decorating with pictures, Splog, Theatre

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1. Joan
   February 5th 2004 20:34

   Why do you care about preserving Osborne’s bulls in Catalunya? That’s hillarious… So UE makes a law prohibiting the use of advertising in roads, but makes an exception with the Osborne bull (Alcoholic drink) because it’s become a cultural symbol of Spain. Well, we are not Spanish in Catalonia. We hate the bullfighting. And in no way we want to be related with this bloody activity. Is it so hard to understand? We’ll the destroy the goddamn Bull advertising anytime.

   You want to see bulls? Go to Madrid…

2. pj
   February 5th 2004 22:35

   Em sona que el van tornar a aixecar

3. Pep
   February 5th 2004 23:23

   Joan, in iberian notes weblog you seemed to show more respect and good manners. Now I think that you’re just trolling.

4. Joan
   February 5th 2004 23:58

   Pep,

   I’m not a troll. These are my thoughts exactly. I go abroad and people ask me if I bullfight, dance flamenco and shit like that. I’m tired of that ignorance. We have to make sure that they know there is a place called Catalonia and we have Sardanas, not flamenco. Castellers and not bullfights.

   Anyway you should change your name to PEPE or even better… JOSÉ. It suits you more.

5. joan
   February 6th 2004 00:10

   Trevor,

   I have commented the catalan translation of the dutch text. It made me realise how difficult is to master a foreign language.

   http://oreneta.com/baldie/blog/archives/000046.asp

6. Reiner
   February 6th 2004 12:11

   The advantage of bulls is that it is very difficult to teach them bad things, unlike dogs.

7. martin
   February 6th 2004 23:27

   “We have to make sure that they know there is a place called Catalonia and we have Sardanas…”.

   Joan, some things are best kept under your hat.

8. joan
   February 7th 2004 00:34

   Trevor,

   “I am left with the impression that the Francoist state actually encouraged the sardana as an acceptable form of bourgeois regionalism of the type espoused by conservatives like Josep Pla. Additionally, my evidence suggests that the sardana suffered its greatest problems during the period of revolutionary anarcho-syndicalist and Stalinist control (1936-9).”

   This is pretty funny. You could be a comedian or something. Sardanas were not allowed during the Franco dictatorship. As you should know, the first years of Franco’s regime were the toughest… but as it was becoming very clear that the fascist would lose WWII, the regime had to become more “moderate” so they allowed Sardanas and other Catalan folklore they also stop obliguing people do the facist salude in cinemas, theathers…, but still songs like “Santa Espina” were not allowed to sing until the early 50’s. This is my grandfather and my father words, but of course you as a foreign visitor and a Franco fan as yourself should know more about it.

   This is one dedicated to you. It was not during Franco’s time, but that’s good enough, so you get the idea about what it means historically to be Catalan:

   ¿Como se llama Vd. ?
   -Antoni Gaudí .
   ¿Que edad tiene?
   -Setenta-un anys .
   ¿Que profesión?
   -Arquitecte .
   Pues su profesión le obliga a Vd. a hablar en castellano .
   -La professió d’arquitecte m’obliga a pagar contribució i ja la pago , però no a deixar de parlar la meva llengua.
   ¿Cómo se llamaba su padre?
   -Francesc Gaudí .
   ¿Que es esto de Francesc? Si Vd. no fuese viejo , le rompería la cara , ¡ sinverguenza , cochino !
   -Jo a vosté no l’insulto i vosté a mi sí . Jo parlo la meva llengua [...]
   Gaudí detingut per parlar català , 1924

9. Geoff
   February 7th 2004 09:25

   If you won’t accept factual evidence, what will convince you that you’re wrong about the sardana?

10. Trevor
    February 7th 2004 09:59

    Joan, you’re trolling. If you want to discuss the evidence – which is that sardanas manifestly were allowed by Franco, right from the start – then do so. Otherwise go somewhere else and start your own blog.

11. Joan
    February 7th 2004 13:33

    Dear Trevor,

    The only Troll here it’s you… How can you say Franco encouraged the Sardanas? Josep Pla was a Catalan and a Franco supporter. I’m sure he and other Catalans that sympathised with Franco helped him realise that Sardanas were just folklore and that to forbid them would only cause more hate and resentment towards the regime for nothing. so that among other reasons (mainly the defeat of fascism in WWII) made Franco decide to allow Sardanas again. That’s very far from actually supporting the Sardanas (Are you crazy?). Please… Sardanas is a popular dance among the middle class, and specially in rural areas (you need open spaces). It is far from being bourgeois as you say. You seem to do half research and then invent the other half to make it suit your particular point of view.

    By the way, I very much doubt that people during civil war had the spirit to dance Sardanas and everything. Anyway as you should know… even though the anarchists ruled the streets, the government in Generalitat was ERC and as you can imagine they never forbid Sardanas.

    Do you anything about being unbiased?. I understand you want to have something everyday… and if it’s shocking, even better. But do you actually have to make up things?

    Yours sincerely,

    Joan

12. Toni
    February 8th 2004 14:36

    The numbers and quotes on Trevor’s original page show that the Franco government approved of the sardana. He hasn’t made anything up, but you will need to get used to the idea that not everything you were told at school is true. Companys only stayed in power because the anarchists let him, and the FAI were more anti-Catalan than Franco. They hated bourgeois nationalism and they probably banned sardana associations in 1936 when they were killing all the bourgeois nationalists they could find.

13. Trevor
    February 6th 2004 00:00

    So why not destroy cockerels as well? Think of all the terrible things the French do to your comrades in Roussillon.

14. Trevor
    February 6th 2004 10:51

    … as if you didn’t know already.

15. Trevor
    February 6th 2004 23:59

    Too late, people.

16. BIG SANDY
    February 7th 2004 10:46

    IT IS WHOLLY FITTING FOR ALL THESE THINGS TO BE FULFILLED ACCORDING TO THE INVIOLABLE SENTENCE OF THE KING AND HIS IMPERIUM.

17. Trevor
    February 7th 2004 10:52

    Wotchit, Sandy. I know how to write a rule to fix your case problem, but I think you’ll be a much happier and more rounded person if you fish all that gunk out of your keyboard.

18. Geoff
    February 8th 2004 22:44

    I don’t think Joan’s read very much Catalan history. There’s a bit in “Red Barcelona: Social Protest and…” where Angel Smith describes how “The tensions were exteriorized by the use of flags, with the anarchist red and black countered by the Catalan ‘four bars’, flown by both the Catalan authorities and the PSUC… It was, therefore, of significant symbolic importance that after the May Days at the telephone exchange … the anarchist colours were lowered and in their place was hoisted the Catalan flag.”

19. Opineitor
    May 31st 2009 02:02

    Joan, so good you mention castells, as an example of highly civilizated cultural Catalan demonstration. Which good can make a child risking her/his life 10 m high from ground? History tells 3 deaths in 200 yrs. The number doesn’t matter to me: just being there, the chance of a fatality exists. I don’t like bullfights either, but I propose that example for we all to see how many “ancestral” uses, not only bullfights, need a revision.