United Kingdom

... The greatest offenses have been against the people of the world, both past and present. These offenses are the result of constantly trivializing serious, weighty words that cannot be used lightly without causing affront. A land with a higher degree of self-government than any equivalent entity in Europe or the Americas (greater than Germany’s Länder or than US states); where people have been voting freely in various elections for nearly four decades; where the language is protected and no restrictions of any kind placed on it; a land that is, or was, one of the most prosperous places on the continent; where there is, and has been, absolute freedom of speech and freedom to defend any and all ideas; where people live, or used to live, in peace and comfort; a place praised and admired by the rest of the planet, and rightly so, for its extraordinary cities and villages and for its dazzling cultural traditions…; despite all this, for the last five years its governing leaders and its fanatics have been plaintively crying out “Visca Catalunya lliure!” (Long live a free Catalonia) and displaying signs with the slogan “Freedom for Catalonia.” They claim to be “oppressed,” “occupied,” and “humiliated,” and constantly appeal to “democracy” while brazenly violating the very same democratic principles that they wish to eliminate in their “republic” without dissidents, where judges will be appointed and controlled by politicians, where freedom of the press will be curtailed if not eliminated altogether, where those who are considered hostile to or unenthusiastic about the regime will be reported (“desafectos,” for hostile, and “tibios,” for unenthusiastic, are terms that were once used by the Franco regime in its own insatiable purges). They take the liberty of calling Joan Manuel Serrat and Isabel Coixet, along with over half of the Catalan people, “fascists,” while the writer Juan Marsé is described as a “traitor” and a “renegade.” Nobody should feel bitter or downcast about this: it is as though Mussolini’s minions were to call them “fascists.” Imagine the value of such an insult from the lips of those who are issuing it...

... The way words are being mishandled and defiled represents the biggest offense and the greatest lack of respect. Even more so than the way numbers are being twisted out of shape, such as when at the last Catalan election a result of 47% or 48% was turned by the chieftains and witch-hunters (not by all the separatists, of course) into “a distinct majority” and “a clear mandate” emanating from the Catalan people. That was the warning sign that we are, to all effects and purposes, in the presence of Mussolini imitators who oddly describe themselves as oppressed, humiliated and without freedom, and who perpetrate the infamy of calling “fascists” those who could soon become their victims.

https://elpais.com/elpais/2017/10/23/inenglish/1508745387_134918.html

... Until now, this harassment was limited to online lynching. I dealt with this by not having a Facebook or Twitter account (the latter was hacked, as was my WhatsApp profile, which was then used to send out a message that I did not write). Although there is always someone on hand to inform you about the tide of trash being piled on you in the social media. But this is the third time that they have yelled “fascist” at me so far this week (and the first time that I have answered back). And I find that something inside me is breaking.

I see now, with horrifying clarity, that no matter what happens next, there is no room here for me or for anybody who dares to think independently, even though this is my place of birth. Today it is insults against me, yesterday it was insults against members of my family; the day before it was insults against friends of mine whose other friends openly criticize the fact that the former are still friends with me. And tomorrow, it will be something worse.

It makes no difference whether you unequivocally condemn police brutality, or whether you demand Rajoy’s resignation (in my case, I have been asking for that since long before any of this happened).

Because if, when you condemn the Spanish government’s actions, you don’t also condone the Catalan government’s actions, you immediately become an enemy, a fascist, a fascistoid, a Franco follower, the scum of the Earth. And you think about the fear that has already covered, like spores, the skin of all those people who keep quiet but who secretly come to tell you that they’re on your side – that they are grateful for what you are doing, and then they tell you that they don’t even talk about the situation inside their own homes, for fear that their children will hear them and get into trouble at school.

These are not mere anecdotes. This is the reality on the ground for those of us who live here...

https://elpais.com/elpais/2017/10/04/inenglish/1507107040_799383.html