Spain: politicians who fine you for disagreeing with them and without going through a court

@ElentirENG ES 4·26·2023 · 17:29 0

In democratic countries, the word "censorship" sounds very bad because it represents a concept that is incompatible with freedom of expression.

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Fines for reasons of opinion and without going through a court

However, in some democratic countries, censorship is being implemented with the support of many who consider themselves democrats and even the majority of the media, which should be the most interested in opposing >That politicians can dictate what can be said and what can't. It is amazing to see how naturally some not only justify, but even applaud imposing fines for reasons of opinion without going through a court, which should be the normal procedure in a democracy to sanction any abuse of the right to freedom of expression.

The case of Spain: fines to impose gender ideology

In Spain we have already had a few examples of this government censorship imposed for the sake of anti-scientific gender ideology. One of the first came in July 2011: the socialist government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero imposed a fine of 100,000 euros to the Intereconomía channel for criticizing gay pride day. One year later, the Justice annulled the fine, noting that the government violated freedom of expression and the right to criticize.

Socialists are not the only ones who have resorted to this undemocratic mechanism to persecute opinions. In the Community of Madrid, the regional government of the Popular Party (PP) imposed three fines for the sake of the laws that impose gender ideology: one of them against a school director who criticized that law, another against an association that published a book that criticized the abuses of these laws and a third against a professional who helped homosexuals who were dissatisfied with their condition.

In all three cases, the Justice annulled the fines, stating that they violated fundamental rights, but the laws that allowed these fines to be imposed are still in force because ethe PP se he has refused to repeal them, as Vox party has asked it on four occasions.

The separatist parties have also been applying this censorship in Catalonia. In 2017, the association HazteOir.org was fined by the Catalan government, with an amount of 1,707 euros, for a bus in which it showed its disagreement with the theses of gender ideology. In 2019, the Court annulled the fine. Yesterday, the Catalan government again fined HazteOir.org for another bus, this time for criticizing the Trans Law. Now the fine is 20,000 euros. The association has already announced a judicial appeal. All the precedents indicate that Justice will also annul this sanction.

The complicity of almost all parties and many media

The most astonishing thing is that almost all the media advertise this type of fine, presenting those fined as guilty of crimes of opinion for the mere fact of criticizing a law or disagreeing with gender ideology. Many who criticized censorship during the Franco regime now support it because they are the ones who impose it. But government censorship was unacceptable then and continues to be so now, no matter how much they criminalize the censored to justify it .

The big difference is that before Spain lived under a dictatorship, and now they are imposing censorship on us in a democratic regime: it is something that seemed unthinkable but it is already happening, and what is worse, with the support of all the political parties except one (Vox, which is the only one that opposes the anti-democratic laws that contemplate these sanctions for reasons of opinion) and with the approval of many media outlets. Those who support this government censorship call themselves democrats but they are apprentice dictators. A democrat does not admit that politicians can fine someone because he does not think like them. That is something typical of a dictatorship, not of a democracy.