José Bretón's book: The Voice and the Gaze of Abusers neither instructs nor enlightens.

This week, a judge authorized the publication ofHate, by Luisgé Martín, but the Barcelona Juvenile Prosecutor's Office has appealed the decision and the publisher Anagrama has indefinitely halted the publication of the book.It is a portrait of José Bretón, the man who murdered and burned his children in 2011 to harm the children's mother, Ruth Ortiz. Both she and the Juvenile Prosecutor's Office requested a halt to publication, as it violates the victims' right to honor, reparation, privacy, and image.

From a literary perspective, it's difficult to go against creative freedom. But in this specific case, there is an essential ethical dimension. Hate It uses the voice of a murderer and abuser who speaks at length about his victim, Ruth Ortiz. He reveals, in his opinion, very intimate details of their relationship. He uncovers gruesome and sordid aspects of the children's murder. He falls into the typical discourse of abusers, blaming Ruth Ortiz for her behavior, perpetuating sexist violence fourteen years after the events. Bretón's obsession and cruelty toward his ex-wife, evident in his language, remain intact. Luisgé Martín argued: "My purpose was to try to understand the mind of someone who had been capable of murdering his own children, so I found any other point of view distracting, especially that of Ruth Ortiz, whom, in any case, I would not have dared to mortify with anything. The morbidity of evil is disguised as a high intellectual exercise and formal sophistication. "Understanding" the mind of a murderer as something that requires superior intelligence and analysis.

The author finds the victim's point of view "distracting." And, in the name of morality, he assures that he would not have wanted to "mortify" the mother. On the other hand, in Bretón, the father, this subject stimulates and entertains him, it allows him to release his sadism. The murderer is not mortified by having to talk about how he burned his children to death to leave no trace, on the contrary, he wants to share it. The writer could have novelized a fictional story based on this case, and done so masterfully. But it needs to have the label of real, of true crime, with first and last names, because that's what makes readers and companies salivate now. It ignores the consequences for the victim, with the excuse that it has the authority of "the voice of the killer." All the pseudo-intellectual theses we've been dragging around for centuries about investigating what lies behind evil and what happens in the mind of a killer fantasize about discovering different elevated forms of darkness, which reveal an imaginary higher reality that allows us to understand new nuances of evil. And a radish. It's a pavement fruit of morbidity and fascination with violence, especially that which is exercised against women. Literature doesn't need to use the real life of a specific victim to tell a story that conveys truth. We've seen it in hundreds of true-crimes where, no matter how many chapters they add, nothing new is discovered beyond the eroticization of hatred and the glorification of primal and visceral criminals who have a narcissistic, limited, and manipulative discourse about themselves. The voice and gaze of abusers neither instruct nor illuminate. If we criticize television for interviewing and remunerating criminals, why should it be able to do so in the name of literature?

Sanctifying books by virtue of supposed creative processes that only exploit the lives of victims and innocent people is distorting the literary function. And let's not even talk about what would come after the publication ofHateA hurricane of sensationalism on TV reveling in the killer's voice and the book's content, further torturing Ruth Ortiz's life, just because someone wants to know what goes on in the mind of a killer. Ask Ruth Ortiz, who knows better than anyone.