The night Franco died... if he never really died

1. Get ready to tell the tale. In the coming days, we'll be seeing countless images of Arias Navarro, in black and white, announcing what half of Spain desired and the other half feared:Franco is dead"Even the most outlandish stories will feature the then-Prime Minister, his voice hoarse from the regime's brutality. At that time, fifty years ago, TVE was the only television channel, and the second channel—UHF—didn't even come close to reaching the entire Iberian Peninsula. Forty percent of Spanish territory could only watch one channel. The story of the dictator's death is also interesting from a communications standpoint. Who did the King entrust with forming a government? A young Adolfo Suárez, who for four years had been the Director General of Spanish Radio and Television during the final throes of Franco's regime. Not at all self-conscious."

2. The Generalissimo had made his last public appearance on October 1st—a different kind of October 1st—and in the regime's final days, as it crumbled, the only television channel was more Catholic than the Pope. Or as pro-Franco as Franco himself. Examples of censorship were constant. Josep Maria Baget Herms told us all about it, using all the formal "eres" and "ustedes" (formal "you" and "ustedes"), at the Autonomous University, when he was our professor. Not only was there absolute control over information to hide the executions of September 25th, but they also censored sketches from the comedy show "Tip y Coll" and children's programs. The Movement acted with insatiable relish until the very last minute. On the night of November 20th, TVE was scheduled to broadcast the film Satan never sleeps And because of the title, the subject matter, and the impending death of the Caudillo, they decided to postpone its broadcast. Certainly, a story about the Chinese revolution that brought Mao to power didn't seem like the most appropriate film for the night Franco died. If he really did die.

3. Fifty years later, his spirit lives on. The magnificent dossier of the ARA He demonstrated it with facts and arguments. We have a chilling reality. Beyond the millions who still yearn for him, beyond even the fascists and textbook chauvinists, there is a whole generation that never even saw a Franco stamp, yet they find in Vox's discourse an ideology and a flag-waving aesthetic that makes them feel important. Ignorance, cloaked in moral supremacy, fuels these phenomena. They are not exclusive to Spain. These are winds blowing in too many corners of the First World, but feeling nostalgia for a bloodthirsty dictator is a collective pathology that, apparently, doesn't heal with time. On the contrary, it seems to be contagious. And, in this, the way people get their information and consume the media is also important.

4. The current media landscape bears no resemblance to the single-channel television monopoly of five decades ago. We live in a society where, in addition to numerous television options (public, private, regional, satellite), there has been the rise of digital media and, above all, the social media revolution. The latest CEO provides clear data: 81% of young people aged 16 to 24 follow current events through social media. Only 6% do so through print media. 64% of these young people get their news from Instagram, 50% from TikTok, and 38% from other sources. The more right-wing the party (Vox, PP, and Aliança Catalana), the more they admit to knowing what's happening in the world through these channels, where the information presented doesn't necessarily have to be true. On the contrary, credibility tends toward zero, and the disinformation pandemic is their big business. And so it goes.