These days, when there's so much talk about corruption, it's good to know that even a linguist, a philologist, can be corrupted. Sometimes, money isn't even necessary: all it takes is a bit of notoriety, a moment of false recognition, a moment of satisfied vanity, for some individuals to agree to serve a lie. Even a philological lie. This is what happened with a Valencian linguist, whose name we won't mention because it's not necessary, who endorsed with a favorable report (directly contrary to the criteria of the Valencian Academy of Language, of which he is a member, to make matters worse), the crude maneuver of changing the official name of the city of Valencia. Indeed, the plenary session of the City Council of this city this Tuesday, the last of the school year, has approved that from now on the toponym Valencia will have Valencia as its official formThe PP and Vox government, which is pushing for this change, relies on a report by the aforementioned linguist (whom they refer to as a "renowned linguist," and with that, he should be considered paid), according to which this form is valid because, in his opinion, it coincides "with the traditional and majority pronunciation" of the city's inhabitants. Philologically, this is such an inconsistent and absurd argument that it barely merits comment. Let's say, for a laugh, that if the names of cities had to be written as their inhabitants pronounce them, we would see things like Barsalona, Lleide, Madrid, Zebiya either Naked Yok.
Insisting on making the form official Valencia It's simply making a spelling mistake official. Curiously, it would also be a spelling mistake in Spanish, which is evidently the only language the PP and Vox governments would want for the capital of the Valencian Community, for the entire Valencian Community. Valencia Thus, with this closed accent, it is a way, like any other, of indulging in one's own ignorance, of wallowing in obfuscation and fanaticism. It is a way of proclaiming that, among the many things and people they hate, they also feel a profound hatred for science, for knowledge, for culture, and for everything that allows us to make some progress in understanding the world, in the cohesion of communities, in the coexistence of citizens. This hatred, by the way, they also feel for the poor man who has decided to cover for them and thus throw away the authority he might one day have had in exchange for a crumb of glory, and even then a rotten crumb.
Vox and the PP can maintain that the sun revolves around the Earth if they want, and they'll surely have no trouble finding a resentful scientist willing to agree with them in a ludicrous report. In the Valencian Community, the linguistic authority rests with the Valencian Academy of Language, despite Vox's public announcement that they intend to "strangle" it and Mazón's concession to it in exchange for continuing their long and grotesque flight to nowhere. But neither they nor all the deniers we now have to endure will prevail. Ignorance always leads to defeat.
