All the Mallorcan parties have voted in favor of maintaining subsidies for businesses to label in CatalanExcept for Vox, which hasn't set foot in Barcelona for a while, or it would know, by now, that this is, above all, a way to avoid everything being in English. Toni Gili, the spokesperson, used a flowery and revealing phrase: "It's as immoral for the PSOE to spend money on whores and cocaine as it is for you to vote in favor of these subsidies." Let's leave aside the fact that this sentence contains two levels of language. I would recommend, if I were to give you a speech, that it should be said either "whores and lines" or "prostitutes and cocaine." Podemos reproached him for being a partner in the company Terracor, which apparently received aid for labeling in the devil's language. I find, in short, that this detail is an act of coherence.

As a reader, I've always been surprised by the number of prostitutes who appear in books written by men. I'd say that authors of my generation and younger no longer portray this figure, so present in the male imagination, as normally as possible. As if it were the most normal thing in the world to pay money to buy sex. Of course, they always seek something more than sex in the exploited: they seek power and domination, to do what they want without having to explain themselves or respond to the demands of the person they've slept with. In other words, many pay to be able to rid themselves of the humanity that human females have a mania for possessing. If it hasn't been done yet, someone should dedicate a doctoral thesis to studying the figure of the whore in literature. I was going to say in Spanish (and Catalan) literature, but a mental review of famous authors from all continents leaves the sad conclusion of its universal and transcultural reach. Whether it's that García Márquez character who decided to give himself a teenage virgin at ninety years old, or Naguib Mahfuz's father who consumed belly dancers while keeping his wife locked up at home, passing through all those who during Franco's regime wrote only about (saintly) mothers or butterflies, to a character who uses them to satisfy himself. It's not just that they write about prostitutes, it's that they often represent them with a nauseating contempt, a contempt that coincides with what many real men feel when they use this kind of servicesThey are attracted to prostitutes but hate them because they sell themselves, as if they weren't the ones buying them and, therefore, responsible for the degradation of those they consume. They are the ones who should feel ashamed of the immorality and lack of ethics involved in using a woman who doesn't desire them or enjoy the relationship, a woman who has often been raped because she was turned into a whore or part of a situation of extreme need. It's not enough for them to rape them in exchange for money; they are often the ones who contribute to fostering their social stigma. Just look at how, in some newspapers, the victims of the Koldo and company plot are labeled "young ladies of dubious morals." Isn't dubious morals rather the responsibility of those who use their power to dispose of young women as if they were commodities? Shouldn't the stigma fall on those capable of exchanging human beings without any scruples?

A petrol station, a garage, a bazaar, a carpentry shop and one of the biggest brothels in Europe. This is what Mas Morató industrial estate in La Jonquera has to offer. It is where Club Paradise is located, known because it can accommodate more than a hundred prostitutes. It is five o'clock in the afternoon, opening time, and there is already a group of six men waiting to enter. "But how can you do this to me? I have a wife!" one of the clients replies to the question of whether he wants to give an interview. The Generalitat considers brothels "public establishments with private annexes" and, throughout the pandemic, the same measures have been applied to them as to nightclubs. This means that, in 2021, they were only allowed to open for two weeks in July, until on October 8 most restrictions were lifted. The only condition is that all customers must present a covid certificate or a negative PCR test result, as in nightclubs. On the first weekend, many customers did not have a test and had to go to a shopping centre next door to get one. To avoid losing customers, this weekend the club hired medical staff who offer tests just outside the brothel. Five security staff check documents, bags and put the men through a metal detector. "We've had a great time, there are some very beautiful women!" two regulars from Toulouse exclaim. They come out squirming and with reddish cheeks. They have paid €17 to get in – with a free drink – and about €60 for the sex service.