The fact that thousands of young people—because it was, fundamentally, young people, more so than parents—protested on Thursday at the Fossar de les Moreres against racism in any of its forms is, if nothing else, good news. That they did so, specifically, against the closest xenophobic formula, that is to say, against Aliança Catalana, is much more relevant. In these troubled times, when it is so easy to see the eye of the hurricane ten thousand kilometers away and not want to see it nearby, right at home or knocking on the door. In any case, yes, there were thousands of young people, and some of the most active and supportive in the country, answering the call of the pro-independence left and with the support of the Tenants' Union (Sindicat de Llogateres), Top Manta, the Educational Assembly of Catalonia, the OJS, or the Enough Complicity with Israel coalition. Paradoxically, they are the only ones arrested this Diada. It must be remembered that they were protesting against 400 people who were gathered there under an institutional protection that was shameful, through an unusual deployment of various operational areas of the Mossos d'Esquadra and alongside some remnants of the most violent faction of the Boixos Nois. Insufferable paradoxes. In the middle, photojournalist Jordi Borràs, attacked by both. Because it happens that those 400 people, compared to the 8,000 who were protesting so justly against their presence, crudely represent the Catalan niche that euphorically congratulates itself on the victory of the AfD in Saxony-Anhalt, celebrates the genocide in Gaza with open arms, and miserably stirs up a humiliating ethnic-racial segregation. The Mossos, paradoxically, looked outward, but the German police have long been looking inward and classifying the AfD as a real threat of far-right extremism.Less paradoxical, more paroxysmal are some events I experienced during the afternoon of the Diada. Simultaneously, while the neo-Nazi group Núcleo Nacional was gathering at Plaça Verdaguer –poor Mossèn Cinto– under a drastic encirclement by the Mossos and with 1,500 anti-fascists protesting nearby, a small block of Aliança Catalana tried to march in the middle of the pro-independence demonstration almost as if nothing were happening –amidst growing reproaches and constant rejections, final police encirclement included, when the majority understands and understands very well everything that is at stake. Because what one must never do –in the light of the darkness of history– is to normalize racism, walk by its side, or give it space. The organizers have some responsibility, despite the prior warnings and alerts, just as we all do. I say this feeling both angry and disillusioned, worried and committed, scared and hopeful, as a cry or a plea or as an enough. Discreet or loud, the form is all the same to me, but the ethical, political, and cultural foundation is clear, explicit, and simple for future gatherings: no form of racism should be invited, allowed, whitewashed, or tolerated in a democratic, unitary demonstration. Do sanitary cordons work? They work, of course they do. Basically, if they are implemented. Let them manifest their racist hatred wherever they can, but let them not contaminate or parasitize a mobilization that demands a country for everyone by insulting diversity, cowardly criminalizing newcomers, and fueling the dirty and brutal reality that is all racism, when those responsible for the structural problems the country suffers sit in other seats of power and never arrive in boats adrift. I say this while returning home, pondering at every step and remembering an old anti-racist slogan from the nineties, when Lucrècia Pérez was murdered in 1992: don't mess with my friend, we used to say back then. And today it is of a literal militant anti-racism: don't mess for even a second –today, now, here– with my neighbors; don't bother the Senegalese family that lives on my same landing, door to door, anymore; nor the beloved Colombian neighbor from the fifth floor, who are already an inseparable part of my community, landscape, and country. The shoes of others, Casaldàliga would say, are mine. Paradoxically, polysemically, we are here because they are here —and vice versa.

Today, September 12th, after the Diada, is the time to continue existing. To continue existing means to continue being. To be, which is different from just being present, requires a lot of work. And the main work is to have the consciousness that the work that is needed is to do a great job so that the work does not feel like work.

I hear President Pujol on Catalunya Ràdio delivering a message for this National Day, with the most vibrant tone that his 96 years allow him. He still retains the craft of a politician who has dedicated his whole life to addressing the hearts of the people. He may lose strength in his voice and clarity in his diction, but not his skill or his intention: "We have the capacity to build a great Catalonia".He speaks from a full awareness of the present (“the country is experiencing complicated moments, of disillusionment and of people who are losing hope"). He returns, of course, to the core of his thought: the Eleventh of September is the "celebration of all those who live and work in Catalonia and want to be Catalan", and he prescribes going there, knowing that there is moral discouragement: "Faith and optimism can be spread if there is a desire and will to continue being and to move forward".To instill some kind of faith or optimism in people, governments must speak, above all, through deeds. The disillusionment and hopelessness that Pujol speaks of are based on real facts that have to do with the state of public services, the impoverishment of the majority, the frustration and disbandment post-Procés, and the umpteenth confirmation that autonomy falls short in solving problems that require sovereignty.And yet, in Pujol’s fading voice one can sense, without reproach, the reminder of the activists who did everything when there were no tools, because the beginning of all things is not the legal framework or economic funding, but the will. In the Kennedy-esque manner, it is a do not ask what Catalonia can do for you, but whether you still believe in it and are willing to join forces to return to it.

I do not know if we are different people, or the same ones in a different skin, than those from almost a decade ago, in this corner of the world. I know that our children, who were small then, have embraced other causes, kinder ones, than being among the losers, the unpleasant ones, those who do not stop poking and complaining, like woodworms. The house cats, well-fed and pampered, are very nice. The stray ones, those who have nothing and beg all day, or steal, exasperate us. We are the stray ones.

We have a country with eight and a half million inhabitants and public services that barely covered the needs of six million Catalans forty years ago. With a birth rate among the native population that is not even enough to maintain the population, the analysis is clear: without foreigners we would be better off. Therefore, let's kick them out. This way, healthcare, education, public transport, social aid, and, in short, the well-being of the true Catalans will be at the level we deserve (and that one day, which we no longer remember, we had). Without immigrants, moreover, we will go out for a walk in our streets calmly, without fear that a gang of Latinos, Arabs, or sub-Saharans will take our lives.A purified Catalonia would certainly be more prosperous. Sooner or later we will need new Catalans; Catalans from here, Catalans named Puig, Vergés, Ferré or Giró, so perhaps we will have to review the laws we have regarding homosexual people, because whether we like it or not, nothing comes out of the relationships between them that makes the country grow. God forbid I tell people what they should do in the privacy of their own homes, but a responsible policy must look after demographic issues. And a prosperous country cannot afford for people not to have children. Therefore, if we love the country, perhaps we will have to kick out the gays, the lesbians, and the transsexuals, who do not want to make it prosper by bringing new generations of Catalans into the world. While this does not happen, however, we could rethink the role of the elderly. It is not fair that the average pension of an older person in Catalonia is higher than the minimum wage of a worker. Something is not working if it is this worker who has to pay for the pension of the older person. Taking into account how life expectancy has lengthened, and the excessive consumption that the elderly make of public healthcare, it is a country requirement to cut their benefits and direct these resources to the productive youth. We are already late to dismantle a pension regime based on plunder, because it is unfair—and ineffective—in plain sight. We must promote that every Catalan saves what they can to take charge, when the moment arrives, of the needs they may have.In short, a more dynamic and fairer Catalonia cannot afford for one-fifth of the population to live off the rest. In Catalonia, we do not want old people!

On the National Day, and in view of the number of volunteers there are to carry out the arduous task of thinking about the country, let my humble recommendation from here be to look at the Valencian Country and the Balearic Islands. “We must get closer to Valencia,” said Josep Pla: there, on Saturday, there is a great demonstration in defense of public school in Catalan and against the pretension of subjecting it to ideological and linguistic control. It is a crucial fight for everyone. In the Balearic Islands, and in particular in Mallorca and Ibiza, the consequences of touristification are posed with harshness: massification, speculation, overexploitation of natural resources, tension and social inequalities, expulsion of the citizenry due to the impossibility of accessing housing, PISA results at the very tail end of everything. The recommendation is to look at them, the Valencian Country and the Balearic Islands, not to confirm prejudices or archetypes, nor to exercise arrogance or paternalism, because the problems that arise there are, to a large extent, the same ones that Catalonia has. Aena milks us with identical voracity; the Civil Guard, the National Police and the Mossos hit us with the same dedication at demonstrations; the concern for the future (what future and in what conditions) is, more or less, the same throughout the Catalan Countries (and I am already aware that I have not mentioned Northern Catalonia, the Franja, or Alghero; I do so now).Another recommendation if one wants to think about the country is to look at the world. It is not the same as it was nine years ago, when on a day like today it had been a little over three weeks since the 17-A and a little less than three weeks remained until the 1-O. Discussing Catalonia regardless of the climate emergency is to expose oneself to manufacturing obsolete diagnoses and prescriptions from the start. Pretending to discuss immigration while simultaneously minimizing the influence of the far-right—ignoring or leaving out of the discussion the democratic involution and institutional corrosion that the far-right produces throughout the West—is completely missing the mark. It is even more misguided if one loses sight of the fact that Catalonia—and the Valencian Country, and the Balearic Islands—as a small, rich country of the south, and also its language and culture, are true delicacies for the gurus of the global anti-European far-right, potential Ceutas or Greenlands.We wanted a republic to have our own voice in these debates and for it to be a progressive, bold (I will spare the overused adjective revolutionary), open, profoundly and radically democratic voice, with an identity built on the Catalan language and culture that would be capable of welcoming the languages and cultures of the people who come to live here and benefiting from them. That instead of this, public debate has succumbed to the provocations of a few self-proclaimed saviors, to the masturbatory rhetoric of warmongering speeches, or to the rehash of age-old squabbles (where everyone's grandparents were from, for example), is disappointing. Despite this, despite the stifling atmosphere and the feeling of the end of days, the future remains ahead. Long live a free Catalonia and a happy National Day to everyone, except the fascists.