Vicente Palermo
08/04/2021 21:13
Clarín.com
Opinion
Updated 08/04/2021 21:13
Of course, Beatriz Sarlo is not a country vendor, even if she has seen fit to unearth that archaic term - which serves only to provoke unnecessarily.
If Sarlo had any genuinely political disposition and genuinely devoted to dialogue - as I think it should be - he would, in my opinion, have to start by addressing the criticism of the Malvinas cause from other sides.
To affirm that the Malvinas do not think - "when people say that the Falklands are Argentine they do not sit down for a minute to think" - is purely insulting provocation, it does not contribute one iota to the generation of an effective and constructively political approach and criticism of the nationalist position of the Falkland Islands. I assume that Sarlo cares about this purely political dimension, and a lot.
The Malvinas think, they argue, they are carriers of values, they carry, like any poor Christ who walks the world, with beliefs, and they have an idea of the future, not only of the Falklands, but of Argentina. The fact that I completely disagree with them on these issues does not allow me to deny them their status as interlocutors citizens and I suppose that Sarlo should not be allowed either (from the height of his contempt, Sarlo wants to send the Malvineros “to live six months to the Falklands. ”When it is clearly evident that many Malvineros would like to have that experience! Better not give them ideas, Beatriz, they already have them).
But this is how I approach the hard core of the question: does it make sense to affirm in a media context that the Falklands are "a British territory that is the closest thing to the south of Scotland"?
Does not have it.
Sarlo forgive me, but that's a good example of an association figure of speech.
It does not say, literally, that the Falklands are British because they are similar to the south of Scotland, but it suggests it with all the force of the understanding.
I don't get what this bombastic statement contributes to the receptors thinking.
It is curious, who criticizes because the Malvineros do not think, does not seem very interested in them thinking.
A few years ago, Sarlo and I were among the signatories of a declaration that defended the self-determination of the Falklands.
And I still believe that it is there that the dialogue must begin, or try.
Speaking in the enfant terrible style that the islands are British territory is like slapping an absent-minded man, sticking his tongue out at a soccer fan, making fun of a lady who was always told that the Falklands are Argentine.
They neither deserve it nor do they serve any purpose.
On the other hand, trying to be heard arguing that a community lives on the islands, and that Argentines should admit that this community determines itself (although it is not the figure of self-determination of international political law) I think it can be a shock, a commotion , but also perhaps the beginning of a dialogue.
Let's start by talking about the people, not the territory and its Scottish morphology. Let's put aside the endless and incantable historical dispute of rights (the Argentines, as well as the British, we lack the "other half" of the library, and we don't even know that that other half exists), and let's think and talk about what matters politically, republicanly and patriotically: that we Argentines win, instead of losing, if we admit that the Falklands (please do not talk more about kelpers, algae do not think, in the same way that it seems that according to Sarlo the Malviners do not they do), they can and should decide their future as a community of free citizens.
Whether we like the outcome of that choice or not. Sarlo affirms that he cares very little about the controversy with Malvineros; very well, but it is difficult not to understand that this controversy has been opened in the heat of the imminent elections and, curiously, there are not missing the diggers, something macabre, of twitters that perhaps should have been deleted and, unfortunately, there are also the retractions of pre-candidates that they now maintain, contrary to what they said before, that they assume a commitment to fight vigorously for the "recovery of sovereignty" in the islands.
This seems to me not to measure up to prudent political courage.
It's a shame.
I would like to be able to vote for a candidate who does not care if the territory of the archipelago is British or not, but if we Argentines can be in tune with our best political traditions and genuinely care about what the Falklands want.
I am not unaware that many Malvineros will throw the 1994 National Constitution over my head, rather its transitory clause.
It does not matter.
Constitutions many times are out of date in the changing of the times, and many times they are modified.
Let's not be so conservative.
This transitory clause is precisely a chain that the conventional constituents tied to the feet and hands of future generations.
It is not much more than that.
But let's start by talking about the people who live on the islands, of whom Sarlo affirms that "there is no inhabitant there who does not experience the arrival of the military as an invasion."
It is so much more than that.
They are the current feeling and perception of the islanders in relation to the Argentines.
And it is self-respect as citizens that we Argentines should maintain, or achieve, not by "recovering" the islands but by observing a mature and fair political behavior.
Vicente Palermo is a political scientist and essayist. His latest book is The Brief Life of Dardo Cabo (Siglo Veintiuno Editores, 2021)