I Stand Corrected (Sort Of)

As it happens, our week's Basque-phobe, Colin Davis, is not an US citizen, he is a Brit.

That is what he tells us in his most recent post.

Sorry, I was taken by surprise by his ignorance on the Basque Country and by his openly hatred towards the Basques, which got me thinking that he was a product of the USA's poor educational system.

Anyway, same difference, he is our week's Basque-phobe, no matter where he comes from.

And before he deletes it, this is what he tells me:

6. Alexsu has confirmed his long-standing [and deeply-felt] view on the constitution of the Basque country, though he’s not yet answered my question as to whether he lives there or [as I suspect] in the USA he purports to despise. Incidentally, I don’t want to lose a reader but my impression is that Alexsu’s concept of nationality is so strong he would have been with Hitler on the question of the Sudetenland Germans. But perhaps I do him a disservice. Doubtless he will let me know. If you are going to respond, Alexsu, please also tell me why we shouldn’t return to the 11th century Kingdom of Leon, the 6th century Visigoth Iberian kingdom or the even earlier Roman empire. I suppose it would be because the Basques weren’t any more independent under any of these than they are now as a ‘Castilian colony’.

Uh oh!

He spouses Francoist points of view, but then he casts the "Hitler" thing against me. I guess he is too ignorant to know who installed Francisco Franco in Spain, or that the Basques fought the Nazis from 1937 all the way through 1945.

But then he answers to a comment left in his previous post by a person that also acknowledges Navarre as the Basque Country which I reproduce here:

Anonymous said...

zazpiat bat - - the seven are one. The seven seperate provinces are one , the Basque Country. Yes, Navarra is part of the equation, as are Lapurdi, Behe Nafaroa and Zuberoa, or what is known in French as Labourd, Basse Navarre and the Soule. Add these to Alaba, Guipuzkua and Biskaia, the seven are one. Because of their history, Navarricos are fiercely independent and say they are not Basque nor Spanish, but Navarrans, yet the many many people I know from Navarre go to all the Basque festivals, Basque cultural centers, and, what do you know...they speak Basque and display both the Navarrese and Basque flags on their car bumper! If it looks like a cat and sounds like a cat and acts like a cat, well then, it must be.....a dog???

With this:

7. To the anonymous reader who says everyone in Navarra walks and talks like a Basque so must be a Basque, I can only say I didn’t see much evidence of this when I visited Vitoria [Gasteiz] and Pamplona [Iruña ], especially the former. And would attending a Basque festival really make me a Basque? Finally, would the Basque nationalists accord to parts of Euskadi the same right to opt out that they demand of Spain? I suspect not but would be happy to be disabused of any misconception.

That question he asks is one more of the obstacle the fascist scumbags from the Partido Popular place on the Basque road to self-determination, which proves my statement that Colin spends way too much time with the colonialist minded people.

And once again, before he deletes my new comment, here you have it.

So, you are a Brit, like Lenox.

Sorry, but your complete ignorance about the Basque Country had me thinking that you were an American and that your endemic hatred towards the Basques was a result of the poor educational system in that country.

As it happens, you dislike the Basques because as a Brit you share the old inclination by the Spaniards to cling to your colonialist past.

Too bad.

And as long as you continue to spouse the Francoist points of view on the matter, like your mention of the some obscure kingdoms in the history of the Iberian peninsula, I will continue to point it out to you and your drone-like visitors.

Navarre was an independent kingdom for over a thousand years, ergo, you lie when you say that the Basques were never independent.

And before Navarre, at the fall of the Roman Empire, the first people in the Iberian peninsula to regain their indepdendence was the commonwealth of Basques provinces.

But you are not going to find that information in your Francoist library, that one was designed to perpetuate the lies you so merrily quote in your blog.

And no, I do not live in the USA.

I bet there will be more on this issue, Basque-phobes are known for their obsessive quest against the right to the nations without statehood to achive such international recognition.

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