¡Big Mouth!
Censoring Cartoon Sex
Big Mouth is getting all hot under the collar over censorship and the Spanish monarchy. While Grapevine is not responsible for the opinions or comments in these articles, we note that Big Mouth is not censored (even if we sometimes wish he’d just shut up).
Oh, charming that is. Now, you must know that, as Lord of the Universe, I know everything there is to know about the way things should be run. Unfortunately, that doesn’t always happen. Just think about the royals…
Now, I know the Spanish media can be, well, crude. Porn isn’t pushed onto the top shelf; obsequious ‘celeb’ mags kow-tow to the famous (Holá was the origin of Hello Magazine) while, at the other end, tacky gossip rags proliferate, footage of celebrities being chased down alleyways while someone shouts questions about their intimate private lives at them, is shown unedited. Most Spanish T.V., which used to be excrutiatingly bad, has improved so much that it is merely dire. No one is much offended or surprised, though why any one is interested in it stumps me. And there is not much litigation, either. It’s bad really; forcing long distance cameras through the shrubbery, or getting into people’s gardens is trespassing and invasion of privacy, unjustified by any valid public interest. And if Britain’s Private Eye was as unsubtle as the Spanish media it would have been closed down years ago.
But on the hand, satire shouldn’t be squashed. We need all the witty social commentary we can get: it’s the best critique of politics and of the powerful there is. Sadly, it seems that here in Spain, freedom of speech – that freedom to comment – is a crime. In November the Spanish court upheld the conviction of ‘El Jueves’ editor Manel Fontdevila and the cartoonist ‘Guillermo’ for ‘damaging the prestige of the crown’.
How come? Well, their crime involved a pop at the Government’s scheme to up the birth rate by introducing new payments to mothers, per childbirth. ‘El Jueves’ printed a ribald caricature of Prince Felipe, making love to his wife and saying, “Do you realise that if you get pregnant this will be the closest thing to work I’ve ever done?”
Tee hee. That’s the worst of it: it’s actually funny. Unfortunately, the crown’s reaction wasn’t: within hours judges had ordered seizure of all copies of that magazine (they were taken from the newsstands by police). Now, there’s damage to the prestige of the crown.
Is there a case for the cartoon? Like I said, it’s funny. It’s satirical, witty and raises valid questions in a lighthearted way: is paying all mothers for producing children sensible? And is the privilege of the royal family reasonable? Those are surely legitimate questions to ask.
We don’t see any prosecutions when magazines print derogatory cartoons about common people like the snobbishly mocked ‘chavs’, nor about most celebs: the TV personalities, the sports stars. As for the politicians, Zapatero, Rajoy, Brown, Merkel, Bush and the rest are constantly being shredded by the press, with accusations and illustrations at least as personal and crude as that of El Jueves. They might not like it, but they normally just ignore it. Why don’t they get their knickers in a twist, and start prosecutions?
Why? Don’t be daft: because there would be one hell of a backlash. The people who are best known for reacting to bad publicity (stripping press from shelves, and forcing cartoonists, editors and everyone else to think first about what the powerful want them to say and second about the truth) aren’t the world’s great democrats. They range from control-states like communist China to dictators like Kim II of North Korea to outright monsters like Zimbabwe’s Mugabe. This is not a club many politicians are keen to join. Happily, they know that making a great hairy fuss over the sly cheek of journalists will raise hackles as well as fears. But most of all they know that trying to crush cheeky satire will make them look pompous, humourless and ridiculous. More than they already are!
What on earth was the Spanish royal family thinking of? It is not as if there were any risk to their status; they are very popular in Spain and abroad: King Juan Carlos’ extraordinary courage, integrity and ‘nous’ helped bring democracy back to Spain, and helped preserve through the 1981 coup attempt. That hasn’t been forgotten. Nor is the King a stuffy old-schooler obsessed with keeping to protocol: he recently caused a storm by snubbing Venezuela’s overbearing President, Hugo Chavez with “Why don’t you shut up?” Chavez was behaving badly: you can’t help liking the King for standing up to him.
And yet El Jueves was prosecuted: Spanish journalists and editors must now worry about offending the rich and privileged, or risk fines, court costs, and other losses, and it appears that Prince Felipe is so sensitive to criticism of his luxury life style, he – or his advisors – will be ready to crush freedom of speech. Perhaps that is unfair. I have been reliable informed (well, I heard it from some bloke in the bar) that when shown the cartoon the Prince laughed and shrugged. But if so, it is doubly sad that he didn’t act to stop this ludicrous case being brought to court. If anything damages the prestige of the Spanish crown, it’s this petty and sad prosecution. Don’t you agree?
