Read an Exclusive Excerpt from 'Diary of a Traitor,' the Book by Laura Fàbregas

Being a journalist in Catalonia isn't easy. Well, it is if you don't question the prevailing narrative of the "procés" and the benevolence promoted by the Catalan establishment. But if you dare to question it, you know what will happen to you. Right off the bat, accusations of being a colonist, fascist, "ñordo," far-right, "botifler," etc.

There are quite a few examples of this type of journalist. Not many, but a few, yes. One of the most prominent is Laura Fàbregas. On April 9, this journalist born in Argentona publishes the book "Diary of a Traitor."

In it, Fàbregas explains how she experienced the "procés" from the inside, but she also tries to show how years and years of "pujolismo" ended up evolving into a separatism process that, as we can see, ended up sinking Catalonia economically, politically, and socially. She does it from a personal perspective. From someone raised in nationalism, who even attended independence demonstrations, but who ended up on what is considered, for Catalan nationalism, the "dark side."

Jordi Pujol, Jordi Basté, the relationship of independence with the Spanish national soccer team, social media harassment campaigns... even criticisms of constitutionalism. In the book "Diary of a Traitor," Laura Fàbregas tries to explain what happened sociologically in Catalonia during the "procés," how it reached the extremes it did, and how it was experienced in the newsrooms of the media.

Two days before its publication, readers of E-Notícies have the privilege of enjoying an exclusive chapter of this book. The chapter titled "Rahola's Fake News."

"Rahola's Fake News," Excerpt from the Book "Diary of a Traitor" by Laura Fàbregas

What caused me the most suffering when they started calling me from TV3 and other media to join political debates were the unpleasant comments my parents and sisters had to endure. I suspect that, to spare me this suffering, my family has hidden many of these episodes from me. Only the most harmless ones have reached me, like the time when a former secretary of my mother ran into my sister on the street, and in a total state of consternation asked her:

—What happened to Laura? She was such a nice girl...

—As far as I know, she's still nice—my sister replied.

When political debate penetrates the most visceral layers of the human being, there is a risk of morally censoring those who think differently. It stops being a matter of right or left, of being reformist or conservative, and becomes a matter of good and bad. If the majority were offended or scandalized by my public opinions, a small part wished, or prayed, that it was just a form of provocation, "épater le bourgeois." They believed that, deep down, a good person like me couldn't really believe what I was saying. When they confirmed that I defended in public the same as in private, they looked at me with a certain pity, like someone who doesn't know they are completely wrong.

My family and I weren't applauded or given a wink of complicity, unlike those who vehemently oppose nationalism from the warmth offered by the capital. I don't intend to play the martyr in a country where true civil heroes have died with shots to the back of the head, as I've only had the unpleasant sensation of facing disapproving looks while walking through the town. I remember an occasion when several friends and I went to spend a weekend in Castellfollit de la Roca, the tiny ultranationalist town famous for hanging from a cliff; one of these friends was afraid that if they recognized me, they wouldn't rent us the house. I had the slight suspicion that if that had been the case, they would have blamed me. I would have deserved it!

Where there was explicit animosity toward my television and radio interventions was on social media. Many people insulted me. Not just anonymous thugs or incel wankers, but also women and mothers who told me that "they would be ashamed to have a daughter like me." I won't deny that this comment affected me, but the day a tear rolled down my big cheeks was when they called me "Francoist." It was like losing my virginity; an abrupt penetration of the infected world of social media. For me, who unlike so many illustrious independents, like Lluís Llach or Marta Rovira, haven't had Francoists in the family, it felt like a kick in the butt. Many of these comments also affected my mother, and I had to ask her not to respond. Since I overcame this phase of innocence of believing that the media and social media foster understanding, and considering that television makes you gain weight, I proudly carry being called a fascist rather than fat.

Now the virulence of the attacks on X (formerly Twitter) has been relativized, and we forget, but at first, it was most shocking. Most people don't know, and I, despite being a panelist, also didn't know, that the main reference entities of independence, the ANC and Òmnium Cultural, were pioneers in Spain of the so-called digital guerrilla tactics. They launched their most fanatical supporters or trolls against the dissidents of their political project to seek an effect of inhibition or self-censorship by those who didn't go along with them. It seems trivial, but these practices, later adopted by Podemos and Vox, were effective. Politically, there was also the phenomenon that many leaders changed their discourse if it affected their popularity on social media. At the stroke of a poll or a tweet. To the point that the paradox was that this virtual reality conditioned the discourse of the new politicians much more than representative democracy and the real vote of the citizens.

Of course, it was also much easier for fake news to slip through. The independence "procés" has been full of great fake news. One of the most widespread, which left Albert Rivera, leader of Ciudadanos, out of combat, was the one propagated by Pilar Rahola and Jordi Barbeta from the media about a resolution of the Hague Tribunal on Kosovo and the supposed prevalence of "democratic will" over the legality of a State. The ruling exists, but a fragment was reformulated not by trolls on X, but by the Commission for the Defense of Human Rights of the Illustrious Bar Association of Barcelona in January 2013.

The invented text read: "We declare that there is no rule in international law prohibiting unilateral declarations of independence, we declare that when there is a contradiction between the constitutional legality of a State and democratic will, the latter prevails, it is not the law that determines the will of the citizens, but it is this that creates and modifies the existing legality when necessary." In a third degree to Rivera on 8tv, in 2013, Rahola repeated this false quote like a parrot.

The lie was so powerful that on the eve of the illegal referendum on October 1, 2017, it circulated strongly again, despite having been debunked by the very media that had given it credibility. In those days, messages circulated on WhatsApp about a possible recognition of Slovenia or Israel to Catalonia's independence. In the family group chat, the wife of one of my cousins, with all the condescension in the world, and knowing that in that chat it had been decided to stop talking about politics for the sake of the family, made one last attempt to convince us to "go vote," appealing to an inverse ethnicism, because she, with a Castilian surname, would go to vote, while we, with a "Catalan surname," wouldn't, and sending us that false quote from The Hague about Kosovo's unilateral declaration of independence. As she laid it on a platter, I sent her the real information and reproached her that, like the ignorant Trumpists she so detested, she too was a yokel—in her case, far-left—who swallowed a fake news like a cathedral. It was one of the few times that the facts, being so overwhelming, imposed themselves on opinions. She had to shut up, and since that conversation, we haven't seen her again, she has stopped attending family gatherings and, as if that weren't enough, she must be so fond of the right to decide that she doesn't let my cousin attend either...

This de facto alliance against Spain of the Catalan bourgeoisie and the alternative left of the CUP puzzled me. The then director of El País, Antonio Caño, wrote in an article in 2018 that, in each country, demagoguery takes on different expressions; in some places, it is the far-right that capitalizes on discontent over the effects of a globalized and constantly changing world, and in others, the far-left.

In our latitudes, political incorrectness came hand in hand with the CUP and was applauded by many, let's say, moderate Catalans. And by very dapper journalists and columnists like Josep Ramoneda or Manuel Castells. The hyperbolic gesturality and mockery in parliamentary headquarters were celebrated. It all started on November 11, 2013, when in a commission in the Parliament the leader of the anti-system brandished a sandal before the banker and former PP minister Rodrigo Rato. Did that gesture by David Fernández serve to finally put Rato behind bars? No! That was by the work and grace of the courts. The political action of the CUP leader was very useful to feel good about himself and feed the people thirsty for carnage. This CUP seed of political spectacle bore fruit later in Congress, thanks to the stellar interventions of Gabriel Rufián. In contrast, now everyone is scandalized when it's Vox who practices them.