Occupy public space

If this writer of La Punyalada were to run for mayor of Barcelona, ​​something that fortunately (for fellow citizens, I clarify) will never happen, he would do so with a very ambitious electoral program that could be summarized in a single proposal: to ensure that Barcelonians can walk the streets in peace. It seems little, but the idea would imply an urban revolution on par with the Cerdà Plan.

Take, for example, the case of Portal de l'Àngel; if one intends to walk through this curious Barcelona avenue to Carrer de Cucurulla ---either to enjoy a divine horchata at Can Planelles Donat or, simply, to sit at the Font de Santa Anna--- they will find that, in less than a kilometer of a hypothetically peaceful route, the pedestrian collides with an countless and very heavy number of obstacles that castrate their inalienable right to be mesmerized.

I am sure that my loyal readers could complete this list of nuisances who were born with the perfidious objective of ruining our walk, be it those children and NEETs who fill out absurd surveys (and who try to tackle you in the street, mistreating your soul with diminutives; "Would you have a second?", "It will only be a minute!"), also including the usual and disastrous street musicians whom one would pay several bags of bills to stop bellowing with such impunity, and ending with activists of impossible causes ---like peace in Palestine or the preservation of seals in Antarctica--- who decide to dirty the public road with their dreadful performances. For the past five years, this zoo of the grotesque has been joined by some perfidious groups of young people who one cursed day had the idea of torturing our eyes with their nauseating street dance choreographies.

If the suffering and calm Barcelonian continues the aforementioned route with the intention of reaching Plaça del Pi, they will find that ---in the epicenter of this beautiful place--- there is a group of sculptural acrobats acting like hooligans with the theoretical intention of entertaining the people who try to have a drink in such nice places as the Bar del Pi, where we still find some recalcitrant natives who refuse to leave their neighborhood.

That a group of shouting Argentinians want to exercise their muscles by jumping around becomes part of the delusions implied by freedom of expression; but our City Council should understand that this exercise clashes with the prerogative of the right-to-walk-in-peace that we, the citizens of Barcelona, have. If one wants to organize school dances or rehearse the triple somersault, by all means, let them do it, but they should have the kindness to get off the public road, which in theory belongs to all citizens.

The reputational crisis (ugh) of our city is not only expressed in terms of lack of housing or social precariousness; it is also a matter related to good taste. If, as the cliché goes, we are a European city, it should not be necessary to quote Baudelaire or Robert Walser to remember that the first of our civic commandments should consist of allowing everyone to walk in peace on public roads.

Occupying public space should begin to be seen as a crime against humanity

Dear citizens, I know I am not alone in writing such a mission. You can rest assured that this is not an electoral pre-campaign text. But if someone wants to use it to start a civic ---or even political--- movement, I will be able to break my (circumstantial) absenteeism to participate again in the feast of democracy. They will not be able to defeat us, the strollers.