Spain is doing reasonably well as a country, in contrast to the alarmist language of its politicians. The most worrying thing is that the verbal escalation does not stop, in a competition in which the first victim is the truth; the second, common sense and the third it could be all of us. Either we pause it or we will hurt ourselves. And journalism must have some responsibility, which not only acts as a loudspeaker for nonsense, but often intervenes as a hooligan on the side.
It is dramatic to see how we have gone from hyperbole to warlike language, after going down the path of insult. Yesterday, José María Aznar, who marks the step for the PP, declared to Susanna Griso on Antena 3 that Pedro Sánchez has made “a declaration of war on the right” in the Congress of Deputies, by proclaiming that a wall had to be erected to that the conservative and reactionary forces represented by the PP and Vox would not continue advancing. The president was not correct with the metaphor, which an El Mundo columnist titled “Pedrín's wall,” which recalls the Cold War. But calling that allegory a declaration of war is, to say the least, a mistake.
The language of war is worrying, since it advances without anyone stopping it. The RAE itself held a session last year, chaired by Queen Letizia, where it was revealed how these warrior expressions are gaining space in the conversation, especially among young people, but also in the field of journalism, and extending into areas like sports or medicine. War metaphors have been taking over language.
Trump, when he did not even dream of becoming president, wrote a book (The Art of the Negotiation) where he said that he played with people's imagination because they want to believe that something is the biggest, the most important, the most spectacular: “ I call that true hyperbole. “It is innocent exaggeration and effective promotion.” Groucho, in The Marx Brothers in the West, shows the danger of using war as an argument. “More wood, it's war!” He shouts as they turn the cars into fuel, until he runs out of train and speech. Well, be very careful with your words.
