I think Penkles is right.
Spanish people generally don't have any sense of political participation; they really do feel that it is out of their range of influence. There is no choice, you vote for a closed list system of career politicians who are unaccountable. And these politicians in turn have no sense of what life is like outside of their clique.
You can no more expect them to legislate on the lives of ordinary people than you can expect professional footballers to have valid political opinions.
It is a sad state of affairs because even the new laws making it illegal to demonstrate in the street
s (link) are virtually irrelevant because it is a reaction against something that was insignificantly small anyway.
How do we explain this national apathy?
Is it simply laziness? Like “I’ll make the effort to traipse out and vote in our wonderful “democracy” every once in a while, then you lot just get on with it and leave me alone”
Or is it a historical conditioning or some sort of genetic attitude cleansing?
Any family with any propensity towards action or protest either would have been snuffed out two generations ago or relocated. And during the long and prosperous Franco dictatorship the Spaniard learned submission and acceptance of his lot.
He may be very pleased when, as a reward for his patience, he is given “democracy”, but don’t expect him to criticise it.
I suspect a combination of both.
