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Comment by jorgemf | Hacker News Reader

I am one of the persons who think this is not the way to do the things and there should be an open debate. (and also that both sides are wrong right now). As we lack of this open debate about the independence I am interested to know your opinion about it, as how independent Cataluña wants to be. Does it want to be an associate state, or a completely independent state (that would also need to enter the Europena Union by its own)? This is something it is still not clear for me, and I have the feeling that some politics don't want to discuss it because their goal is to get rid of corruption trials and with any independence they will achieve it.

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> Does it want to be an associate state, or a completely independent state (that would also need to enter the Europena Union by its own)? This is something it is still not clear for me,

Hmm, maybe if you want to know what the people of Cataluña want, maybe we should ask them? Perhaps by holding a referendum to get their views on the matter?

(Note that a similar situation in Scotland was addressed by doing exactly this. The referendum was done begrudgingly, and certainly was not popular in Westminster, but it did happen, as it should have -- even though I'm personally glad they voted to remain.)

I am asking directly a catalan because our country didn't want to have that debate. This is a binding referendum, they have other open referendums before with low participacion (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalan_self-determination_ref... ), in none of them the question I am making was made that clear.

The question couldn't be clearer. I'm not sure where the confusion comes from? Is that how bad are people in Spain informed these days?

Question: Do you want Catalonia to be an independent state in the form of a republic?

It doesn't state whether to be an associate state or not. Some politics want to be independent but as an associate state to Spain, that means to remain in the EU and be part of Spain for most things.

It says independent, which means "not associate".

But this is not what some politics defend and claim. Some say Cataluña as an independent associate state. That is why I made the question and we should have an open debate.

I don't know where you get those ideas from. Literally no one talks about an associate state, no one. Especially after these weeks repressive reactions by the Spanish Government.

No one is talking about anything. The attitude of politics of both sides is really an issue, and the worst thing is that they are both supported by the population, they get more votes because of this. I find completely stupid the central government not willing to talk about this while they negotiate with them about other things and even get their support. I still want a couple of Catalans tell me what they exactly want with the independence. I find a completely mistake to be independent, because being part of something bigger where people help each other is better. But I make this question several times here in this thread and still don't have an answer yet.

You'll never hear them if you keep your fingers in your ears while humming your own thoughts like this.

Are you serious? I said what I think in the 7th nested comment, I repeated 6 times I want to know what they think before saying what I think. You have to be kidding me.

> I find a completely mistake to be independent, because being part of something bigger where people help each other is better

That premise does not necessarily lead to that conclusion. Ask the USSR.

> Perhaps by holding a referendum to get their views on the matter?

Playing devil’s advocate. Referenda may prematurely compress a multidimensional discussion space into binary options. There’s no “I’d prefer to stay in Spain if X, Y and Z.”

True, I was being slightly facetious. That's why the wording of the question is so very important, e.g. in the case of Scotland there was no "third option", which would have been further devolution of powers.

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