Changes - David Bowie

Changes. Canvis. Pel que sembla hi ha gent reticent als canvis ... dos noticies de propostes politiques que he notat recentment, el del cine en català, bé, el 50% només, però algo és algo comparat en el que tenim ara! I encara així, alguns cines van fer una vaga en contra! No conec els arguments tècnics o econòmics en contra, però l’argument que vaig sentir a la radio, de que la gent “no vol” veure pel·lícules en català em va semblar surreal.

L’altra canvi que espero en candeletes seria la prohibició de fumar en bars, ja que l’ultima llei, la de deixar triar als bars si volen ser de fumar o no-fumar, ha sigut un fracàs – al meu entendre. També he sentit opinions en contra, argumentant que la gent ja no aniria al bar, però les experiències d’altres països ens demostra el contrari.

Bé, ja veurem com evolucionen aquests possibles canvis. Mentrestant no parlarem tant de la crisi, i quan torna els Champions d’aquí uns dies, Zapatero podrà tornar a dormir tranquil.

Changes (Bowie) és del LP Hunky Dory que David Bowie va gravar a l’any 1971.

Changes. Seems like no one accepts changes so easily. Two ideas the Catalan and Spanish governments have come up with are currently struggling to convince people. The first one is to finally oblige, by law, cinemas to show at least 50% of films dubbed into Catalan, rather than Spanish. At present the proportion is more like 3:97 in favour of Spanish, a weird situation given that Catalan is the official language here, spoken by most and understood by all, with Catalan press, radio, TV ... maybe there are economic or technical reasons against dubbing films into two languages, but the argument put forward that “people don’t want to see films in Catalan” does not hold water.

The other change has been proposed by the Spanish central government – to finally ban smoking in bars and cafés. The previous law allowing such places to choose if they wished to be a smoking or non-smoking area has not worked, with most choosing the status quo of continuing as they were – smoke-filled. Again, arguments that people will stop going out to bars don’t really convince me when we see the results of similar measures in other countries.

Anyway, we can but wait and see – meanwhile these matters keep us arguing and keep our minds of the economic crisis. And when the Champions’ League starts again next week, the Spanish PM will once again be able to sleep soundly as people’s woes will take a back seat to Barça’s success!

David Bowie’s Changes is from his 1971 LP, Hunky Dory.