Spanish TV debate on Catalan immersion sparks Valencia backlash

Marc Giró defends Catalan immersion as Valencia debate intensifies

Is rejecting Catalan immersion in Valencian schools a form of "Catalanphobia"? Comedian Marc Giró defended teaching in Catalan on television, and presenter Jordi Évole backed the monologue with a social media post asking viewers to "take this monologue every 8 hours against various intolerances, mainly Catalanphobia." The reaction was immediate: much of the Valencian public interpreted this as labeling what they consider a legitimate rejection of an ideological imposition disguised as language policy as phobia.

The core of the conflict is not the language itself, but what is taught behind it. A sector of teachers and regional administration has historically linked the normalization of Valencian to a pan-Catalanist narrative that identifies the former Crown of Aragon with the so-called Països Catalans (Catalan Countries). Those who reject this framework argue that they are not defending a language, but opposing an ideology that presents Spain as a foreign and hostile entity. Therefore, the discussion is not about philology: it is about political projects.

What is actually voted on in Valencian school consultations?

Consultations on the base language in education have served as a thermometer for discontent. In the latest one, a significant portion of families chose Spanish as the main language, whereas in previous calls, the majority had chosen Valencian due to the inertia of the immersion system. Read coldly, the data indicates that when given a choice without environmental pressure, Spanish regains ground. It is not a rejection of Valencian: it is a rejection of having decisions made for them.

Some argue that the immersion system has been a form of social engineering for years, rather than educational policy. The criticism rests on the idea that the goal was not for children to learn Valencian—which no one disputes—but to internalize a specific collective identity. When that goal becomes explicit, the reaction is proportional to the perceived degree of imposition.

The Hispanophobia argument and the Catalan response

Against the framework of Catalanphobia, a current of Valencian analysis reverses the diagnosis: what is being inoculated in classrooms is Hispanophobia. The thesis is that presenting Spanish as the language of the far right—as seen in materials and statements collected in the debate—is not educational neutrality, but indoctrination. And that this message, repeated over a generation, makes independence or annexation seem natural to children.

The response from the other side is that this antiestéticar is a myth of Blaverism, a movement which, according to its critics, has only half a century of history and was built as a political reaction. The dispute over whether Valencian is a distinct language or a variant of Catalan has been entrenched for centuries, and each attempt to settle it academically has failed because the problem was never academic.

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Why would PSPV and PSC vote yes to independence?

The suspicion that the PSPV (Socialists' Party of Catalonia) and PSC (Party of Socialists of Catalonia) would ultimately support an independence referendum at the decisive moment runs through much of the critical argument. There is no proof of this, but distrust is fueled by the ambiguity maintained by both formations in territorial debates. It is a political hypothesis, not a fact, and should be treated as such.

What is a fact is that the conversation has shifted from linguistic terrain to territorial issues. Every time language is discussed, the shadow of the annexation of Valencia and the Balearic Islands to the Catalan project appears. And every time that shadow appears, the debate becomes unbreathable.

Linguistic war fatigue

There is a segment of the public that no longer distinguishes who started the fight. For that sector, language is a trench that does not belong to them and forces them to take a position in a conflict they did not choose. They speak what they want, vote what they want, and do not understand why every linguistic choice becomes a declaration of national identity.

The final irony is that while debating in which language children are educated, the underlying issue—what country they are being taught to imagine—remains unaddressed with the seriousness it deserves. And there we are, arguing about languages while the wall cracks elsewhere.