Sabino Méndez, a Catalan columnist, wrote in an opinion piece published on 4 August 2026 that he was tired of being labelled abnormal by politicians pursuing their own interests. He said the pattern began with a project he called linguistic normalization, pushed by regionalist politicians who argued that anyone who chose not to use Catalan was abnormal.
Méndez wrote that Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez later widened the claim, declaring that all Catalans were abnormal and that pardons were needed for political allies he described as criminals so that Catalans could stop being abnormal. Méndez said Sánchez is doing it again.
He recalled that, after those pardons, officials kept insisting Catalans remained abnormal and that an amnesty was needed to normalize them, an amnesty that in fact applied only to a minority of Catalans, specifically those whose votes were essential to keep Sánchez in power.
Financing dispute and 'normalization'
Méndez wrote that some of the same political allies have recently requested a specific financing arrangement giving them an advantage on their own taxes. To justify that inequality, he said, Sánchez again resorted to the same argument: a new, necessary normalization.
Méndez argued that words such as abnormal, subnormal, deficient, incapable and disabled have changed meaning in recent years and are now widely treated as insults. He said he wants the prime minister to stop insulting Catalans by implicitly calling them abnormal every time he speaks.
Méndez said Sánchez was free to privately think Catalans were abnormal or mentally retarded, as long as he kept that opinion to himself rather than voicing it publicly. But he said it seemed very ugly that Sánchez keeps insisting that he himself needs to be normalized less than Catalans do.
