According to EL PAIS INTERNATIONAL "Artists up in arms in Spain": “Now they hug the robber".

The culture industry seemed disoriented following last Tuesday’s congressional defeat of the Sinde law. A survey of around 20 musicians, filmmakers, producers, actors, writers and philosophers evidenced a widespread feeling of indignation over “a direct aggression that breaks the rule of law,” in the words of film producer Agustín Almodóvar, brother of director Pedro Almodóvar. The writer Fernando Savater said “the clumsiness of a government that introduces this piece of legislation as a mere clause of a generic law and the deplorable spectacle of all groups voting against it” caused himto feel “shame and desolation.” Meanwhile, writing in EL PAÍS, the singer Alejandro Sanz accused politicians of acting in a cowardly and hypocritical way. “I think many of them, despite knowing the law was fair, voted against it for their own benefit or due to cowardice,” he said. “Here piracy is protected [...]; here they voted to protect the right of the pirate to keep his musical brothel open and they voted against the artist... and our rights... Do you know how many jobs have been lost in music because of the [internet] Taliban and their accomplices?” Also writing in EL PAÍS, actor Javier Bardem expressed similar concern for those working behind the scenes in the film industry. “Now there is no law protecting those who have been robbed. Now they hug the robber.” One group, the Creators Platformfor Copyright, has circulated via email a nine-point manifesto outlining its position in relation to the Sinde law rejected by Congress. The manifesto is signed by 150 names from the cultural world, including Savater, writer and filmmaker Vicente Molina Foix and the author Enrique Vila Matas. “We demand the government, political parties and the media do not succumb to the to the temptation of populism on this issue,” it reads.