An unsporting language policy

The Catalan football club Barça (FC Barcelona) has set a trend all of its own in matters of regional pride by cancelling a flight with the German airline Air Berlin because the latter's management expressed criticism of Catalonian language policy. The Spanish daily El Mundo says the club has gone too far: "Today [Catalan society] should be ashamed of the embarrassing impression the club made by cancelling an Air Berlin flight. It was acting in protest at an article recently published in the press by the president [of Air Berlin]. In the article he complained about discrimination against the Spanish language on the Balearics and accused the regional government of putting the airline under pressure to have its crew speak in Catalan. In response the Barça management refused to fly with Air Berlin even though the tickets had already been paid for and decided to book a charter flight with another airline to get from Pisa (Italy) to Chicago, where Barça is playing its preseason games."

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