Woke Archaeology

What one expects when visiting an archaeology museum are vestiges of the past, the remains of the civilizations that preceded us, and the traces our ancestors left in history. What one does not expect to find are woke narratives more typical of a Netflix series, but that is what we can find in some Spanish museums thanks to the nefarious ideological work of Minister of Culture Ernest Urtasun.

The National Museum of Underwater Archaeology, located in Cartagena, is an institution responsible for the study, assessment, research, conservation, and protection of Spain’s underwater cultural heritage. The museum houses collections of immense value, such as the remains of two Phoenician ships from the 7th century B.C. or the coin cargo from the frigate Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes, recovered in 2012, which contains nearly 600,000 pieces of eight coins. In addition to its conservation work, the museum’s other major mission is to share this heritage with the public. The problem arises when the dissemination of history and heritage is neglected in order to promote an ideology, and in the display cases housing archaeological artifacts, modern objects are exhibited alongside signs in Spanish and English (for tourists) that convey political messages, ranging from condemnations of European colonialism to advocacy for immigration.

The first of these out-of-place objects is a Spanish passport placed next to a Punic-era drinking vessel with the following text: 

Every year, thousands of immigrants arrive on Spanish soil in search of a better life, fleeing poverty, violence, and persecution. Among the migrants are the so-called Unaccompanied Foreign Minors [Menores Extranjeros No Acompañadxs, MENAs—the ‘x’ is not a mistake; the signs in Spanish use the inclusive form], a term that, in itself, reveals how language can function as a tool of discrimination. They have been victims of racist political campaigns, and their distribution across the autonomous communities is a source of political confrontation.

The “racist political campaign” referred to in the text was a controversial VOX campaign in Madrid that denounced the cost of each MENA in comparison to the lowest pensions. The campaign was denounced, but the courts upheld its use in the election. 

European colonialism—whose most prominent manifestation, for Spain’s “woke” crowd, is the discovery of the Americas—also deserves a place here: a few colored marbles next to a glass bowl from the 1st century B.C.: 

Christopher Columbus used glass beads to deceive the Taíno people with their apparent playfulness during his first encounters in the Caribbean. In exchange, the Europeans acquired gold and food, establishing a model of exchange that would lay the groundwork for the plunder, exploitation, and subsequent genocide of the peoples of Abya Yala. 

‘Abya Yala’ is the term used by indigenist movements to refer to the American continent; ‘America’ is a colonial and European term.

Of course, there’s a place for gender ideology, with a pink makeup brush sitting alongside personal care items: 

Boy, girl, gender-fluid. How can we even begin to imagine the possibility of deconstructing our personalities and bodies hundreds of thousands of years ago? … What opportunities did people back then have to challenge their assigned gender, alter their physical appearance, and explore their sexuality? 

Curiously, archaeologists have been unable to find any remains of the more than one hundred genders.

But there is more, much more, and no tenet of Urtasun’s ideology is absent from the museum. A lamp reminds us that “racism, Islamophobia, and the rhetoric of the so-called Reconquista have rendered invisible and antagonized the relationship between the Iberian Peninsula and Arab culture.” A Batman figurine placed next to a figure of Camazotz—a Mayan deity who is half-man and half-bat—highlights the cultural appropriation resulting from “processes of colonization.” An 18th-century gold snuffbox reminds us of “the tobacco industry, which was built on the slave system that laid the foundations for today’s global economic and political order.” The only thing missing from the museum was a display case dedicated to Franco…

What is happening at the National Museum of Underwater Archaeology is part of the process of “decolonization” of national museums, announced by Minister Urtasun in January 2024 before the Congress of Deputies—a review of the collections of the 17 state museums with the aim of eliminating museographic practices considered rooted in a “colonial framework” as well as those perceived as perpetuating gender biases or ethnocentrism. A woke revision of history based on the ‘decolonial’ ideology of a minister of culture who has compared the Spanish viceroyalties in the Americas to Belgian colonialism in the Congo.

In November 2025, a renovation project began—set to continue through 2028—to transform the permanent exhibitions at the National Museum of Anthropology and the Museum of the Americas. The goal is to incorporate decolonial, anti-racist, and intercultural perspectives and to make the national museums “children of the present and builders of the future.” The ‘decolonization’ of the National Museum of Anthropology will cost taxpayers approximately €4.4 million and will include contemporary art as a “critical tool” for addressing current social issues. The estimated cost for the Museum of the Americas is €9.2 million. “We must showcase the diversity of American cultures and put an end to the colonial gaze,” explains Andrés Gutiérrez, the museum’s director. There are no budgetary constraints when it comes to imposing ideology.

Where does minister Urtasun’s ‘decolonial’ ideology come from?

To no one’s surprise, and like so many other products of cultural Marxism, the ‘decolonial’ approach took hold in academic circles beginning in the 1990s; unlike other schools of thought that view colonialism as a phase that has been overcome, it asserts that coloniality remains fully in force. In other words, although the Latin American nations achieved independence in the 19th century, the political break with Spain was only superficial because the dominant system remained intact, perpetuating itself through “structures of power, knowledge, and subjectivity.”

Promoted by 21st-century socialism, ‘decolonial’ thinking has taken hold in universities, cultural centers, and museums, distorting history and attributing to Spain, and, to a lesser extent, the United States, responsibility for nearly all of Latin America’s contemporary problems: extreme poverty, mass migration, economic collapse, inequality, corruption, the plundering of natural resources, violence, and organized crime. This narrative is intellectually convenient and politically expedient, because it shifts all responsibility outward and exonerates local elites from their decisions, mistakes, and abuses. History thus becomes a selective moral tribunal where the past explains and justifies the present and where any current failure is attributed to an inescapable colonial legacy. It is Spain’s fault.

Similarly, in light of the failure of socialism in its various forms, ‘decolonial’ thinking serves an ideological function: it provides a moral alibi that allows these failures to be presented not as the consequences of a flawed political model but as the inevitable effects of an omnipresent ‘coloniality’ that cannot be eradicated as long as any ties to the West remain.

Backed by allies of Pedro Sánchez’s government—Urtasun belongs to the far-left coalition Sumar—this ideology has made its way into the ministry of culture, bringing with it all the hallmarks of woke ideology: cultural appropriation, narratives of the oppressed versus the oppressors, distortion of history, and so on. The plan to decolonize museums is set to conclude in 2028, so it could be interrupted if the political shift predicted by the polls occurs. Spaniards deserve a ministry of culture that does not disparage their history and does not take a lukewarm stance when it comes to confronting and dismantling the ‘decolonial’ narrative—and, above all, one that restores museums to their true purpose.