Opinion

This article isn't exactly hopeful at a cursory glance. It tends to make more sense when, through difficult conversation, we achieve some freedom to think and act about wars without the interference of armies. After all, those who promote war can do nothing for peace.

I remember my first lessons on World War II. Well, how could I forget them? At the time, I found it utterly unattractive to learn the years in which it began and ended. I considered the dates meaningless due to my inexperience in relating events. Moreover, my young age didn't differentiate between what fits into one, ten, or a hundred years.

Generally speaking, and for the sake of argument, the Second War followed the First. And it was called "world" because those who named it so considered the entire world to be limited to themselves.  Elementary school knowledge that remains relevant today.

(Parenthesis: Those who lived through the 1990s know that, in terms of forensic pathology – people run over, stabbed, corpses in decomposition – television abundantly supplied us with violent images. In the city where I grew up, a woman drowned her two children in a well and then threw herself in after them. On the lunchtime news program, I watched the small bodies floating. Another case involved a daughter who, with the help of her girlfriend, killed her mother and grandmother. Not to mention the rape, murder, and robbery committed against an elderly woman living alone on Rua XV.)

Ultimately, those who died and those who killed had some kinship with someone close. They were, in any case, considered degenerate, not exactly counted as people. This is without mentioning national cases like the Candelária Massacre, the murder of Daniella Perez, and the murder of Índio Galdino. (End parenthesis)

This is my argument: it's difficult to impress a Brazilian child.

Those common murderers, though extremely dangerous, committed their crimes clandestinely. They were discovered, and then televised, arrested, lynched, or killed by the police. But what they told us about the extermination camps was entirely different, and often more terrifying. There was something wrong about multitudes being murdered in broad daylight.

The way it remains

What we know about the genocide of Jews is etched in black and white in our memories, both through photographs and the brilliant cinematic work *Schindler's List* (1993), directed by Steven Spielberg. Thanks to new technologies, some of these memories can touch us even more profoundly. Using digital resources, I myself colorized a photograph of child survivors of Auschwitz taken by Alexander Vorontsov.

It is difficult to look at them and say: “We despised their families to the utmost, we chose who would be enslaved and who would be killed and incinerated in our four gas chambers with crematoria.” Because that is precisely what we did, in the role of humans.  Shouldering responsibility for that atrocity is a lifelong burden, and I don’t believe there’s any other way to deal with it than to carry it, with shame and remorse, until my last day.  

Confronting this inhumanity, however, is not the same as stagnating in lament. It is precisely the opposite. And, to move forward even minimally, we must shed two convenient illusions. The first is that all responsibility can be attributed to the Führer. Let us, even if this discomfits us to almost unbearable levels, be consistent. No single man could have undertaken the Third Reich without assistance. In 1935, the Nazi Party enacted the racial discrimination laws, and Mr. Hitler was not alone – as official footage attests.

The other classic illusion is that the "world" of the Second World War did not prevent the genocide simply because it knew nothing.  Now then. Upon further reflection, I don't even consider it an illusion anymore – since not every illusion is necessarily a misconception – but rather a blatant lie.  With the illusion, we achieve a certain psychic relief, which frequently converts into proud satisfaction: "I would never have done something like that." With the lie, we maintained the idea that we possess a power that, in truth, we do not.

Lie

Since the Gulf War, another ridiculousity of the nineties, international military conflicts have also become television programs. This is not a figure of speech. Literally, wars are simultaneously television programs.  One needs little intelligence – sometimes not even that – to understand that the images we consume are the creations of a single person. Someone holds the camera, chooses when to press REC, when to stop, from what position what he sees will be viewed, what enters or does not enter the frame. In the case of AI-generated content, someone will have to write the prompt. In this way, the media product of war integrates the general arsenal of war. Those with more or fewer resources to create and propagate stories consequently have more or less war power. It is fair to ask what the destructive reach of a weapon of this kind is.

Since the spontaneous constitution of a public sphere, and its progressive and irreversible decay, public opinion has been used to legitimize or delegitimize the actions of the State. If I convince Brazil that I am "good" and the other is "evil," then Brazilians tend to pressure their government in a specific direction, the product of which varies from support on digital social networks to proposals in the United Nations Security Council.  Telling the best story, however, has nothing to do with telling the most accurate story. This quality criterion is restricted to citizens who are not easily moved by the appeals of the masses – people who, in each social circle, can be counted on the fingers of one hand.

On the path to the finally. So, if the world had known about the annihilation of humans in World War II, it would have acted to protect the Jews. I guarantee that with a clear mind, and three or four videos of the apocalypse in Palestine, one can guarantee with one hundred percent accuracy that it is a lie.

Weakness

Not even the adequate terms to address war crimes in Palestine have been used appropriately in different parliaments around the world.  The Washington Post columnist Jennifer Rubin wrote that "the closer one looks, the more Netanyahu resembles Trump," in the worst sense. The article states that "about eighty percent of Israelis blame Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his coalition government for the Hamas catastrophe, according to a poll by the Hebrew newspaper Maariv."

In Brazil, Congresswoman Carla Zambelli – a woman born to be a donkey and who will never become a mare – published an image depicting a US and Israeli eagle attacking a Palestinian rat. I am persuaded, by myself, not to expect this human project to grasp the enormity of its own bestiality.

Faced with nominal lists of thousands of civilians killed by Israel, the response of the “world” is so weak, languid, flaccid. Perhaps this is the moment for this awareness: we are incapable of preventing violence merely by knowing that violence exists. I am warning you now: in the coming hours, Palestinian children will be brutally murdered or maimed, and those who survive will have witnessed their families and friends explode. Knowing this changes absolutely nothing.

A few hours ago, a Palestinian boy went to retrieve a ball when a bombardment occurred directly behind him. His nephew’s back was injured. But the nephew is better off than Saleh al Qaraan, whose head was obliterated in the explosion.

Accustomed to daily encounters with animal posts on Instagram, I saw a tabby cat leap onto the lap of a Palestinian man, where the pale body of a dead child lay. The kitten nestled in, closing its eyes.  This, alongside the mother, who, with the dead baby wrapped in white cloth, refused to cease kissing it. Or the countless videos of children experiencing panic attacks within hospitals.

On an individual level, my work or yours against the war seems insufficient. We cannot count on, at least not now, the prudence of the wise finding a space on the world leaders' agenda. But whether or not we defend Palestinian civilians, now, at every opportunity, speaks volumes about what we have learned about our own wickedness.

Some time ago, I searched for Palestine on Google Maps and found it in the middle of the ocean. At the time, I concluded that the world had ended, at least a certain project of the world, upon finding a people I love so much and who love me, drowned in the hatred in which someone, somewhere, had drowned them.

 Today, after the murder of hundreds (the number is imprecise, but staggering) of Palestinians who were in a hospital, I realized that the world has ended for them, that the apocalypse, the end times, has arrived for those human beings. They witnessed shame, hunger, and then died.

Imagine with me. Suddenly, a foreign authority orders you to leave your home. Fleeing with nothing, your journey is one of thirst and hunger. Then you see rubble, dust, friends, and family sprawled on the ground, some dismembered, others unburied. Then you too die.

If this, which is true, does not also make it true that we have reached the end of the world, then what would constitute the end of the world? Natural disasters, however terrible, are at least honorable. No one can blame the volcano. Genocide with the support of religious groups is the end of the world.

The stance of the international community is insufficient. Humanity is excessively paralyzed in its reaction to wars; the powerful are not truly powerful. They are nothing more than men of the market! And a market of souls, as described in the Book of Revelation.

When I heard, under the administration of the evangelical couple Bolsonaro and Michelle, about a Supreme Court Justice described as "terribly evangelical," I felt shame and fear. The shame pertained to the utilitarian practice of religion, whereby significant theologies, both large and small, are reduced to the opening of yet another unique branch of the latest global church in the neighborhood, or transformed into a political party.

One of the preliminary findings of my latest philosophical research is that Brazilian Pentecostals obtained "authorization" to participate in the public sphere, in their "Bible caucus" form, on the condition that they do not effectively integrate into the political culture except as a voting base.

This finding is based on the fact that, since the Constituent Assembly, speeches and texts funded by Brazilian taxpayers' money have been used to promote agendas of little or no significance, such as the obsession with sexual freedom and the poignant question of the end of the world.

The agreement with the current political power is that anything can be preached from the pulpit, at any cost (whether true or false, objective reality or childish fantasy, it doesn't matter), as long as that preaching favors obtaining votes.

In 2023, very sadly, Pentecostals holding office or employed in cabinets of this kind are not expected to contribute – broadly speaking, in general – to the promotion of public policies and the maintenance of dialogue. Even less are they expected to surprise us with any examination of conscience that would make them reflect on what they do with the cherished role we attribute to them. It is striking that we hold such affection for Pentecostals while they disdain us.

The fear I felt, on the other hand, was that the phrase "terribly evangelical," which expressed an arrogant and provocative stance, would worsen the quality of dialogue among Brazilians, which at that point was at extremely low levels. While the shame had to do with my intellectual and pacifist stance (something more individual), the fear was projected onto what is experienced in terms of the country. As it is expected that the worst fear will overcome us, the communication bridges between those who still believe in community life and the Pentecostals are shattered.

It will be necessary for Pentecostals, marked by their subjection to cultural imprisonment, the enslavement of ignorance, and, for these and other reasons, also subjected to an impressive amount of violence of many kinds, to give a sign that they are willing to collaborate with a balanced future. From our (my) side, patience has run out. Moreover, the patience of evangelicals with their leaders has run out.

Meanwhile, in terms of appointments, it is important to remember the consequences of that "terribly evangelical" comment. Another Supreme Court Justice was appointed by a president "demonized" by fundamentalists. This is Lula's ninth appointment. With the appointments by Dilma and Temer, there are five more. That is, there is a terribly Brazilian collegiate body. Not to mention the Justice yet to arrive.

The word democracy appears constantly in the news, often coupled with the reality that it is problematic. We agree with the visibility of the topic, as well as with the reinforcement that "it is the best model among all political models, which, including democracy, are flawed".

When we research political communication in Brazil, we are attentive to the need to create opportunities for voters to integrate into public debate, culminating in the vote cast at the ballot box. For this to be possible, it is first necessary for the Legislature to guarantee a minimum degree of trust in the democratic process.

But financial investment is also necessary. That is, the dissemination of state campaigns – from party propaganda to electoral court announcements – requires cutting-edge research and media production capable of engaging Brazilians, and all of this costs a significant amount of money. But the results are evident. The abstention rate in the second round of the 2022 presidential election was 20.95%, the lowest in 16 years.

A Reason for Not Participating

In Sigmund Freud's psychoanalysis, we can find a deeper reason for disinterest in politics. In Civilization and Its Discontents (1930), the Viennese psychoanalyst writes about the methods by which human beings seek to avoid suffering. One of them is precisely to abdicate social relations. This decision, however, drastically reduces the amount of possible satisfaction for the individual.

In other words, denying the existence of the other does offer some degree of security against pain, while at the same time the pleasures brought by the other, only accessible when we recognize the other's importance, become limited.

Nature is a risk to human life – global warming and the imminent disappearance of some islands in Tonga are proof of this. Science can help in this regard. Our bodies, destined for degeneration, are also a source of difficulties. Science can help in this regard. But none of these sufferings, according to Freud, is greater than that caused by our contact with other people.

It so happens that the practice of democracy requires the other; it requires deliberation. Science can help in this regard.

Of the sand statue,
nothing will remain
after the high tide.
—"Areia," Helena Kolody.

Last week, I made a small painting of Our Lady, using watercolor pencils. I used three colors that blended well: sky blue, water green, and a skin tone similar to my own, a light brown. Looking closely, I think she is pregnant, and this surprised both of us. I used that same canvas, the same stiff, high-quality paper, to write the instructions for the course I taught on online reputation. That painting and those lecture notes were my greatest contributions to communication in recent years. That is, we are dealing with a visual surprise the pregnancy of a virgin lady and a surprise of wisdom that the worst among colleagues should speak of reputation.

We are all tired of the news, ladies and gentlemen. The numbers are there for anyone who wants to see them. Personally, I’ve joined those who avoid knowing what someone somewhere wants us to know. All of us with great editorial and artistic talent now prefer that petty thefts and the cruelest abandonments be dealt with within each family, because we have nothing to do with it. We were, in good times, deluded by a seductive literature of intelligence and future. But our proverbs very quickly turned into chasing after the wind. We didn't have time to savor the harem of our beauties, or to eat and drink from the fruits of our labor. We violently set off to chase the wind.

We failed gradually and miserably. We were not avenged against our perpetrators, we honored people who wish us dead, we were victims of breathless negotiations. They shove our kindness and mercy up our asses. We are nothing to our enemies but their f*ck toys, Olavão guarantees.

We are no longer interested in the number of deaths on the highway. They were never interested in our truths about traffic violence. We want the fiscal issues and the robberies of legislators to remain as they are, putrid wounds for those who operate them. Power and money have melted such beautiful people, people we would invite to be godparents to our children. We could have forgiven everything, we could have overcome this difficult moment together, but now they have killed Helena Kolody.

Former student invades school and shoots student dead in Cambé, Paraná

'Condescending digital structures'

Writer Cassiana Pizaia recorded the following on the subject:

"Helena Kolody School, in Cambé, is two blocks from the house where I grew up and lived until I finished college. Seeing students and teachers walking up and down the street was part of the daily life of a peaceful neighborhood.

Someone entering the school armed, killing a 16-year-old girl, injuring and threatening students is the inconceivable and unacceptable rupture of decades of normalcy, of everything that is believed to be the school space.

It is not an isolated case, a consequence only of a sick mind. It is replicated barbarism, stimulated by violent practices and discourses, which needs to be understood and fought at its origin and in the condescending digital structures that feed and reward it.

My solidarity to the families of the victims and to the community of Helena Kolody School and Cambé, forced to experience such horror".

The news outlets are right to broadcast live the pronouncements of the former prosecutor and former federal deputy for Paraná, Deltan Dallagnol, this Wednesday (17th), but they are right with the caveat that there might be something sadistic about it on a national network. The decision to strip him of his mandate came out yesterday, and he defended himself today. As is common knowledge, he was ousted by the Superior Electoral Court (TSE), which divides the opinions of serious people. Some consider it a legal error, while others defend the interpretation and vote of Minister Benedito Gonçalves. In this text, that discussion is over.

I had just arrived home from a university commitment when I turned on the television and came face to face with Dallagnol, alongside a rather intriguing group, explaining to Brazilians that evil had triumphed in Brazil because he had lost in court. Blatant narcissism, megalomania, Protestant fundamentalism, a bit of everything? Or, on the contrary, the absence of anything at all?

Frankly, I was expecting a striking speech, but I had no idea how striking it would actually be. It’s a historical embarrassment, fit for use in psychoanalysis and political communication classes. Could it work to the point of restoring his ridiculously inflated prestige? It could. Especially from the people of my state, I can expect them to make him mayor of the capital (even without any experience in governing, but sufficiently white and resentful).

I'm not in the habit of celebrating blunders in public life. I'm ashamed when our authorities are investigated or arrested, or anything of that sort. So there's nothing to celebrate in the ousting of this gentleman, just as there's no lament, at least on my part. Perhaps they forgot to tell him how things work in politics. Or had all politicians suddenly forgotten the way Dallagnol referred to and scorned them? What was this guy expecting? Was it with this naiveté that he led Operation Car Wash?

From the perspective of some friends who not only support Dallagnol but also have little or no regard for the Workers' Party or Lula, vehemently opposing the latter two, moral practice also applies when it’s necessary to imprison (or kill) a dangerous individual. Judging by the hero's words today, it is absolutely moral to remove him from public life as long as he is incapable of understanding that politics is a communal experience, and that what matters is what the other person thinks. That this is how things are built.

Setting oneself up as a hero

Setting himself up as a hero, this man’s speech doesn’t offend me, but it worries me in civilizational terms. Once again, a "brother", an equal, a "piece of shit like us", rants: "I will save you". Sir, I and the people I know didn't ask you for anything. You compared yourself to Joseph of Egypt (a round of applause for the Record TV series!), to Jesus. You know what you're missing? Reading the Gospels a bit more. There's something you interpreted à la Car Wash in the biblical text, if you know what I mean.

In recent weeks, I've been leaning toward the psychological perspectives of leaders' choices. Broadly speaking, those who are elected to govern run enormous risks – including that of being assassinated (e.g., Bolsonaro's stabbing). Becoming a passion of the masses requires offering them protection and assistance. When these elements become scarce or cease, and that leadership is no longer useful (after garnering more than 300,000 votes for a party, for example), then they are lynched by those who lauded them. On this point, there is indeed a connection with Jesus, because he was crucified by those who received him with palm branches.

The same press that reported Dallagnol as the country's salvation now exposes him in a humiliating role of a crying child. "But this only happens to me", "why don't they do this to Gilmar?", "even Beto Richa has a mandate". Then he transitions to a furious critical stance through which he will supposedly deliver all of Brazil from an evil he fears.

If we take it as truth that individuals are responsible for their own paths, we can then ask ourselves the child's question: "why does Beto Richa have a mandate and Dallagnol is ousted?".

Amidst the discussion surrounding "freedom of expression", and in the presence of relatives who believe that regulating the internet in Brazil will turn the country communist (whatever that means to them at this point), I think that, with or without legislation, "silence is golden". A basic tenet of wisdom.

My idea is original because I wrote about it in November 2021, without Byung-Chul Han's current influence on me. The fact, therefore, undeniable, is that we are subjected to an informational outrage. Han advances on Foucault, arguing that we have moved from biopolitics to psychopolitics.

In the era of production lines, the individual was subjected to a social organization that impelled them, through biopolitical "orthopedics", to wake and sleep, eat and enjoy, to do everything necessary for the body to fulfill its shift. Now, production is immaterial.

We are accustomed to, have "naturalized", the role of entrepreneurs of ourselves. Have you updated your LinkedIn? And your Lattes? We lack the "peace to read a book"—a famous statement by an artist about the quantum of anguish. Who really knows how to rest in 2023?

If culture has brought us the benefit of the instantaneous, video calls, for example, at the same time we ask ourselves if there would be a need for video calls if the people we love were close, if there was really any benefit; certainly there was and there is a malaise.

Will we be minimally civilized enough to recognize that the internet causes us feelings diametrically opposed to happiness? If we have lost the ability to find common ground between people and groups, we have failed miserably. The networks, through our utmost fault, are sinister places.

How much do platforms have to do with this? How can we hold accountable the producers who have discovered their talent in capturing audiences and generating income with content? It's both admirable and humiliating that influencers have overtaken journalism. But this recklessness is costing us dearly.

I don't think it's necessary to insist that the matter is extremely serious, urgent, and relevant, because I am persuaded that we are in the same boat. What can differentiate us is the reaction to the hole in the hull: some build lifeboats (I am of this lineage), others wait for a miracle.

The Bill mentioned in the first paragraph can be read in full.

Watch the Fantástico report "Perverse Challenges: How the Discord app became a tool to involve teenagers in an underworld of extreme violence".

The ten "racists" of the State University of Ponta Grossa (UEPG, PR) inaugurate a type of news for which I have to abandon my restrictions on the use of quotation marks, so I can comment in peace. That is, the festival of "allegedly" has begun with a bang in this week's journalism.

I recorded a video about two major annoyances related to the news of the matter, not exactly about the matter itself. The journalism students were basically attending a lecture they found unpleasant, and they abused the group's trust by posting awful stickers.

Whether they were operating under the city's conservative banner, we don't know. In 2017, a city council member threatened to arrest a drag queen who had a show scheduled there. It may be that the city's water is contaminated with ignorance, and a little bit of what I call "wounded agro pride".

I find it possible and probable, however, that it is a case of immature sarcasm, since by choosing to study journalism they might have some appreciation for letters. I can argue on personal and psychoanalytic levels (following Wilfred Bion) about humor corroding prejudices, perhaps later.

The state's main TV station reported the matter, and became emotional about its own action of signing a joint statement with the Union against the students. As a viewer, I appreciate it, but I didn't ask for anything. I prefer an analytical anchor, with their feet on the ground.

Regarding the "complaint" of racism at UEPG, I feel obliged to ask: was it the Ombuds Office that received the prints? If the proceedings against the students are administrative, what was the administrative path of the complaint? Or are we dealing with a complaint based on a morality superior to the regulations?

Another aspect is the legal one. And the situation gets a little worse. Sarney, Cardoso, and Lula signed laws on the matter. Broadly speaking, the ten "racists" of Ponta Grossa need to i. have offended an ethnic group, a race, color, or religion; and ii. have had the intention to offend. What was the objective of the conduct? What was the intent?

Ponta Grossa is sick

Added to another seven agronomy individuals from the same university, there are 17 Ponta Grossa residents featured in the newspaper for being the mouth, the arm, the leg of Paraná's "caipira-ism" (rural backwardness). I reiterate my argument that the Paraná native of this ilk is not fascist, he's worse, he's a "caipira".

The "caipira" who should be offended in these terms is not the one from "Jeca's Sadness" (a Mazzaropi film, released in 1961). Those 17 are not worthy of carrying the bags of a man from the countryside. The "caipira" I'm referring to needs Bia de Luna: "The most beautiful stupidity, and ignorance by choice."

In a social psychoanalysis, in an organizational transactional analysis, in religious terms of the Christian faith, from these roles that I can and do occupy, I understand that Ponta Grossa is sick.

No. This is not about normalizing the attacks we suffered with the interruption of Holy Mass in Curitiba last Saturday (5th). I even wonder. Do those who are not Catholic have any idea what a Mass is? It is God himself being killed again, it is communion with the sacrifice and with brothers and sisters in faith. It is a master reset of the founding act of civilization. I am not okay with interrupting Mass. No.

I am not okay with the feedback loop of violence against the individual, let alone against the individual's sacred space.

My parents wrote a book of blessings for me. Many pages with excerpts from the Scriptures, icons related to talents, love letters. When I showed it, a few years ago, to the analyst Michelle Thomé, she didn't touch that collage without first washing her hands. She leafed through it so carefully that it made me think: "that's how it's done". I imitate Michelle in this too. Yesterday, my sacred space was desecrated.

First, I know a powerful God who—for those who believe—was lynched while declaring his innocence. From Jesus Christ onward, the wheel of violence spins in the void. Or could the protesters (of the lowest category? Of course, but still protesters) have achieved the feat of disturbing an imperturbable God? If they have succeeded, I hereby surrender my Christian credentials.

No. Absolutely not. No way! My answer is no. I am not okay with the reaction of those who use the mark of Christ to murder. In my modest interpretation of Mosaic Law, "thou shalt not kill".

Yesterday, they stole my money, kicked my saint, burned my sacred ground, but it wasn't because they interrupted Mass. It was because I read—with these beautiful bright brown eyes I have—that "if someone had been armed at Mass, this wouldn't have happened". "This" what, murderer?

No. I am not okay knowing that there's someone in the world who is okay with emptying their gun into a Mass. Imagine the beautiful update to the Book of Acts. "When persecution came, the Christians started shooting".

No. Not this. Absolutely not.

In the morning, as soon as he arrives in the kitchen for coffee, the husband finds his wife astonished, staring out the window.

—What a filthy neighbor! How can she be so slovenly? Look at the sheets on her clothesline, they're absolutely filthy! —she exclaims.

And it happens again, the next day. And the next.

—My love, have you seen how dirty the neighbor is? The sheets are all stained, what filth! —she insists, disapprovingly.

And the band plays on like this, time after time.

Until one day, the husband takes a cloth and cleans their windows. And those sheets become clean instantly.

We were talking in philosophy class about the scientist who leaves the laboratory and stops by Mass before going home. And I think about the respectful way we addressed this subject. Freud was also respectful enough to write about religion.

Although our dear psychoanalyst from Vienna regarded the relationship between religion and man as a “universal neurosis”, there are countless indications, for me, that he didn't lay his hands on the Spirit more than he could or should.

Being intelligent, rationalizing what is useful to rationalize, doesn't prohibit or contradict the experience of faith. Especially because, and we all know this, God is here, there, and everywhere, outside of time, doing His work, which is no small task.

Ethnic religion is one thing—the human impasse faced with another who may know what we don't, have what we don't—the “church signboard” is one thing. A life with God is something absurdly different. “For this purpose the Son of God was manifested”.

I also bring the terrible news that eternity has already begun, and that we will have to resolve things detail by detail until we are in the Glory of this earthly experience. Sooner or later, my brethren, we will be in a totally different project. And still together, one with another.

In January 2009, a few weeks after Beto Richa's reelection as mayor of Curitiba (77.2%), a woman fell from an overcrowded bus and died instantly. The way the newsroom learned about it was appalling. A listener called the radio station and said, "A woman died on the highway". To which the journalist asked, "Are you sure she's dead?". "Unless she can live without her head, she is," the listener retorted.

The news caused a commotion. The victim was a general services worker, on a bus route that had been showing signs of strain for quite some time, as it was excessively violent even by the standards of the capital. I myself attended the burial. It took place in a simple cemetery in the Metropolitan Region, with the deceased's colleagues in uniform, as if they had gone straight from the cafeteria to the funeral.

When the news reached José Wille's anchor desk at CBN Curitiba, the popular commentator Luiz Geraldo Mazza said something like this: "This woman's death is a result of the 77%". Not far from there, from the PSDB's jubilation over a record-breaking vote, an approval considered glorious, Richa went on to become governor of Paraná and, beyond that, to the back of a police van.

To this day, I haven't been presented with plausible reasons for Richa's arrest (I wrote for O Globo about the matter, more than once, which gives me a sense of the national press coverage on the subject). Whatever he did, he offended someone who doesn't take offense. A journalist who advised Richa during his time as mayor explained it this way: "The people around Richa isolated him. He lost his bearings, and he easily fell into what they wanted from him". It makes sense, because I heard something similar from Euclides Scalco. In fact, that morning Scalco was so unwell, so very unwell, that Hélio Pugliesi said to him, "Don't be so sad, my friend".

I think the bitter medicine is to avoid flatterers.

When we think about the name “Lab”, initially it had to do with experimental journalism. But not an experimental type unconcerned with market standards. The idea was to bring together these two things: the intellectual lineages of journalism, and the practices in broadcasting. We still think about this, because we believe in ways of doing, like precision journalism, solutions journalism, etc. But the Lab demanded for itself an irreversible change.

We began to realize that the transformations that are so dear to us in personal terms, always in the direction of happiness, were also possible in personal life projects, brands, and companies.

What kind of experiments are possible in such a broad laboratory? Well, this conversation could take a lifetime. So, let's go to our most orthodox laboratory test, which is historiographical. Who brought us to this moment?

Starting with the founders' parents, then the founders, the heirs, the people who passed through the firm—what does the history of these people have to do with what is lived today, or what relationship does it have with the challenges to be overcome? A company is strictly the people who work in it.

In this context, issues such as unhealthy leadership flows, inaccurate beliefs, small and large authorities with confused roles, recurrently arise. The price of transformation is extremely high. That is, eventually, with new music setting the rhythm, someone might get lost in the organizational choreography.

Transformation is the natural path of life, as well as something lucrative. Preventing or delaying it has no lasting effect. It is best that we are minimally prepared.

Learn a little more about our solutions in Organizational Transactional Analysis. Schedule a meeting.

Last December, the company's end-of-year party was a Bermuda Triangle of musical styles. From team anthems to the sertanejo hits of the moment, everything played on the Saboto sound system. Except for my two attempts to drink and dance to Shake It Bololo ft. Classics of MPB. In both instances, the music was abruptly interrupted by someone (I don't know who) who clearly doesn't handle the popular use of Latin languages very well, especially street Portuguese.

Far from comparing MC Bin Laden to Marília Mendonça in terms of the importance of popularizing social themes, because you already know I was smitten with Marília a week before her plane crash, I’m convinced they are my most extravagant and useful recent discoveries for social communication research. Nofa!

Besides the danceable sound and ridiculously fun lyrics (because they are very funny, I almost always die laughing!), what “Bololo” (the remix version, linked in the first paragraph) brings me is concrete data: more than 26 million views; there’s a language of its own related to interacting with the world; it’s never boring.

Note, ladies and gentlemen, that if there’s a difficult type to deal with in the world, it’s not the neurotic, nor the hypochondriac, nor even the phony, but specifically the boring person. The boring person can also be called a “corner person”. You know the corner guy? Goes to the party and stays in the corner? Needs to be moved by forces beyond their control to anywhere other than the corner, because they're like a child who's pooped in the corner of the room.

‘Let the boys play’

For those of us who work in media production, there’s a part in “Bololo” where they repeatedly shout: “let the boys play”, which I hear as “let the guys publish.” Basically, very basically, I've been taking the word of “Bololo” with me wherever I go.

No song is more of a “coup d'état” of Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) than “Bololo”. Love it or leave it, but let it serve as a flick on the ear regarding what is uniquely musical, fun, a language that I also want to understand, speak, and write fluently (one more? 😆).

Today, our house smells somewhere between church incense (that's how they sell me the little stones at the Sanctuary shop) and fabric softener. Although I've never heard any complaints about the smell of cigarettes here, I feel like that rotten smoke had permeated the place over time. I quit smoking.

When I told Racca about using nicotine patches, he responded with a hearty laugh, saying "it depends where you stick it". I immediately pictured my mouth taped shut with duct tape. It would have been cheaper than buying the patches.

I miss you in all the intervals of my day. While filling my coffee mug, or going to the bathroom, or on my way to and from lunch, or when I dare to cook (if it were up to me, we'd live on simple things to prepare) – basically, my day consists of these activities interspersed with work – I only think of you.

For some years now, I've fallen into a terrible trap of appearing happy. That is, I think I bought into the idea of doing complex things, which demand a fair amount of intelligence, like someone playing with a "slinky" (remember slinkies?).

Anyway, I don't think the degree of difficulty of things is relevant, although I'm telling you this now.

In general, women and men with professional experience act like this, but they don't "strut their stuff". The trap isn't having "humble self-esteem" (I'm reading a book by Michel Esparza that's a punch in the mouth of pride), but thinking I have the detachment, the self-sufficiency, the happiness of Instagram. I don't, you know – laughs. I know that part of what you like about me has to do with this, anyway. If I could, I'd just stay with you.

For now, the two research projects I'm working on, at two universities, are taking a tremendous amount of energy from my reasoning. In one, I'm invited to look at the world in a "helpless" way, which is in philosophy. In the other, we're all in a new field of study and it seems like no one knows exactly where it's going (and that's precisely the "field", the instability of communication).

I can't wait to see you so we can do nothing but the things we already do, only whole because we're not missing each other. I dream of you telling me to fuck Instagram.

I'll always be waiting for you. A kiss.

I give up on the internet's "style guide", which the robot, in its dullness, doesn't understand Portuguese with passive voice. "A truck of marijuana was seized" became "The police seized a truck of marijuana".

But not only that, unfortunately. I've stopped nitpicking the "details" they offer me on the news. The anchors say "now all the details". And I used to think, "but isn't it 'information'?" Now, I watch the "details" and let it slide.

Not to mention the terrible conjugation of the imperative. It's "access" the site (acesse). Not "access" (acessa). Unless there is a change in verb tense. "You access the site to find out when the world is going to end for good", for example. But you want to speak incorrectly? Fine. Chew gum loudly, too.

What is an innovative school for you? There is still a consolidated image of a space filled with technology and, often, with the use of expressive colors and furniture different from traditional school desks. But we believe that innovation goes far beyond this vision.

Innovation is solving problems with creativity and using available resources, whether they are technological and "modern" or not. In fact, innovative initiatives in education occurred long before the rise of technology. One of the most interesting examples of this is the Japanese educator Tsunesaburo Makiguchi (pictured). In the early 1900s, he began to apply concepts such as education for happiness, education for a creative life, and the importance of developing global citizenship with his students. "Instead of encouraging students to appropriate the intellectual treasures discovered by others, we must empower them to carry out the process of discovery and invention on their own", the educator argued.

These disruptive ideas for the time led to his punishment and forced him to leave his teaching position. But that didn't make him give up on the way he believed education should be. Years later, he created the Soka Gakkai organization, which today has schools in various parts of the world.

Currently, Soka schools do use technology and take advantage of resources such as desks with wheels to alter the classroom organization based on the objective of each lesson. However, technology is not yet the main star. At all ages, students have specific subjects and times to develop other skills:

Elementary School - Early Years The

"Habits of Mind" subject develops students' self-esteem and positive thinking skills.

Elementary School - Final Years

Students study with the guidance of educators and peer support during "Study Skills" time.

Full-Time High School

Integrates various disciplines. Global Politics, Business Management, Environmental Systems and Societies, Theory of Knowledge, and International Proficiency in Portuguese Language and Literature are on the list. All are taught in English. Soka education has a primary focus on training global citizens and disseminating a culture of peace.

What the Soka school teaches us is that we need to go beyond technology to innovate. Being based on humanized relationships can be more revolutionary for a world with more citizens who transform their realities.

The Ten-Year Plan for the Rights of Children and Adolescents of the State of Paraná (2014-2023), all 450 pages of it, landed in my lap. My impressions begin with the reverse: before listing the names of the people who actually did the work, there's an endless list of politicians. Annoying!

Having overcome that section, what one reads is a delight for academics, public administrators, and child advocates. The information is clear, even to the point of noting: "on such a matter, we have no information". But allow me to explain the reason for my comment.

Although that list of politicians makes me somewhat nauseous (because of the inverted hierarchy of things; the merit belongs to the technicians who wrote it, yet the authors' names come first!), their signatures are essential.

Not just the signature, but a commitment that goes beyond this: legislation does not change reality, plans do not change reality, but daily action does.

We have the matter of abuses to discuss – abuses against our communities that cannot and will not go unnoticed. I invite the reader to set aside reservations, because we are bigger than the Workers' Party (PT) or the Social Liberal Party (PSL). Last Sunday, President Jair Bolsonaro was democratically elected, and if we remain vigilant, it will always be this way: votes cast in reliable ballot boxes grant mandates to those chosen by the people. But I also invite the reader to consider a statement by German professor Hanna Knapp that I heard recently. I write about Germany so that we can compare ourselves to a country better than ours, not worse. It's a panorama. Germany – in addition to its historical importance – maintains a leading role in the European Union and is one of the largest economies in the world. This country, which from here on becomes part of our conversation, is attentive to refugee policies and the violence of neo-Nazi groups. The German Foreign Minister, Heiko Maas, calls on US President Donald Trump for a cordial attitude. Such an attitude is broad and forward-looking, encompassing economic agreements and human rights.

Judging by the words of professors – Brazilian historian Francielly Barbosa researches the unfolding of Nazism in Curitiba – and the content of the news, we understand the German concern: they are working to prevent the tragic events of World War II from being repeated. Despite Germany being a democratic country with a free press, groups that condone crimes are prevented from propagating their ideas. This is where the "paradox of intolerance" comes from. A paradox is an "opinion contrary to the common one". An example helps us. Hypothetically, a group that assaults and kills (or that believes that assaulting and killing are paths to a better world) – in this example, a neo-Nazi group – must be combated so that it does not assault and kill. Germany and other countries have understood that intolerance must be offered to the intolerant. Hence the expression "paradox of intolerance".

The German experience is that, step by step, the death of millions of people can be reached. For those who understand the killing of humans as an irreparable atrocity, violent groups – right-wing, left-wing, abusers disguised as #lulalivre or #B17, and a huge list – should be close targets of our police and our community leaders.

Far beyond the election, the removal of an anti-fascist banner from a university is an alarm – and this actually happened in Brazil. One step, then another, then another. Now, if someone is effectively fascist, that person has problems with the police. That there is an ethical crisis in universities, no one doubts – we could mention the installation of electoral committees within them, for example. University students frequently enter the world of work lost. But, if university students cannot be anti-fascist, the ethical crisis is also in families, governments, and police forces. Last year, I conducted interviews with teachers, historians, police chiefs, and psychologists to discuss, journalistically, violent groups – but the editors to whom I offered the material did not consider the topic sufficiently relevant.

The idea of the common good tends to be commonly bothersome for those it inspires. In a good way. Before thinking from an economic standpoint (fully integrated with biology and the human sciences, as defined by Jean Tirole), I think about the excellent editorial section name that “common good” makes. Instead of “daily” or “every day” – the latter, a classic in my writing –, we could call news about potholes “common good”, quite trivial, quite human.

When I argue that “common good” is bothersome, it’s because, whatever role we occupy, we are invited to suspend – even if in a limited way – our understandings of the world. Read slowly what comes next. If it's what I think, it's what I think and it's mine. If it's what you think, it's what you think and it's yours. The catch is here: if it’s mine or yours, it’s not ours, it’s not common good.

"Economics for the Common Good" is the title of Tirole's book, winner of the 2014 Nobel Prize in Economics. The copy that reached me is from Zahar publishers, with the seal of the French Republic. Supported by economic research, the text clarified something beautiful for me: at least in the laboratory, we are more often honest and generous than selfish (except when we have very bad examples around). And more: we tend to engage in causes that don't bring us rewards that sound like reciprocation, because we don't like to appear greedy. The trick: at the same time, when we go to the polls and are seen in the voting booth, we feel pleasure. Mail-in voting in the United States decreased participation. People really wanted to meet their neighbors on the sidewalk, wear a sticker on their chest.

Some years ago, Professor Belmiro Valverde Jobim Castor (author of "Size Isn't Everything", among other titles) searched for the poorest locality in Curitiba and its metropolitan region. He used the Basic Education Development Index (Ideb) figures as a parameter. He came across a very poor neighborhood in Piraquara. There, he established a first-world school, with philanthropic funding from the United States. Names like architect Manoel Coelho and journalists Aroldo Murá and Michelle Thomé signed on to projects. In operation, the João Paulo II Education Center began to offer full-time education, with three meals a day, at the same cost the government spent per child in the public school system.

The person who recommended the reading about the common good to me was the Secretary of Planning and Structural Works of Paraná, Valdemar Bernardo Jorge. He and a state team identified the municipalities with the lowest Human Development Index (HDI) and created the Paraná Produtivo program. In this, the program resembles Belmiro's education center, by leveling up: a business intelligence platform began operating with data collected from various sources, such as tables from the Parana Institute for Economic and Social Development (Ipardes), to make the strengths and weaknesses of the regions clear and measurable. It only works if the local actors want to participate, and if they are willing to share the advantages and risks. This is common good.