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By Mirna Wabi-Sabi For those of us who work editing people’s writing, one of the first lessons is that each writer handles edits differently, and it’s helpful to be flexible in your approach to feedback. In my career, it has happened that someone’s writing and response to edits made me suspect they might be on the autism spectrum, but there is never a need to confirm a layman’s diagnosis, only to adapt your approach as you would with any other individual writer. Recently, however, quite a few writers have come to me with texts about being on the spectrum, and this led me to identify some patterns and to organize some of my editing tools accordingly. This information can be helpful to those who have felt the urge to abandon a project because they may have observed these signs but interpreted them as confusion, hostility or inexperience. Sign 1–Prolix When a short passage is unclear, and an editor asks for an explanation, the text comes back with a few extra pages, which don’t necessarily address the issue in the first place. Possible cause: Extreme wordiness as a response to being asked for clarity can be a sign that the writer is insecure about their ability to make themselves understood, often even to themselves. Tool: In this case, there is no need to abandon the piece because it got too long and even more confusing than the first draft. Make sure you talk to the writer and agree on what the main point of the article is. With this in mind, remove the passages, sentences or paragraphs that go off on tangents (away from the main point). As you peel off the layers, you will see there is a narrative beneath. Sign 2–Retreat Sometimes, as a response to an editor asking for an explanation, a writer will retreat, saying “nevermind, I don’t want to write or publish anymore.” Possible cause: Frustration over the challenges of trying to connect with an audience can lead any writer down a path of self-doubt mixed with annoyance. For someone on the spectrum, this feeling can be dialed up, making them want to disappear. Tool: Reassure the writer that this frustration is a natural response to the writing process, and that your job as an editor is to help build a bridge between their work and their audience. Then, provide examples of explanations (be as wild as you want in your suggestions). This way, you spark a brainstorming session, inspiring the writer to come up with their own explanation. Sign 3–Diary Some texts sound like entries of a diary. This is when a writer starts too many sentences with the word “I”, the narrative of events is too linear, and they struggle to make the leap from their experience to a slightly more universal one. Possible cause: The narrative style of, “I did this, then I did that. Therefore, this is what I did” can be a sign that the writer is having a hard time putting themselves in someone else’s shoes. In this case, in the shoes of the reader who might be asking themselves, “so what, why do I care?” Tool: Encourage the writer to avoid starting sentences/paragraphs with the word “I” or “It”. Give examples of how to do that, by making the object the subject of a sentence. Ask the question, “for a reader who does not have this specific experience, how would this apply to them?” Sign 4–Prose Perhaps the writing is structured in an unusual way — Extremely long paragraphs, inability to separate themes and to organize these paragraphs, or odd line breaks and punctuation. Possible cause: Unclear overview of the whole text and lack of structure are signs that the writing is happening as a stream of consciousness which doesn’t prioritize the reader’s understanding or access to the content. This type of writing is associated with the aforementioned Prolix and Diary Signs, and shows that the writer is attempting to clarify the content to themselves. Tool: The same tools used for the Prolix and Diary Signs can be used here, with the addition of openness to innovative approaches to structure. If the main point of the article is clear, being flexible to accommodate the writer’s instinctive use of structure can be helpful. Such as, prose poetry, rhythmic line breaks and so on (I, personally, would encourage academia and its professionals to be more open-minded when it comes to this). Of course, not everyone who is prone to some of these behaviors as writers are on the spectrum. But understanding that these behaviors can be approached in an efficient way is helpful to everyone. Communication skills are something we all have to learn, and often struggle with.

Two situations caused major uproar in Brazil this month, both involving photos. First is a double exposure image of Lula with shattered glass pointing at his heart. The other of a Yanomami woman who died due to severe malnutrition. Debates which used to be directed at the Lula/Bolsonaro dichotomy have turned inward, within leftists, over how to handle post-victory political crises. Many people were horrified at the photo of Lula on the cover of a major São Paulo newspaper, claiming it incited violence against him. The shattered glass was from the capital building attack on January 8th, and the artistic composition by a renown leftist photographer was harshly criticized because it’s too dubious in a landscape where most feel there is no space for nuance. To me, the photo depicts a bulletproof scene, where there was a failed attempt to destroy his presidency, and he leaves smiling victorious among the ruins. But to others, the possibility it might promote violence against the president, as if someone ought to shoot him in the heart, was enough to promote violence against the photographer herself. She was the target of an online mob until a more problematic scene arose. Quite frankly, since the first news of what happened to those in the Yanomami territory, I couldn’t read anything about it because I couldn’t stand looking at the photos that came with the texts. Social media became infested with images of not just a crime, but of victims of what is the brink of genocide. The sharing of these images were justified as needed evidence, but that never convinced me. In court cases involving white children, the visual evidence is not publicized. More often than not, testimonies are enough. From the beginning, to utilize the images felt dehumanizing to me. Now that one of the women from this community died from malnourishment, Yanomami leaders are finally pleading for people to stop sharing her image in a show of respect for Yanomami tradition. Still, people argue against it, saying this image has to be shared on the internet as evidence, as if the internet was the grand forum where justice is achieved by exposing violated marginalized peoples. The images of malnourished Yanomami children were never tolerable to me, and it’s intolerable that to some, at this point, they are still needed as evidence for what the Brazilian government puts these peoples through. This resonates so much with what the brilliant professor and journalist Allissa V. Richardson says about black people and the need for mediatic evidence for the racist violence perpetrated against Black Americans. She says: “I would like to get to the point where we don’t need the videos to believe black people […] Why are black people asked to produce this footage to kind of pre-litigate the fact that they didn’t deserve their own demise?” When it comes to the subject of ‘Bearing witness’ to racist brutality, black and native people find common ground in the use of media. Considering the hundreds of years of colonization, what do people think Indigenous rights activists have been fighting against? Did the main stream think it wasn’t that bad, so they needed photographic evidence of how bad it actually has been? Do they think this is as bad as it gets? Or, they just need another reason to continue to blame Bolsonaro for everything bad that has ever happened in Brazil? Indigenous peoples have endured rampant assault, starvation and murder for hundreds of years, the fraction which survived are still enduring this paradigm, and the last 4 years are not single-handedly responsible for the injustices these peoples have been faced with, only for allowing business to go on as usual. The Yanomami have been dealing with the issue of absurd numbers of garimpeiros invading their land since at least the 70s. There has been rampant disease, malnutrition and massacres since then, even a declared genocide in 1993... If it took these images in 2023 for someone to realize the inhumane and undignified living conditions natives have been submitted to, they haven’t been paying attention. And it surely is not the responsibility of the Yanomami to make an exception to their way of living (in dealing with death) to serve non-native people’s need for a wake-up call. Were it so, wouldn’t that just be an extension of the dehumanization forced upon them? I also ask myself what the purpose is to juxtapose images of the Yanomami with historic images of Holocaust survivors. If this is an attempt to stress how violent it is what is happening to natives, it’s utterly inadequate and anachronistic, because what is happening in Brazil has been happening for much longer and to many more people than what happened in Nazi Germany. And the same goes for making the parallel with malnourished children in sub-Saharan Africa, as if Brazil should be above that, when in reality, it's a tragedy that this is happening anywhere for any reason. Could it be that when we think of the hundreds of years of genocide perpetrated against Indigenous and African people in Brazil, that doesn’t carry the same weight as what happened in Europe, with Europeans? So we take something way older and bigger, like colonial genocide, and try to fit it into a Eurocentric narrative. This way, perhaps, people will see it as more unacceptable, and therefore, ensure it never happens again. Yes, we want the genocide of Indigenous people to stop and for it to happen ‘never again’. Indigenous people have wanted that at least since a century before the Second World War. If this isn’t resilience, I don’t know what is. Maybe that’s why I can’t stand these images being used as evidence. Because they are used as evidence of something of a frail, defeated group of people, when in reality they couldn’t be farther from that. The Yanomami have endured the unimaginable for hundreds of years — this is not a story of weakness, it’s a story of power, and we should be so honored to stand next to them and fight for their dignity. Against this background, Lula doesn’t look so vulnerable double-exposed to shattered glass, smiling, fixing his tie, does he? He is shielded by much more than bullet-proof glass, cars, vests and suits. He’s shielded by passing-whiteness, by the global markets and its super-powers. When it comes to his flesh, blood and consciousness, it will be the Yanomami who will save him, not the other way around, and they deserve the world in exchange for that. _______ Mirna Wabi-Sabi is a Brazilian writer, site editor at Gods and Radicals and founder of Plataforma9. She is the author of the book Anarcho-transcreation and producer of several other titles under the P9 press.

Written by Renato Libardi Bittencourt Photographed by Fabio Teixeira There was and still is a certain air of “promise” and “hope” here in Brazil that, after Lula's electoral victory, we would re-establish the “normality” of life in the fragile Liberal Democracy. What has been said around (see MST note on roadblocks) is that it would be enough to wait passively and orderly for the newly elected president to take office and let the extreme right agonize in what would be its last breath. However, since the day the results of the polls were defined, the extreme right has taken to the streets in a clear attempt at a Coup and a demonstration of strength, thus showing that, far from being on its last breath, they are united, articulated, strong and cohesive. Since the 30th of October we have had: road closures throughout much of the national territory; requests for a military intervention in the streets and military headquarters (which continue until now and with no end in sight); buses invaded by Bolsonaristas who attacked students; the dean of a Federal university filing a document in support of the coup's lockout; support and connivance of the State security forces to the coup's and anti-democratic manifestations; manifestations of xenophobia and racism against North-easterners of the country; swastikas and arson at the MST (Landless Workers Movement) headquarters in Pernambuco; apart from the tantrums of "Deus Mercado" or the Market God. (See, for example, this article in Brasil de Fato.) The curious (or tragic) thing about this whole absurdity is the absolute immobility of the majority, hegemonic and institutional left, which, faced with such absurdities, was incapable of reacting. No, this is not about calling for a civil war. We know that the Brazilian security forces and justice are not on our side (much less would be enough for a “bloodbath” against us by the police). But, since when do we need state support or a favorable situation to occupy what has historically always been ours, the streets? It is true that any type of demonstration carries its own risks and that the current situation inspires fear in many of us. However, that old saying by Marighella is still current: “I didn't have time to be afraid”. RIO DE JANEIRO, October 30th. By Fabio Teixeira. On the side of the revolutionary, autonomous and combative left, the story was quite different. On November 1st, the page “Antifa Hooligans Brasil” issued a statement calling on organized supporters to stop the coup attempt, unblock the roads and defend the limited democracy we still have left. On that same occasion, the MTST (Homeless Workers Movement) also issued a statement to its militancy to thwart the coup leaders and their financiers. Differently and in strategic disagreement with the MTST, the Landless Workers Movement (MST) issued a note calling on the left to remain calm, trust the institutions and await Lula's inauguration. Well, here we have an evident theoretical and strategic conflict within the left. After all, should we or should we not occupy the streets at this moment? Is it safe? What to do in the face of all this? Will Lula's inauguration be the beginning of better times? These are complex questions that do not have a simple answer or a magic recipe that can objectively guide us in the face of so many challenges. However, the good old philosophical tradition teaches us that, in the face of difficult questions, it is wise and prudent to ask more refined questions on top of the original questions. For example: “Does it make sense to fear a civil war when, for someone who is black and from the periphery, war and genocide happen every day”? Does this question reflect the division of class and race within the left itself? The argument of the “civil war”, that is, that the militancy and the people in the streets could truly provoke a real war, a bloodbath and a great systemic rupture, only reveals the privileges or a certain degree of social alienation of those who use it to justify a left that looks more and more like the System which they once opposed in a more radical and honest way. Let's be frank, you don't just die from bullets in Brazil. One dies of hunger, helplessness, the scrapping of public health and even political indifference, as is the case in question. The argument of the “civil war” reminds me of the lyrics of the song “Estamos Mortos” by Rapper Eduardo Taddeo (former Facção Central) which begins by saying: “Nobody can be considered alive; Eating leftovers from dumpsters; Raising hands for alms; Smoking crack; Losing health pulling cardboard wagons (...)” and ends by emphasizing that: “As long as we cannot prevent genocide; The racism; The alienation; Mass imprisonment; Extreme poverty and social nullification; We will be nothing more than breathing corpses; My condolences to all of us who vegetate; In the morgue of the living.” RIO DE JANEIRO, October 20th. The question I ask myself at the moment is: are we anesthetized? Is this anesthesia the result of so much beating we've taken in recent years from liberals and the extreme right? Was the damage such that we lost the ability to react accordingly? Are we meek as lambs? Do we let the righteous anger of our hearts metamorphose into a depressed, lethargic state? No, once again, I am not evoking those plastic and stereotyped scenes of militants throwing Molotov cocktails at the Military Police and “playing terror” (as much as I like this dreamlike vision). I'm talking about ordinary people en masse taking to the streets. Even if there are those who say that this would only bring more confusion and give more visibility to the extreme right and to Bolsonaristas, this is an urgent matter, a duty dear to the anti-fascist tradition: “no stage for fascists”. It is true that the liberals and the extreme right had a large and overwhelming victory in the last elections, but to continue to clear the avenue for the extreme right to pass instead of putting a foot in the streets and shouting “they shall not pass!” has catastrophic historical results. Every time that, in history, we have ignored the rise of fascism and have not dismantled them with combative strategies of direct action, guess what: they triumphed, grew, bore fruit and boosted their social reach even further among the masses.

Originally published at Abeautifulresistance.org PHOTOS BY FABIO TEIXEIRA, taken in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. NOVEMBER 02: ‘Bolsonaristas’, supporters of the defeated president Jair Messias Bolsonaro, protest against the election results in front of the Eastern Military Command. Since the end of this year’s Brazilian elections, supporters of the losing candidate, Jair Bolsonaro, camp outside military headquarters around the country asking for an intervention against the results. They claim fraud, and invoke an article of the constitution which, according to their interpretation, would grant the armed forces the power to “guarantee order” and “uphold of the law” when “there is an exhaustion of the traditional forces of public security”. This exhaustion of traditional forces would be, to them, the president-elect being a convicted criminal, aided by forces of a new world order, against which aliens ought to intervene. Some of these supporters went as far as sending help signals to an alien general with the flashlights of their smartphones. It's no easy feat to track down the origins of the relationship between Bolsonaro supporters and the belief that aliens are actively involved in partisan politics. In 2018, The Guardian published an article calling Bolsonaro, a front running candidate for the presidency then, a “cult leader” who claimed to have had contact with aliens. However, the article provides no sources regarding when, how or why Bolsonaro made the claim of alien contact. The author of this piece is a man called Dom Phillips, who was killed this year in a high-profile assassination case, alongside another journalist, Bruno Pereira, while investigating a corruption case in the Amazon region. OCTOBER 28: At the debate between the 2022 presidential candidates of Brazil, Luis Inácio Lula da Silva and Jair Messias Bolsonaro. Satanism Other more sinister and conspiratorial connections have been made, involving a satanic cult from the 80s accused of horrifying killings of poor boys. The woman who founded the cult, Valentina de Andrade, wrote a book called ‘God, the big farce’, where claims were made that, not only aliens are among us, but that they influence human births; one alien general and ship in particular are to soon come to earth and request help from good citizens to achieve a crucial (possibly political) task. Somehow, the name of Bolsonaro’s family lawyer, Frederick Wassef, shows up in documents about the court case against Valentina. He testified about how he bought Valentina’s book in 1988, which describes her experience meeting aliens and how God is not the Creator of the Universe, but instead a sort of Devil. This sparked Wassef’s interest, leading him to write her a letter and, upon her invitation, travel to several cities to visit certain spaces associated with the cult, including the cult’s headquarters in Buenos Aires. In these trips, he met Valentina and several people from her circle, and attended several courses and lectures, none of which, according to him, discussed anything besides the core principles of the group — no drugs, prostitution, abuse of trust or disrespect. This whole saga ends with it all being attributed to the Satanic Panic phenomenon, a period between the 80s and 90s where there was a spike in unverified cases of satanic rituals involving the murder and abuse of children. It’s widely known to have happened in the US, but Brazil, so it seems, also fell victim to it. Both of these countries have unexpected political ties — the 1980s marking the end of a Brazilian military dictatorship financed by the CIA, and the 2020s marked by the symbiosis between Bolsonaro, Trump, and their supporters. Now, the connection between these politicians, Satanism and Aliens falls right up QAnon’s alley. NOVEMBER 15: Thousands of supporters of Jair Bolsonaro gathered in protest against the October election results. QAnon In an ideological landscape plagued with conspiratorial ideas, it’s not hard to imagine a natural progression from the theories of QAnon to UFO Conspiracies. In 2019, Vice published about how, in the absence of Qs posts, “many of his followers have turned to the UFO narrative for their conspiratorial fix” — especially since Q himself had made a few posts about UFOs and several about Satanism — earning QAnon the reputation of bringing the Satanic Panic back. The merging of Aliens and QAnon being attributed to a conspiratorial “fix” is insufficient, though. The parallel between Satanism and aliens predates QAnon, and some researchers from the late 90s and early 2000s have explored a “striking” similarity between the reports of Satanist abuse and alien abductions, as shared in their respective support groups. Interestingly, the study which asks the question ‘Who Are the UFO Abductees and Ritual-Abuse Survivors?’ answers this by saying they are both overwhelmingly white. This answer begs another question of why a chunk of the white demographic leans towards these explanations for the political and social unrest in the world. In his 1997 research titled “Satanist abuse and alien abduction: A comparative analysis[…]”, John Paley speculates on yet another explanation — a spectrum of temporal lobe epilepsy and bad therapy. Considering that the vast majority of those who identify as abuse survivors or abductees are women; the framing of these reports as delusional (page 47) needs to be looked at from a more modern, intersectional lens. The truth is that no one fully understands or can provide a sturdy scientific explanation for these social phenomena. [LEFT] OCTOBER 28: Bolsonaro at the presidential debate. [RIGHT] OCTOBER 30: Brazil’s president, and candidate for reelection Jair Messias Bolsonaro, speaking to the press shortly after voting. The US Army and Navy There is, however, a more conservative (or at least less peculiar) explanation for the fact that Bolsonaro supporters are flashing their phones at an extraterrestrial ship and its general. The US government has been putting effort into destigmatizing the belief in UFOs (or UAPs, Unidentified Aerial Phenomena.) In May, the US held a congressional hearing with the purpose of encouraging the general public, and specifically Navy officers, to collect data and report on unidentified flying (and under-water) objects. It's in the US Army's interest that new technologies remain classified. Upon unexplained sightings, it would benefit them if the public associates it with aliens and not with secret military technology being tested. For instance, it would be fair to assume that, by the time the “Predator drone” was introduced in the early 2000s, it had already been in testing for the better part of the previous decade (Perhaps not by chance during the X-Files era). In fact, at the hearing, it was stated that drones were tested to see if they served as an explanation to modern-day Navy Intelligence data on unexplained sightings. Some data was made public. Some was discussed in a classified hearing. And some they admit they have no explanation for, due to insufficient data or lack of understanding of this data. Nevertheless, the US Army is navigating a fine line between the need to have their own classified military technology kept secret, but also relying on reports from the population, and Navy personnel, on what could be secret technology from ‘non-allied’ forces. NOVEMBER 15. Protest in front of the Eastern Military Command. Technology There is a significant segment of the Brazilian population which believes certain technology we have today, such as the internet, Artificial Intelligence, machine learning, motorcycles which don’t fall over, and so on, come from aliens. Someone recently told me, “humans are smart, but not that smart.” This relates to the theory that the pyramids couldn’t have been built by humans, so they must have been built by ancient aliens, and so on. Interestingly, we now live in the era of smartphones, which can be used to collect more data than ever on UFOs (or UAPs), expose classified military technology and who knows what else. And yet, there is doubt about whether the very object we hold in our hands to collect this data is of this world. The human experience is marked by the distress of realizing the exorbitant number of things we don’t understand about the universe, and all that we can’t control or predict. Not even this statement can be said with too much certainty, which is probably why we look for meaning in the most varied, unexpected places. That in itself can be a healthy coping mechanism for the absurdity and frailty of all life on Earth. Having said that, once we advocate for Democratic principles, or any basic mode of co-existing on a planet with 8 billion people, we are bound to face situations where certain groups take their theories to a Dictatorial level. When it comes to these people camped in front of Brazilian military headquarters, asking for the regression from Democracy to Military Dictatorship, believe it or not, our strategy has been to wait them out, and for panic to subside. Because an understandable or manageable line of political reasoning is even further from sight than this extraterrestrial ship they are trying to communicate with. ___ Written by Mirna Wabi-Sabi Photograped by Fabio Teixeira Edited by Nox Morningstar

Written by Mirna Wabi-Sabi and photographed by Fabio Teixeira. Originally published at Abeautifulresistance.org. Lula has won the Brazilian presidential election this year, but Bolsonaro supporters are taking to the streets demanding “federal intervention” to impede the “installation of communism” in the country. Nowadays, however, Lula advocates for a mixed economy, and the main arguments against him are that he is corrupt, and that he will foment organized crime and chaos. Communism here is used as a smoke screen to conceal fantasies of a military dictatorship come-back and of genocide of poor and black people — the demographic Lula seeks to include in the market economy. After questioning the election results, Gustavo Gayer, a politician, influencer and YouTuber, removed several videos he posted last week on YouTube, and had his Twitter account suspended. In the video called “Urgent! Lula voters have already begun to terrorize Brazil. Strong scenes”, the strongest scene according to him was a woman’s recording of a building being invaded across the street from her apartment, where she sounded clearly terrified. Gayer fails to indicate the context of such invasion, as is customary in his work. He has already been condemned for propagating Fake News twice this year, both times involving other politicians and Covid-19 policies. What the Brazilian electorate considers to be terrifying is at the core of the political polarization we are witnessing. While one housed woman (representing about half of the Brazilian voting population) is horrified at seeing a large group of poor people invade a building and put tarp on the windows — the other half is horrified at seeing widespread misery, homelessness, and hunger. The occupation of this building in particular was the work of a group called Struggle-for-Housing Front (Frente de Luta por Moradia — FLM), which exists for 2 decades and advocates for dignified housing rights in São Paulo. The building was empty, no one was assaulted or removed from their homes other than the occupiers themselves. In fact, the group published a letter from São Paulo’s Court of Justice stating that the police is the one acting criminally, if it 1) imposes physical or psychological violence against the occupiers, 2) restricts their access to water, food, electricity, lawyers and public defenders. What constitutes justified criminal behavior seems to be the point of contention here, as opposed to a stern anti-crime stance by good, lawful, Christian citizens in face of profane, lawless communists. Spreading fake news and police brutality, though unlawful, is tolerated or even applauded by Bolsonaro supporters, while the fight for dignified housing is described as such: “Crime has won. Our lives will be hell. Homicides will go up. [Drug] trafficking will go up. Criminals will reign. Because now their boss sits, will sit, at the presidential chair. Brazil is no longer a friendly place for good people, patriots, Christians… I don’t know what else to say. They have managed it and will destroy our country.” — Gustavo Gayer, on the (since removed) video “Urgent! Lula voters have already begun to terrorize Brazil. Strong scenes” on YouTube. From October 31st, with 462 thousand views in 6 hours. In a recent piece by Eduardo Barbosa entitled “Between bullets and mining: the life of indigenous peoples and black favela residents under the state of exception”, this tolerance for certain criminal behaviors by enthusiastic defenders of the rule of law is described as a State of Exception. The Bolsonaro regime is, or was, an extension and exacerbation of decades of “perverted policies” which enacted “recurrent massacres in favelas and the serial extermination of native peoples”. These demographics are a target because they undermine the power the State has over certain territories. In this sense, they are a threat to the State, and the desire to eradicate them trumps the patriot’s law-abiding rhetoric and becomes a well-established mechanism. There is a massive class of Brazilians which are repulsed by the poor and marginalized. They may think of ways to lift people out of poverty with economic incentives and charity, while others advocate for literal eradication, through the barrel of a gun. There is plenty to be questioned about the use of capitalist tools to solve an issue that capitalism not only creates but relies on to thrive — class disparity. Mass murder, however, is beyond questioning, it’s the abysmal, unbridgeable gap in the binary political landscape we are living in. Lula will not be able to single-handedly eradicate the nation’s hate towards the poor, or shift humanity’s course away from economic despair and global collapse. Expectations of his potential for change are high, but unrealistic. What we need is a shift in culture. The narrative Bolsonaro normalized has been shunned not only by the Brazilian electorate, but also by international communities. Still, the win was narrow, and supporters have ironclad convictions on both sides. In this sense, the ballot box isn’t a tool which produces rightfulness. Legitimacy and dignity are ideals we need to uphold, defend, and fight for every day, not only every 4 years. ____ Written by Mirna Wabi-Sabi and photographed by Fabio Teixeira

Originally published at Abeautifulresistance.org. “I believe that our human condition is defined more by the push-and-pulls of multiple, often contradictory commitments, than by linear strategies, limpid “worldviews” and direct cause-effect relations.” (Andrea Brigaglia) Before starting a conversation about Nigerian women in refuge in São Paulo, Brazil, it’s necessary to point out the gross negligence of global media in reporting any news about Nigeria. As a country with a booming economy, vast natural resources and vibrant culture, the occasional mentions of it are overwhelmingly within the context of Islamist terrorism. Boko Haram is indeed an urgent issue, it has been for decades and affects millions of people. While the organization overshadows all other news about Nigeria, it isn’t discussed with the level of urgency it deserves. Any genuine concern over the well-being of Americans in the aftermath of 9-11 ought to be matched with concern over the well-being of Nigerians in the continuing conflict with Boko Haram. At alarming rates, this conflict has been displacing vulnerable populations which are further silenced in their foreign countries of refuge. Brazil, despite its unmatched connection to Africa, is utterly unequipped to care for the influx of African refugees, especially Muslim Nigerian women. Upon arrival, these women are only further victimized by the weakness of Brazilian institutions and how oblivious the local population is to their plight. This leads to, of course, a new type of precarious living circumstances, which may not involve Boko Haram, but involves instead exploitative and clandestine working environments, as well as religious and social isolation. To understand the failures of counterterrorism efforts in Nigeria, perhaps we ought to look at the failure of counterterrorism efforts of a post-9-11 geopolitical paradigm ignited by the United States. Surely, ethno-religious conflict in that region is a result of arbitrary borders put in place by a British colonial regime. Hundreds of ethnic groups were lumped together as either Northern or Southern Nigeria, which were soon “amalgamated” for the sole purpose of facilitating accounting of the exploration the British crown was doing across the Niger River. Not to mention all the years of conflict before British occupation, at the peak of the slave trade. All of which laid a foundation of brutality framing the events to come at the turn of the 21st century. Boko Haram is a “franchise” of Al-Qaeda. According to Andrea Brigaglia, a former director of the Centre for Contemporary Islam, the “looseness” of the connections between these franchises has been both a weakness and a strength in Al-Qaeda’s strategy. On the one hand it facilitated the speed and vastness of its reach, but on the other it led to frail control over the distant factions. During the early 2000s, Islamist Nigerian groups were forming and dismantling, Boko Haram being an enduring example of one. Debates among Islamic leaders over how to handle life and public education under a western (Christian) Nigerian Government (arbitrarily crafted by a colonial power) were prominent. Due to the pressures caused by the ‘War on Terror’, “the absence of any exchange of arguments on the legitimacy of Al-Qaeda’s project of global jihad” is “curious and conspicuous”. One would imagine that such conversation or public stance in that period would be undodgeable, unless “to avoid threading any organic links with Al-Qaeda”. The United States’ ‘War on Terror’ has failed to eradicate or contain Boko Haram, and though they only occasionally become major news, the organization is consistently portrayed as horrific abusers of women and children. There are untold parts of this story, however. To portray the multiplicity with which Brigaglia’s defines the human condition, away from “limpid ‘worldviews’”, we ought to talk about Nigeria in multiple ways. Or as the brilliant Nigerian novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie puts it, we must avoid “the danger of a single story”. PHOTOGRAPHY BY FABIO TEIXEIRA Brazil The story of Muslim Nigerian women in refuge in Brazil could be one of beauty and power, where the protagonist is not Islamist violence and suffering. And it can also be about the responsibility of the West to understand the complexities of these women’s lives, especially a life within a society built upon Christian dominance. In this photo series by the photojournalist Fabio Teixeira, about 20 Nigerian women refugees in São Paulo became vibrant protagonists of their own stories. They made their own clothes from fabrics they got at work, which is sewing for clandestine factories that come down as quickly as they pop up. Some of them work cleaning the mannequins on which these clothes are displayed. All these jobs offer no security or proper payment, yet these women can bring dignity to their humble homes in São Paulo, and in some cases care for very young children. In both Brazil and Nigeria, poverty is the main obstacle between Muslim Nigerians and the fulfilling dignified life we all deserve. To practice your religion in peace and provide for your family and loved ones is a right that should be granted to everyone, despite race, nationality, or gender. While we may discuss how the Nigerian government has failed to ensure this right to its peoples, we ought not to forget the failure of Western countries in treating Nigerians with the respect they would expect for themselves. The region which is now Nigeria has been exploited for hundreds of years, and religious violence has taken many forms, including in the form of islamophobia in Christian regions. What is the difference between saving and empowering? Have these refugees been saved from brutal regimes? Perhaps. But they are yet to find a place in this world where they can enjoy the humanity we all have the duty to uphold. If we vow to crack down on terrorism, we vow to support victims of terrorism as well. Is that what the West has been doing to Muslim Nigerian women? According to a publication by Anoosh Soltani at the United Nations University, “popular Western media outlets strongly perpetuate a hegemonic view of Muslim women”. By doing so, these women are confined to the categories of either oppressed, and/or “incompatible with the values and norms of the Western world”. In reality, there are multiple ways of practicing Islam, most of which would be against Western values to berate. Islam arrived in the region we now call Nigeria in the 11th century — a couple hundred years before European colonization. For many women, wearing the hijab was a statement against colonial rule. As such, head coverings worn by Muslim women have been a fierce symbol of belonging and resilience. In the history of Islam, Boko Haram is a recent and distinct phenomenon, born as a result of the pushes and pulls of history, global conflict, and the human condition. To do better, more of us in the West must show Muslim Nigerian women respect and provide them with the basic human dignity we are all entitled to. ______ MIRNA WABI-SABI is a writer, editor and director of Plataforma9. FABIO TEIXEIRA is a photojournalist and documentary filmmaker living in Rio de Janeiro. He has worked for The Guardian, Folha de São Paulo, the International Red Cross, Unicef, among others.

It is difficult to bring a critical eye to such a respected figure in the world of artistic, political and environmental activism. People are complex and therefore so are their artistic productions. I believe that Sebastião Salgado's work exists somewhere between the beneficial and the harmful. By Mirna Wabi-Sabi, originally published at A Beautiful Resistance. A selection of Sebastião Salgado's work is now on display at the 'Museum of Tomorrow' in Rio de Janeiro — black and white photos of the Amazon and indigenous peoples of the region, in a museum dedicated to sustainability financed by Shell. The photographer's artistic and professional skill is undeniable, as is the curatorship of his wife, Lélia Wanick Salgado, reasons why the overwhelming majority of public reaction to this exhibition is positive. As an icon of environmental protection, and a leftist activist since the Brazilian dictatorship, Salgado is admired around the world. But, when I saw the exhibition, I couldn't contain the discomfort with the exoticization and, in some cases, eroticization of indigenous people, with inappropriate texts, full of half-truths that try to contextualize these photos. All of this made me wish he had invested strictly in recording the landscapes, which are magnificent, and avoided merging native people with plants, birds, and monkeys. For a while I thought I was the only one feeling this discomfort, until I found a 2018 research by Marcelo Messina and Teresa Di Somma that reports exactly the problem—“the unnerving logic of colonialism.” “In addition to silencing the stories of violence perpetrated by European colonizers against indigenous people, camouflaging them under friendly exchanges between utensils and women, Salgado visually connects to these stories of violence, symbolically reproducing them.” The explanatory texts in the exhibition misrepresent reality through silencing. Military officer Cândido Rondon is described as the “greatest protector of indigenous people in Brazil”, silencing countless indigenous people who have fought for generations to protect themselves. When speaking of the marshal in this way, the truth is also silenced not only about the violence against indigenous people perpetrated by the military institution of which he was a part, but also the corruption and abuse in the indigenous protection institutions that he founded himself. Many say that he was a protector of indigenous people, but they must also recognize that protection for him meant assimilation into neocolonial Brazilian society. In that same paragraph about Rondon, the indigenous way of life is described as “bucolic”, and I believe this word represents the kind of romanticism we confuse with respect. ‘In relation to the countryside’ places indigenous peoples in contrast to urban, industrialized life. When we glorify the native connection to nature, we confuse exoticization with appreciation, for we simplify by romanticizing, and we also infantilize by reducing these civilizations to categories of 'pure' and 'naive'. There is nothing naive about the cultural legacy of the Amazonian indigenous peoples, there is naivety in us when we create this dichotomy between life in connection with nature and industrialized Christian life. Religion is silenced in the texts when indigenous spirituality is narrated as an anecdote, while the Christian gaze implicitly permeates all readings. In the text about the Suruwahá, it is said that there are high rates of suicide there as a symptom of mythology. They believe in “three heavens”, the best of which is for those who die at the most vigorous moment in life. The use of the word “suicide” alone is already a Western and Christian reading of the practice of “ritual death”. According to Kariny Teixeira De Souza and Márcio Martins Dos Santos, in the 2009 research “Ritual death: Reflections on the suruwaha 'suicide'", “cultural practices, such as the ritual death discussed here, misunderstood by 'Western' and, in a certain sense, Christian, conceptions prevailing in our society, feed our imagination, and so we think we see, right in front of us, beings devoid of humanity and meaning”. The word suicide can indeed be used when describing a serious public health issue among indigenous peoples as a result of the systemic psychic violence of hundreds of years. “The main risk factors for suicide [cited in 111 studies on 7 Brazilian indigenous ethnicities] were poverty, historical and cultural factors, low indicators of well-being, family disintegration, social vulnerability and lack of meaning in life and in the future”, reads an excerpt from the World Health Organization's 2020 Systematic Review. Mythology and spirituality are not factors in suicide rates among indigenous peoples, to say such a thing is a decontextualization of reality, and for what purpose? This question brings us back to the research of Marcelo Messina and Teresa Di Somma – the logic of colonialism is unnerving because it revels in its “stories of violence”, it is perverse. In Salgado's case, this desire is camouflaged in attractive images that frame nudity, especially female nudity, as pure and naive. Some argue that the sexualization of this nudity takes place in the gaze of the audience, not the photographer, but there are artistic choices Salgado made in which the sexualization is evident (note Figure 1 of the research). In many of the portraits, men are framed shoulder-up, and women are photographed with exposed breasts. This choice can happen to emphasize the differences between us and them, and the nudity of female breasts is indeed a difference. This in itself would be problematic, because the emphasis on difference exoticizes and objectifies. Eroticization possibly takes place in the gaze of the photographer and the audience, but certainly in the silencing of the history of sexual violence suffered by indigenous girls and women for centuries. Nowhere is the history of sexual violence addressed in the texts of the exhibition, but all over nudity is romanticized. Brazil suffered for hundreds of years with an “ethnic cleansing” that instrumentalized rape, the female nude was read as animalistic and inhuman. And that reality has not yet been resolved. “Salgado [makes use] of the body of the photographed subjects, to the point of objectifying and sexualizing”, and when contextualizing his work, he fails to point out that rape was a tool for genocide, and that indigenous women still suffer from the remnants of this tool today. It is difficult to bring a critical eye to such a respected figure in the world of artistic, political and environmental activism. People are complex and therefore so are their artistic productions. In the age of social media and cancellation, it is necessary to rescue the nuance and complexity of things that exist between good and evil, between supposed right and wrong. I believe that Sebastião Salgado's work exists somewhere between the beneficial and the harmful. There have been certain positive results, not only from his work in favor of environmental protection, but also from works that mobilize people to have empathy and affection for threatened peoples and forests on the brink of destruction. However, this is not the whole story. There's a lot of important stuff left unsaid, which has counterproductive and pernicious repercussions. When we propose to have a critical look at state violence against nature and indigenous peoples, this critical look cannot be selective, because if it is, we are not advancing in the way that we urgently need to advance. Is there room for what is beautiful? There is. But not at the expense of awareness of the brutality of the reality in which we live. _______ Mirna Wabi-Sabi is a writer, editor and founder of Plataforma9.

Originally published at Abeautifulresistance.org To sign off on; phrasal verb meaning “to give one’s approval to something.” We all sign things nowadays, but not all of us get to sign off on things. The use of a signature as a way to grant approval is not the same as the more commonplace practice of signing things like “terms and conditions”. This distinction ought to me made because in identifying when a signature is not empowering or representative of consent, we can look for alternative tools of resistance against the established order which uses signatures to control and subjugate disenfranchised segments of the population. Signatures earn significance through institutions of Power, governments which establish order and have the resources to enforce this order. In any hierarchical structure, signing off on something is indicative of status, as is the ability to make someone sign an unfavorable agreement. A good example of this is our routine practice of downloading apps into our smartphones. Apple, for instance, signs off on the apps it allows on its app store, but the terms and conditions we agree to when we download them are certainly unfavorable to us as consumers. During the covid pandemic, a “privacy nutrition label” was introduced to apps in the store, supposedly simplifying access consumers have to the content of these conditions. The labels are probably a result of the GDPR, which Apple cites in its page detailing Privacy Policies, and requires not only transparency over these policies but also for this information to be presented in a format which people can easily understand. Unfortunately, these “nutrition labels” are neither effective nor accurate, exacerbating the issue of unfavorable agreements we consent to through digital signatures. Earlier in 2022, in the wake of abortion bans in the United States, women encouraged each other to remove period-tracking apps from their phones for fear of potential privacy breeches and legal backlash. This is a way of not signing, not consenting, to personal data sharing. It is also a form of general strike, provoking a sharp turn in the industry. But this is a privileged position to be in—to be able to delete something from your smartphone. Nearly a quarter of a million immigrants in the United States are tracked by ICE with the use of an app officials describe as more “humane” than ankle bracelets or incarceration. Unsurprisingly, many do not agree with this description, which is why there is an ongoing court case against the Department of Homeland Security, claiming a violation of the Freedom of Information Act and concern over the “drastic increase in the Intensive Supervision Appearance Program (ISAP)”. This program embodies how, nowadays, privacy policies of applications can quite literally become prisons. In Europe, due to the 2015 “refugee crisis”, data monitoring was considered by government institutions as a tool for predicting the “movements of migrants into Europe”. The European Space Agency pitched several EU organizations, including Frontex, on “commercially viable “disruptive smart technologies””. In a report from 2019 on this subject, the ethical and practical limitations of this practice were considered, but no guarantee is given that this tool hasn’t been or isn’t being used. Even though the report acknowledges that users of this technology practice racial profiling—which they describe as an “overfocus on African countries”—and that machine-learning reliant on unpredictable data produces unreliable results, the conclusion describes this method as a “nascent workstream”. In other words, if this deeply flawed and unethical method of handling humanitarian crises isn’t yet widespread, it surely is about to become. Agreeing to dangerous terms and conditions of applications which track movement and seek to predict future movements of people like you infringes upon freedoms of whole segments of the world population. But there are even more profound existential threats to migrants upon arrival in Europe. INTEGRATION CONTRACTS ASYLUM REQUESTS IN EUROPE ARE SIGNED OFF ON BY GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS, AND SEEKERS ARE MADE TO SIGN SEVERAL FORMS—INCLUDING “INTEGRATION CONTRACTS”. The criteria used by those with the power to sign off on these requests are kept from the segment of the public with the most stake in these immigration policies: asylum seekers. It could be said that it’s in the interest of EU countries to have asylum seekers oblivious to the inner workings of its institutions and their decision-making processes. These government branches may not want asylum seekers to have information which can help them present their case more effectively. This is exemplified in the 2014 court case YS and others, where incoherent justifications were used to deny migrants the right to access personal data, a right protected by European privacy laws. In some instances, it was claimed that the right to privacy of government staff and their line of reasoning trumps the plaintiffs’. Meanwhile, when an asylum request is approved, the migrant is required to sign contracts which, among other things, subject them to compulsory “civic training”. The French Office for Immigration and Integration (OFII) calls this the “Republican Integration Contract” (CIR), where “newly arrived foreigners” are taught “the principles [and] values [...] of the Republic, the rights and duties associated with life in France and the organization of French Society”. The granting of the immigration request comes attached to the requirement to resign certain aspects of your cultural identity. Namely, robust integration efforts are not only about inserting immigrants into the workforce, but also a “shield against radicalization”—an umbrella term for extreme cultural differences. The Netherlands has a similar program, where “knowledge of the Dutch society” is mixed in with Dutch language skills. They go even further, in requiring “voluntary” work in businesses, and requiring health insurance from companies which refuse to provide information in any language other than Dutch. I have gone through this process—twice or three times a week I “volunteered” vacuuming a video store; learned about ‘black pete’ (but not about the country’s colonial history); and had to sign up and pay for health services I couldn’t use, because workers refused to give me information in English over the phone. In Brazil, a parallel can be made with the integration efforts of Venezuelan refuges. In official reports, there is no mention of civic training and values, instead, there is mention of opportunities for certification and work. The UNHCR report from 2021 describes Venezuelan refugees in Brazil to be more likely to have completed stages of education, but they earn less and work more hours than their Brazilian counterparts. There is no compulsory integration program. What I take from this approach to dealing with migration is that people in Western countries are somewhat afraid that people from elsewhere will do to them what they did to these other parts of the world—show up uninvited and impose their customs on locals. There is an active effort to demoralize, to humiliate not just any immigrant, but those from countries the West has dominated and continues to dominate to this day. New technologies are not being developed to liberate, they are being developed in large part to extend and strengthen already-existing power structures. Considering that today it’s nearly impossible to not produce data (from the day we are born, documents and data are collected and stored about us), what can we do to disrupt data processing strategies, ensure a certain level of privacy, and allow for freedom of movement? Deleting period-tracking apps is one thing, but sometimes I think increasing data input, and decreasing its predictability can also be useful. Machine learning and algorithms cannot be effective in predicting human behavior, especially when us humans resist the efforts being put towards turning us into machines. Encouraging difference, uniqueness, can be a radical thing, because the pressure to “integrate” is more than a de-radicalization tool, it’s an effort to predict and control our behaviors, even the most intimate ones. _____ MIRNA WABI-SABI is a writer, editor and translator. She is founder and editor-in-chief of the Plataforma9 initiative, author of the bilingual pocket book Anarcho-Transcreation, and site editor of Gods and Radicals.

“Today’s social science is like the production apparatus of modern society: everyone is within it and uses it, but only the bosses draw the profits. You cannot smash it apart – we are told – without pitching mankind back into barbarism. As a first objection, we might ask who said that human civilisation is indeed capital’s dearest concern. And modern workers know of very different ways of defeating capital, beyond the prehistoric cry, ‘Let’s break the machines!’ In short, big industry and its science are not the prize for whoever wins the class struggle. They are the battlefield itself. And so long as the enemy occupies that field, we must spray it with bullets, without crying over the roses that get destroyed along the way.” — Tronti, M. (2019) Workers and capital, Verso Books: London, p.20. Utopiapress.co.uk DIY zines and the capitalist division of labor DIY zines are not utopic objects made 100% by hand. These publications can be created at home, without industrial grade machinery. Which means, they don’t set out to be identical, profitable, or printed and distributed on a corporate scale. In other words, they are not books you think will sell, they are the book you want to read. On Capitalism Industrialized mass production is a tool for maximum profit within an expanding capitalist system, therefore, its antithesis would be the self-production of goods. To do-it-yourself is an art form as well as a political statement, because, in late capitalism, it is impossible to live 100% outside this current industrial system. Therefore, the conversation about this system happens as an abstract representation, provocation, and at best — praxis. In this sense, the DIY zine is the antithesis of the mass-produced bestseller book. Books and publications may depend on a capitalist production, but creating them step by step can help us demystify the process of production in order to make it more comprehensive and accessible. The issue of division of labor was discussed in print, and about print, throughout much of the 19th century, and is still a relevant discussion today. In the book What is Art, Tolstoy exclaims that “the laborers produce food for themselves and also food that the cultured class accept and consume, but that the artists seem too often to produce their spiritual food for the cultured only — at any rate that a singularly small share seems to reach the country laborers who work to supply the bodily food!” (1897). This anti-capitalist approach towards art and publishing through doing away with borders between classes and their labor is further highlighted by Lucy Parsons, who invites her readers to “make of [the paper] what [they] choose” (Salutation, 1905), and that freedom will only come to be when “labor is no longer for sale” (What Freedom Means, 1905). In removing the distinction between the producing and the authoring, we remove (to the best of our abilities) the capitalist division of labor. Therefore, the artistic anarchist publication is a legacy, a valuable resource passed on through generations, for approaching persistent global socioeconomic issues. On DIY DIY culture, as a facet of the punk movement, addressed, specifically, the question of massive mainstream consumption and how it led to a pervasive form of homogenization of human expression. Punk, from its inception, was at the intersection of music, aesthetics, and politics — being anti the establishment which permeated significant realms of the human experience. It’s a misconception “that punk is essentially a white (or Anglo) Do-it-Yourself participatory subculture” (Ensminger in “Coloring Between the Lines of Punk and Hardcore: From Absence to Black Punk Power”, 2010). Race and class were at the root of punk rock, which was moved by an angered white working class in direct contact with black people and black culture in the US and the UK. And the only reason why there were marginalized black people in these places where punk sprung up was because of an African Diaspora induced by colonialism. Punk is, as is DIY culture and its publishing, an intersectional experience. Throughout history and throughout the globe, be it 1880s Russia in the eyes of Tolstoy or 1980s UK in the eyes of the Clash, marginalized communities have needed art to have their voices heard. Art as aesthetics, music or literature has to always be subversive in nature. And we need to subvert the status quo now more than ever. _____ Mirna Wabi-Sabi

Originally published at Abeautifulresistance.org To Instrumentalize [Verb]: to give instruments or conditions for something to happen. Instrumental [Noun]: which serves as an instrument; which helps the action. There has been another massacre in a Brazilian favela. Nearly 20 people were killed in a shoot-out between the military police and alleged drug traffickers in a neighborhood of Rio de Janeiro called Alemão Complex. A recent report by the federal university of Niterói (UFF), financed by a German political foundation called Heinrich Böll, states that between 2007 and 2021, “17,929 operations were carried out by police in Rio de Janeiro. Of this total, 593 police operations resulted in massacres, totaling 2374 deaths.” These deaths are not inevitable, which is why the report also proposes a solution—to further develop a “democratic regime”, in order to legally limit the actions of law enforcement. This solution, however, fails to consider that, though avoidable, these casualties are not unintended, and are precisely through the democratic system that these extermination policies and impunity schemes have been put in place. Since the 60s, Brazil has lived in a dichotomy between Military Dictatorship and Democracy. We went from a right-wing US-backed regime to a charismatic leftist party leader of a working-class background, who was oppressed by that very dictatorial regime. Now, to the astonishment of those who subscribed to this binary political approach, it was the democratic system which gave voice to and elected supporters of the dictatorship. Nowadays, believing a “stronger” democracy is the solution to police violence is like believing taller buildings is the solution to rising sea levels. Do we really want to grow a structure without addressing the foundational issues of racism, classism, and blatant disregard for human life when it doesn’t benefit capitalism? The inefficiencies of Democracy have been discussed since its inception in Ancient Greece. And it would also be safe to say that the philosophical exercise around “democracy” has been a Western endeavor. One of my favorite quotes about this is, "the safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato" (Alfred North Whitehead in Process and Reality). These endless footnotes are an enduring effort to put European values, such as Democracy, at the forefront of any reading of the human condition. In academia, to speak of philosophy is really to refer to a specific group of thinkers, from a specific era—white men from the 19th century. Of the demographic of thinkers which are best equipped to theorize about the sociopolitical conditions favela residents are subjected to, these 19-century-European men are towards the bottom of the list. And the reality is that the demographic which is at the top of this list is exactly the one ending up in body-bags, victim to police violence. This is not by coincidence. Marielle Franco, a queer black woman from a favela in Rio de Janeiro, was a political theorist active in government. She was assassinated in 2018. Her college thesis at the federal university of Niterói (UFF) was about police violence in favelas and how their operations don’t work. The solution presented under the chapter “Popular organization and possible resistances” includes the word “instrumentalization”. Specifically, to render favela residents instrumental. According to Franco, the solution to combatting police violence in the favelas lies in the strengthening of the consciousness that “the favela must be respected” by the government and its “security agents”. Not the consciousness of these agents and government officials, though—the consciousness of the residents. It’s not in the best interest of those in power (government and those financing it) to have marginalized peoples (favela residents) becoming instrumental in society by pursuing their own aims and influencing policy. The established order, which in Brazil today is some type of Democracy, is better off massacring rather than instrumentalizing the favela. It costs less to kill than to restructure society to eradicate misery, poverty, racism, and exploitation. The only ‘justification’ for this slaughter is that these people ‘deserved’ to die because they were either criminals or at the wrong place at the wrong time. Obviously, that’s unacceptable. One of the most unacceptable things about Democracy, though, is when it serves as a means for an instrumentalized segment of the population to pursue the extermination of ‘the other’. The overrepresented use their power to eradicate the underrepresented, igniting a vicious democratic cycle where in each election the opposition gets smaller and is buried deeper. And one thing is for sure, the end of the Brazilian military dictatorship did not mean the end of militarization of Brazilian society. This is because, according to Marielle Franco, militarization is representative of how making money is still more important than protecting human lives. “The fight for demilitarization of society, of the State […] became a priority for those who dream of a world where life is above profit.” (UPP, page 135, n-1 edition, 2018). The 2022 report on police massacres argues that the “volume and a way of carrying out slaughters points to a horizon contrary to democratization.” However, nothing about Democracy “points towards a horizon opposite” to militarization. In fact, militarization has been carried out by the United States in the name “Democracy” for nearly a century. Could it be that Democracy is just a new word for the reign of capitalist profit? It isn’t only in the public security sector that vestiges of the Military Dictatorship can be seen. For as long as capitalist values endure in society, so will the need for militarization—to carry out the extermination of an ‘unprofitable’ segment of the population. Moreover, so will these values be represented by the ballot. Profit as a general concept wouldn’t have to be demonized if it didn’t so often come at the expense of people’s lives, and I’m not convinced Democratic elections are equipped or designed to prevent this from happening. More importantly, will it be through the vote that we can guarantee dignity to everyone? Will there be one politician who will do what needs to be done to guarantee every person has a roof over their head, food in their bellies, and the strengthened consciousness to become “instrumental” in society? When that happens, the role of the politician will be utterly obsolete. TRIGGER WARNING: THE IMAGES BELOW MAY DEPICT DEAD BODIES. Photos by Fabio Teixeira. July 21st, Alemão Complex, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. ______ Written by Mirna Wabi-Sabi

Originally published at A Beautiful Resistance in English, at Le Monde Diplomatique Brasil in Portuguese. Roger Waters' new tour "This Is Not A Drill", which began in Pittsburgh July 6th, doesn't have a message — it's a conversation. The show is Waters' invitation to sit down, have a drink, and talk about something f*cking real: love, life, despair and how people in power are destroying humanity. Power, here, is not discussed in terms of political parties, in fact, U.S. Democrats are not spared from scrutiny, super-power world leaders are all painted in the same shade as war criminals. For an artist with a half-a-century long career, Waters shows he can keep up with the ever-changing landscape of entertainment and technology, while being overtly uninterested in using this ability to follow trends. He forges his own path musically, visually and politically — unapologetically — as he has done since the 60s. This authentic path is not an imposition or a lecture. Instead, he asks the audience to engage in serious reflection and debate about unavoidable threats to the human race and human dignity. As friends often disagree, the bond between the artist and the audience is not about holding the same views, but about sharing profound feelings, especially in the face of despair. If you're unwilling to have a conversation about the tragedy humankind has been submitted to, and the individuals and institutions responsible for it, don't show up. Having said that, the overt political opinion does not exclude audience members with different views. If anything, it's inclusive of everyone, and not just Pink Floyd fans. Even if you have never listened to Pink Floyd (I know it's hard to imagine that, but it's possible), or know nothing about them, here is an opportunity for an introduction. The show embraces and celebrates people of all races, ethnicities, gender and sexual identities, aside from fiercely advocating for every marginalized group's right to live and thrive. Because of this balance between nostalgia and pressing contemporary issues, this performance speaks to at least three generations, from young adults to their parents and grandparents. The social criticism is not subtle when it addresses issues of colonialism, police violence, sanctions, social media, nationalism, racism, wealth disparity, the patriarchy, and so on. But as a critic, Roger does more than tear down — he seeks to build community, unity, and respect for human life in all its diversity. Though one person here and there may be seen frowning at the "Reproductive Rights" display, you can be sure to see them singing their hearts out to Eclipse a few minutes later. It's not news that Waters' politics have rubbed plenty of people the wrong way, he knows that and addresses it head on. Those who think Roger's lack of support for Israel means he is antisemitic, for instance, will see that this show not only doubles down on his pro-Palestinian position, but also shows how his stance is nothing but radically hostile towards Fascism. If you are open to this conversation, it becomes clear that there is agreement over how combatting Fascism is imperative, and so is understanding how this ideology manifests itself then and now. Today, who holds the power and is massacring, surveilling and demoralizing innocent people? If you allow yourself to join this conversation with him, you will see that his unyielding opinion on this question is: The U.S. Army, the police, the politicians in charge of them, and the ultra-wealthy who are in charge of these politicians. In an attempt to avoid any more spoilers, the visuals and the unique stage set-up can only be described as spectacular, and new wowing features are introduced continuously throughout the concert, keeping thousands each night on the edge of their seats. The guitar solos and back-up singer singalongs are bound to gratify any die-hard Pink Floyd fan. While the dynamic ebbs and flows of the set list, not to mention the fantastic saxophone solos, are bound to keep any music enthusiast moving. Above all, Roger Waters' iconic presence on stage is both fierce and warm. He's personal and heartfelt, but stern and authentic. Prepare for both extremes of affection and well-deserved f*ck offs, but most importantly, for his wonderfully familiar voice rocking to some of your all-time favorite songs. _______ Written by Mirna Wabi-Sabi and photographed by Kate Izor.

Do you remember the first time you signed a document? I ask when, not if, because chances are you have signed something, and others have signed something about you. A signed birth certificate, for instance, is likely a person’s 1st legal document, making all future identification documents possible — passports, social security numbers, employment and health care contracts, etc. The signature is so commonplace that we might take it for granted or believe it has always existed, but it hasn’t. Historically, signatures and official seals belonged to a privileged ruling class. It wasn’t until the 1600s that handwritten signatures became widespread, not coincidently at a time when indigenous peoples were being coerced into signing treaties that gave away their land. The Government and its laws not only instate but require of all people a judicial practice of signatures as “biomarkers”. Historically, laws regarding signatures date back to the oldest recorded piece of legal text, the Babylonian Code of Hammurabi, from 17th century BC. “If any one give another silver, gold, or anything else to keep, he shall show everything to some witness, draw up a contract, and then hand it over for safe keeping” (Source). Essentially, the principle of validating contracts was about safeguarding the transfer of wealth, and this witness validation became what we today call notaries. This code directly influenced the Old Testament, Moses’ tablets of stone, and all laws developed within Christendom. What is set in stone, however, isn’t necessarily effective or applicable. Throughout colonization, the inclusion of non-Christians into this framework is in itself telling of the unequal dynamic between colonizer and colonized, not to mention what the treaties resulting from this framework entailed. These treaties were not applicable to the context of land distribution of indigenous peoples, and they were not effective because they did not prevent fraud, social injustice or unrest. It would be fair to say that the US American occupation of indigenous American land was war-like, and called for a judicial system which — as it guaranteed “Liberty” to some, it guaranteed the denial of liberty to others. The so-called “Grand Rush for Indian Territory” counted on the signatures of indigenous American leaders on treaties forged under contentious circumstances. It granted settlers what it denied natives, through a system not only foreign to natives, but manufactured to displace and segregate them. Indigenous peoples did not have signatures as such, and up to that point it was also unusual for the common citizen to have one. Which is why so many of the signatures in these treaties are scribbles, drawings or x-marks. “As everyone knows, treaties were made under conditions that were generally unfavorable to Indians, and as a result they were often accompanied by protest. Treaties led to dramatic changes in the Indian world: loss of land and political autonomy, assent to assimilation polices […]” (Scott Richard Lyons in X-Marks: Native Signatures of Assent (2010), University of Minnesota Press, pp. 1) Legally, a signature is invalidated if it happened under duress. The Latin term vi coactus, when placed next to a signature, shows that there was coercion in the process. Alongside the practice of signing, the Latin signifier was also foreign to natives. Defining duress legally in the context of the west coast of North America in the 17th century, however, requires a decolonial lens. Not only many treaties were signed in the context of armed conflict or economic coercion, communities were often not given what they were promised in return: sovereignty over their new territories. For that, there is also a Latin term (first documented in 1603) — nudum pactum, when a contract is unenforceable and revokable because it lacks something of value promised in exchange. Descriptions of colony/colonizer relations are rarely capable of avoiding the issue of imbalance of power. However, this imbalance is not always understood as unfair, or as a source of duress for the so-called weaker party. Recent international law analyses still describe the legal process of independence from colonizers in patronizing tones, as is the case in this passage from an article published in the Questions of International Law journal in 2019: "The world of sovereign states could be compared to the adult world, whereas the world of decolonization could be understood as the world of child-parent relations. […] Not only is the colonial country a weaker party in any agreement with the administering power on a factual basis, it is also formally (legally) unequal. Article 73 of the UN Charter recognizes its vulnerable position and offers special protection until the colonial country achieves ‘adulthood’ – ie a full measure of self-government either by becoming independent or freely associating or integrating with an independent state". (Demsar et al.) A centuries long attempt to justify the imbalance of power between colony and colonizer is tied to the enduring sentiments that there is such a thing as the categories 1st and 3rd worlds or developed and underdeveloped countries. The rationale behind acknowledging this inequality but not its unjust or distressing quality is possibly the single most effective tool in guaranteeing the longevity of a colonial paradigm. Sylvia Wynter (2003) describes this rationale as “the ongoing imperative of securing the well-being of our present ethnoclass (i.e., Western bourgeois) conception of the human, Man, which overrepresents itself as if it were the human itself.” This conception of the human has been materialized in the deliberate instating of signatures as biomarkers and the documents they validate as proof of personhood. In the digitalized era, proof of personhood (PoP) has taken a specific meaning relating to fake online identities. Alongside the conceptualization of PoP, the signature has also taken a new meaning through private keys, encryption and IP-addresses. This poses a silent threat to those who, for instance, have their mail-in ballots rejected because of mismatched signatures, or resist the push towards being ultra-connected through accepting all terms and conditions without reading. In Brazil, personhood being progressively more tied to the digital sphere poses a threat to indigenous people in particular. Not because indigenous peoples don’t have or want access to technology per se, but because there is a persistent undercurrent of colonial thought which strips natives of their identity if they strive for or are forced to engage with any tool perceived as of Western modernity. It’s the familiar (trigger warning: racist language) “you can’t be a real indian if you have phone” or “if you want your land back, you have to go live naked in the forest.” The colonial weapons used by settlers were not only firearms and disease. Epistemological assaults were even more commonplace, and persist to this day. Law as an epistemological and religious tool, and specifically the use of signatures in the legal process, are not any less pervasive today and victimize a much wider range of marginalized populations, such as the poor and diasporic. Signatures as proof of personhood is an existential threat, both philosophically and materially, to those furthest away from the status of power, wealth and whiteness. We may not be able to refrain from the practice of signatures, but we can at least be critical of the political paradigm which makes this practice unavoidable. In doing so, we are less likely to fall for the lies often told about the democratic and just nature of the Rule of Law. Originally published at abeautifulresistance.org _______ MIRNA WABI-SABI is a writer, editor and translator. She is founder and editor-in-chief of the Plataforma9 initiative, author of the bilingual pocket book Anarcho-Transcreation, and site editor of Gods and Radicals.