By LEONARDO SACRAMENTO*
Notes on the terrorist attack in Saudades, Santa Catarina
In 2019, after the terrorist attack on a school in Suzano, I was invited to the Federal Institute of Education, Science and Technology of São Paulo, Sertãozinho campus, where I work as a pedagogue, to speak about what the school could do to prevent an eventual attack . At the time, teachers and principals were understandably concerned.
I mentioned that, from the few existing studies, mainly in the USA, attacks on schools have little relation with the well-known bullying. That, in the understanding of the North American academy, there is a consensus of some years that link attacks to access to weapons, deep web and terrorist supremacist groups. Such studies and the resurgence of attacks led to a reformulation of US domestic policy, causing some investigative and repressive institutions in that country to classify these acts as “domestic terrorism” or “supremacist terrorism”.
I addressed that in all cases they are men, generally anti-feminists and even anti-women (incels, or voluntary celibates), disgusted by the breach of expectations between what they promised (consumption) and reality (precarious work). They blame lesbianism for the lack of women in their lives. Hence the lesbophobia mixed with misogyny. They blame blacks and immigrants for the lack of work, or for worse work than the work their parents had. That's why they are supremacists. I talked about the incredible coincidence that Suzano's terrorists were men and white and those attacked were mostly women and black – one even walked to the hospital with an ax in his body.
Part of the professors disagreed, despite the North American academic consensus. He sought to psychologize terrorists. I am not opposed to understanding them using this epistemology, on the contrary, but the psychologization disconnected from other epistemologies (sociology, economics, anthropology and the like) for these cases comes from a middle class that perceives that it is a type of crime closer to her, including among practitioners, which makes her have more alterity with the terrorist, trying to understand him under the logic of the “outbreak”, even if the planning for the attack is demonstrated. In a sense, segments of our society psychologize and pathologize these terrorist attacks because they find it perfectly feasible to attack the other who mistreated them; because, in the depths of their souls, they already thought about it when they were the target of personal attacks in their youth. You've felt this anger and thought about reacting. Sometimes they reacted, in a controlled way, in a fight at the school gate. In others, no.
There are numerous films that work with this expectation, such as John Wick (revenge for the death of a dog given by his deceased wife) and the new nobory (revenge of a family head for not reacting to a robbery). If you go back to your memory, you'll realize that revenge action movies work with a fair reaction, or treated as fair. In the case of both films, it was just a dog and the robbery did not produce any injuries or deaths – but it was mocked by neighbors and police for not having reacted. There are other films that criticize this expectation, such as Taxi Driver, even relating it to the conservative and reactionary camp. Some films, with crucial mistakes (or successes), like the change of the main character from Mathias to Capitão Nascimento in Tropa de Elite, can easily turn into a fascist play, to the delight of part of the most reactionary middle class.
Of course, this type of attack, with the supposed motivation of reaction, causes sectors of the middle class to have more otherness than with a young person from the periphery who stole a shoe, because, generally, they got the shoe when they wanted it. There is a hierarchy of otherness. Well, the fact is that the activity at the Federal Institute even had classes on how to defend against alleged attacks. I left.
Two weeks after the Suzano attack, there was an attack on the Federal Institute of Paraná, on the Palmas campus, through Operation On the edge,[1] of the Civil Police.[2] Five days later there was another Federal Police operation at the Farroupilha Federal Institute,[3] identifying a group of students planning an attack against students and teachers. But the month of March 2019, according to the psychologizing conception, would have been just a month with a high rate of bullying. Coincidences (sic). In 2017, there was an attack on a day care center by a Christian fundamentalist in Janaúba, Minas Gerais. Yeah, it's not just for Muslims. In fact, today there are more supremacist and Christian terrorists imprisoned in the West than Muslims, even with the “War on Terror” and Guantánamo Bay. Yes, my good Christian friend, America turned the switch a while ago. They may even have the rhetoric of external war, because it is an imperialist country, with bases and actions on the globe, but they realized that there is an internal enemy, as shown in the invasion of the Capitol. By the way, Trump's defense of the running over of anti-fascists in Charlottesville (Virginia, USA) by a supremacist, killing a woman, was a common point between the republican and the supremacist groups in the forums of the deep web.
As soon as the attack in Saudades took place, the media, which has a similar position with part of the teachers of the aforementioned activity, showed an alleged relationship between attacks and bullying. The Jornal Nacional in the edition of May 05, 2021 called “the young man” an “aggressor”. A wonder. A man is bullied and kills babies. What's the relationship? Why didn't he kill the alleged bullies at his school? How strong would the bullying be to induce him to kill babies? I don't know. The logic is: if you've been bullied, you can do anything, without any rational parameter, because humans, especially if they're white, can supposedly lose control and do things without rationality. Rich people don't steal, they're kleptomaniacs; after all, what motivation would a rich person have to steal? Realize that this speech is not universal, but only for those crimes that a segment of society has otherness. For those who do not have otherness, there is jail, the police and “a good bandit is a dead bandit”.
That year, Guilherme Alves Costa killed a girl gamer. She planned the crime for two weeks and wrote a book, which runs in the deep web. In an email message he said: “I keep thinking about how much I hate humanity. Honestly, these last few years I've been shaking with my girlfriend Eduarda, she didn't understand me, I got a strong hatred for women in these last years of my life, all this drama they go through, all this melancholy, I feel disgust and hate for it, I want to stay away, be a safe and smart man”. He later claimed that Crazychan, an anonymous forum (deep web), helped him: “I made friends there, my friends supported me, a great leader, Lucy, supported me, showed me the path I should follow, I worked until I bought my 9mm”.[4] Any news on Lucy's arrest?
In safe Canada, in March of this year, a terrorist ran over a group of people with a van and killed ten. Shortly before the attack, he wrote on Facebook: "The incel rebellion has begun". The reference is to the American Elliot Rodger, who carried out a terrorist attack in 2014. The Canadian's lawyer claimed “autism”. The judge did not accept it, with strong criticism from organizations and entities in defense of people with the autistic spectrum. Canada is hotter than Brazil.
Is it plausible to kill babies in deep web? I guarantee it is. There are eugenicists, supremacists, counterintelligence activities, induction of attacks, everything. Today, there are reports of anonymous forums claiming the attack on teachers and babies, one even referring to Kipper as "our newest national hero". The forum hopes "that he reaches paradise", because "Death his mentor instructed him the right path".[5] It may be mere vindication after the terrorist attack. Maybe not…
Even if it is mere opportunism, attacks like the one at the day care center serve to bring together misogynistic and supremacist young people in deep web. And they are serving. The symbol of ok (White Power) of Bolsonaro's adviser in Senate activity, reproducing the symbol made by the terrorist responsible for the attack on a mosque in New Zealand, transmitted as if it were a video game, serves or ends up serve the same purpose, implying that the groups are represented in the federal government (and they are).
But the media is going the way it always has. The Police too (and there is no way to charge, as it is an investigative police force in a small town where there are no robberies and thefts, according to the delegate himself). Which path does the country continue to follow? The path from refutation to the lecture I gave. It was bullying, with some pathology and a hint of schizophrenia. The relationship between babies and preschool teachers and terrorist bullying will probably remain the kind of mystery that society is keen not to unravel.
*Leonardo Sacramento is a doctor of education. President of the Association of Teaching Professionals of Ribeirão Preto (APROFERP) and author of the book The mercantile university: a study on the public university and private capital (Appris publisher).
Notes
[1] Available in http://www.folhadelondrina.com.br/geral/policia-civil-evita-possivel-atentado-contra-ifpr-de-palmas-2937009e.html.
[2] Available in www.jornaldebeltrao.com.br/notícia/284417/policia-deflagra-operacao-contra-atentado-ao-ifpr.
[3] Available in http://www.iffarroupilhaead.edu.br/noticias-sau/12769-agentes-da-pol%C3ADcia-federal-visitam-o-campus-para-apurar-%20amea%C3%7as-de-%20atentado.
[4] Available in http://www.google.com/amp/s/noticias.r7.com/sao-paulo/em-mensagem-gamer-que-matou-jovem-cita-odio-a-mulheres-e-lider-25022021%3famp.
[5] Available in: https://www.pragmatismopolitico.com.br/2021/05/professora-e-mails-atentado-sc-somos-soldados-matar-morrer.html.
