By SANDRA BITENCOURT*
José Luiz Datena's chair-throwing of Pablo Marçal, in the midst of the debate in Brazil's largest metropolis, shows our vocation for tragicomic farce
In this year that has seen the highest number of elections around the world — more than 40 national elections in countries that account for more than 40% of the world's population — we have also witnessed scenes of political violence, sometimes frightening and fatal, sometimes pathetic, but intolerable in the exercise of democracy.
The dispute of ideas has not always characterized political disputes. Debates, throughout time, have ended up leading to clashes, wars or duels. Let us take the example of the country that claims to embody the greatest democracy in the world and acts as sheriff in the four corners of other people's democracies: the United States.
Last week we saw a crude and perverse former president resort to the unfounded rumor that Haitian immigrants eat dogs and cats in order to avoid being badly beaten by a woman in the most watched television debate in the United States. Note that Donald Trump may have been inspired by Porto Alegre, a capital whose leader has been part of the world's history of infamy for some time, since in the last election Manuela d'Ávila was accused of the same nonsense.
In the early 1806th century, in XNUMX, the future president of the United States, Andrew Jackson, got into a duel with Charles Dickinson. It all started with an exchange of insults between the gentlemen. Charles Dickinson, touching on Andrew Jackson's weak point, called his wife a bigamist, because Andrew Jackson had married her while she was still officially married to her first husband, making Andrew Jackson extremely nervous. As a result, he summoned him to a pistol duel.
Since such duels were forbidden in the city, the two went to Logan, Kentucky, and fought. The offended husband fired the first shot at Charles Dickinson. He was hit in the chest, but remained standing. So he took careful aim and pulled the trigger, hitting Charles Dickinson square in the chest, who died a few hours later. Andrew Jackson survived and became president. Violence rewarded.
More than two centuries later, here in the tropics, violence is less dramatic, but no less harmful to democracy.
José Luiz Datena's chair-throwing of Pablo Marçal, in the midst of a debate in Brazil's largest metropolis, shows our penchant for tragicomic farce. Everything indicates that Pablo Marçal's barrage of insults and José Luiz Datena's reaction have more to do with calculation than spontaneous action. And in this sense, I would like to contribute with a point of view.
At first we have two characters from outside politics, or “outsiders”, fiercely competing for the position of anti-system representative, since the perception of discredit, fatigue and resentment towards politics can be clearly perceived in the electorate. The fact is that these are not two anti-system candidates, but people policies that embody two systems that are in conflict and measuring strength.
José Luiz Datena is the representative of the traditional media system. A system that has always acted as a player, although it only pretends to narrate the game. Until recently, this system was the absolute owner of the spotlight and the keys to the showcase. It had the exclusive power to shape opinion, schedule debate, manipulate perceptions, exacerbate feelings, and adjust trends. It is no coincidence that there are countless examples of the use of TV and radio as a political springboard, even though the transfer of audience to votes has never been automatic.
Populist police programs, with a high level of simplification and violence, have become a trend and created symbioses that, although illegal in many aspects, have achieved extraordinary results. In 2018, the year of the democratic catastrophe in the country with the election of a convicted torturer to the highest office in the Republic, no less than 23 reporters and/or presenters of police programs, in 10 states, ran in that election, according to a survey by the website Speakers.
In the repertoire, ineffective solutions for public safety, authoritarian stance and violent language. It turns out that this system based on a media business model mainstream is in crisis as a dominant model. On its heels is a new media ecology, with the capacity for viralization, total mediatization of life and personalization of messages and characters.
There is another system in operation, more authoritarian, less transparent and that feeds on violence. Online messaging platforms, channels and applications have simply changed the way of doing politics, requiring a new grammar, a set of references, niches and meanings that are not part of the domain of political discourse. This new system is still without regulation, without ethos, but with audience and money, everything is possible.
Below-the-belt hits become memes and cuts. The notoriety is frighteningly fast and widespread. We have, therefore, a phenomenon that seems to swallow up the other system, with the capacity to influence schools of young people from the outskirts, here, in France, in Argentina, in Indonesia, in India and everywhere. These influencers are not only in the political game, so the effects of digital communication are more overwhelming and are not achieved simply by opening an Instagram profile.
Influencers who promise mental reprogramming, inspire businesses, teach entrepreneurs how to do their own make-up, how to dress, how to play, how to date and have fun, how to believe in God and prosperity, are part of the world of life all the time. They come up with facial harmonization and DIY ideology. They speak in the name of God and the market or, better yet, all of them together. They sell a way of life and when they associate this with politics, political participation and action are transformed. How can we debate in these terms?
The interesting thing is that journalism analysts only look at half of the phenomenon, concluding that discredited politics is what gives vent to these adventurers. When in fact all the most stable institutions are under suspicion, starting with the media itself. José Luiz Datena's system, the mass media, journalism (whether the most serious or the most populist) are all experiencing the same credibility crisis.
The brutal reality produced by accumulation and consumption, which have decomposed into fatigue and chaos, allows citizens to question institutions and centers of power in a violent, resentful and simplistic way. Before, they had no way of making their demands, feelings and disappointments public. Today, they identify with particularities and local scenarios that encourage them to resort to barbarism. Thus, they are free to worship those who were “screwed over” but succeeded in life, even if dishonestly.
Regarding the debates, I used the hypothesis raised in a recent publication by Nucop, in which I participated as one of the authors, under the guidance of Maria Helena Weber, in the text “Political dramaturgy and dispute of truths between Lula and Bolsonaro in the televised debates of the second round of 2022”. The hypothesis suggested by the researchers is that the televised electoral debate is the democratic synthesis of the elections and allows the voter to establish a closer relationship with the candidates and evaluate their projects and speeches.
However, the authors suggest, after exhaustive analysis, that there is a paradox. “Candidates adopt characters that may qualify them for office through rhetorical exercises that may contribute to the disqualification of politics and democracy, to the extent that they value political polarization and disobey the principles of public debate by reducing arguments to opinions, transforming the adversary into an enemy, not prioritizing issues of public interest and governance, bluffing and prevaricating about the truth and reality. In short, televised electoral debates can both clarify and confuse the discernment of undecided voters.”
Looking at this passage and remembering the regrettable scenes of two debased figures, it seems to me that we were visionaries, although it did not occur to us that a chair would fly in the middle of the discussion.
* Sandra Bitencourt is a journalist, PhD in communication and information from UFRGS, director of communication at Instituto Novos Paradigmas (INP).
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