Rethoric: A live confrontation
The rain will spoil the electoral posters stuck in the avenues of this city.
It is an anticipated joy what these faces reflect, so sure of themselves in the portrait. Diluted in water, one can think of the fragility of the political show. Just as the classic paintings of the film “Rome” (Fellini, 1972) faded in time, they will not last either. The candidates separated from each other by a few meters seem silent, so calm and civilized, anyone would say that they are truly candidates for the presidency of a country.
The debate lacked a disinterested attitude towards politics, a renunciation of individual power at the service of the common good. But above all it lacked a consensus among the candidates, to give an example of union, instead of shame in some cases. It’s the show, baby.
The wet paper posters became visceral and anxious people, some did not accept different points of view to theirs or a “no” for an answer.
Teaching in a children’s class, many things can be learned. That boy who looks enraged and angry hides a huge insecurity and this attitude in an adult, behind an uniform suit and tie, it is a disguise that camouflages another discomfort. Maybe they do not feel support from their own teams and take advantage of the television space to play their role.
Working in politics is a matter of social ability to communicate, negotiate and collaborate with other people. Attack as a discourse is an absurd ideological position.
In some regions of Spain, villages will surely vote for the program that promises to stop the rural abandonment, as if it were possible to carry it out in only one term.
During the French elections that pitted Macron and Le Pen, many people only understood Le Pen’s simple and populist discourse. The vote for Macron attracted only those who had a liberal economic situation. In the TVE debate it was mentioned the abandonment and lack of administrative attention to the rural areas. Populist ideas or authentic intentions to help?
Here it’s still raining. The electoral posters have already been unstock. If each candidate chose their identity through design, some people played to be an actor in action movies.
The same rain that falls today in Spain appeared in France on the eve of those elections where social peace was at stake. “What will happen to our students if Le Pen finally wins? It is the message of hatred. It can divide France”, some feared. I remember seeing a recording about the candidate Jean Lassalle. He compared himself to General de Gaulle. The French journalist asked him about his favorite books. “The work of Plato. My parents had not much money during my childhood, but they bought me all of Plato’s work”. The next day when we learned about the results, the Spanish press devoted mostly space to the private life of Macron and his wife. In the lyceum there was a post-election cafe. That room seemed a stage of Eric Rohmer. But it was real. The new generations were asked to be more demanding with their candidates. “Treat them as if they were candidates for a job interview. Have prepared the qualities that your ideal president should have and do not show mercy, if they do not gather them, you leave them out”.
Students can contribute better than anyone to politics, this is also understood by the Danish Youth Council, which organized school elections this year across the country, a project which proposed to involve young people to experience politics as something real, tangible. The Danish educational plans are designed to a large extent in the Folketing, the Parliament. For example, the freedom to build their history, to be architects of their destiny. But this individual freedom is changing since the creation of the Danish citizenship test, in favor of a mentality that unifies the culture and national identity, in an official sense.
The Spanish question, like that of any European country, should try to solve together the challenges of tomorrow. The value of politics belongs to the whole society. There are too many people who believe that their voice is worthless.
If we consider as winner the candidate who most insults the other in a television debate, then something goes a little bit, just slightly wrong. It is not a question of organizing political elections in schools as a democratic exercise, but rather of sending some of our candidates back to school.
Rain has stopped.
