🛼✨The Nexialist #0093

Lula wins | left and right | tribal traps & how to argue | why you are lonely | love, hatred, danger | you are beautiful | tocar você | no more regrets | seasonal change | cultural production

Nov 03, 2022

welcome to another collection of very real (and sometimes serious) digital amusements, The Nexialist

hello, world! i hope this e-mail finds you thrilled (?) post-Halloween and post-tension of Brazilian elections. i know that for me, it feels like there’s one less big worry looming over my head (though i know it is just a first step.) this week i brought for you my favorite new emoji, which i never knew existed 🛼, some purposeful entertainment, actionable materials and other random things. grab yourself a cup of tea and enjoy this newsletter like a fresh croissant 🥐🤤

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🇧🇷Lula wins

just an update from the tension I and a lot of other people had been feeling for the past months: it’s a relief that Lula won the Brazilian elections. on the other side, it is disturbing how close it was: he got 50.9% of the votes. just to show how divided my country is. we are celebrating and we also have to keep in mind that this is just a first step toward a better future. hopefully the worst has already passed. (i love how articulate The Economist’s correspondent Sarah Maslin is in this video.)

🌐left and right

i tried not to get myself in a lot of discussions these past months, but while looking for some arguments in family discussions in whatsapp, i came across this neat infographic that sums up left and right values/examples. of course, we know things aren’t clear-cut like that in reality, and in some things don’t make sense. but still, i found it quite interesting.

🗣️tribal traps & how to argue

if you’re like me, you avoid conflict at all costs. and you might have noticed that is not good for you. i have a theory that because my parents didn’t have conflict at home, i was not prepared to deal with it as an adult. so these three tips from Dan Shapiro, the head of Harvard’s International Negotiation program, come quite handy for me.

Americans are increasingly falling into the “tribal trap,” according to Dan Shapiro, a former American diplomat and author of “Negotiating the Nonnegotiable: How to Resolve Your Most Emotionally Charged Conflicts.” The tribal trap often centers on politics.
Those ensnared in it will do anything they can to shut down the other side in an effort to prove that their side is right, just, and the only way forward. But from abortion to immigration, the problem is often not what we’re arguing about, it’s how.
So, how can we have more productive conversations? In this Big Think interview, Shapiro uses his negotiating expertise to outline several strategies to escape the tribal trap and communicate effectively, including understanding the core values of the other side, listening intently to what they’re saying, conveying that you understand what they’re saying, and finding common ground.

👤why you are lonely and how to make friends

i love these animations from kurzgesagt because they usually talk about the very subjects of the zeitgeist. if you feel lonely, remember that you’re not alone. there is a real loneliness pandemic pandemic going on and many factors on how we have been living influence in that. i like how they give some actionable insights to try.

Why we don’t have enough friends: the main reason for a lack of friendships is the trite fact that most people do not prioritize friendships nearly enough. they don’t realize until it is too late, that retaining friendships demands regular energy and attention. although they are so important for happiness, friends often take a backseat to other life decisions. Work, commuting, romance or kids take up so much time and energy that it is so much easier to crash on your couch and lose yourself in mindless activities. Especially as an adult, going for a bike ride, getting dinner or visiting a hobby store takes much more mental effort and commitment than it did after school, when time ran slower and energy and curiosity were abundant.

📱love, hatred, danger

angèle always makes cute videos, and this time she is talking about our phones and how we relate to it: as if it were our best friend, all the time with it, depending on it for a lot of things. “all of that in one object.” gladly, you can put the subtitles in English, French or Spanish.

There’s all of that in one object
I listen to voice notes at double speed
But when I record them, it lasts 10 minutes
I don’t have that much to say
I think I just want people to listen to me
I wonder how people used to do it
To meet up (I mean, that’s true)
Personally, I need to check my screen a thousand times
To be sure of myself
All of that in one object
All of that in one object
Love, hatred, danger eh eh

🛼you are beautiful

our phones have changed not only how we relate to one another but also to our very selves. Xtina’s hit Beautiful got a timely remake with a message even more necessary these days. the imagery is super powerful. direction is by Fiona Jane Burgess. in case you don’t watch until the end, the message is:

“in the last 20 years, since Stripped was first released, social media has transformed our relationship with our bodies, and in turn, our mental health. research suggests that time spent on social sites is associated with body image issues, self-harm and disordered eating in children and teens. this needs to change.”

🫀tocar você

this is one of my favorite tracks from Duda Beat’s latest album Te Amo Lá Fora, and the video did not disappoint. love the 70s and 80s VHS horror chic Halloween vibe and she looks just so stunning. i wish everyone understood brazilian portuguese to get the sweetness of her accent from Recife.

🔫no more regrets

it’s exciting when i see two artists that I enjoy together, especially when i don’t know a lot of dutch artists. S10 represented The Netherlands in the last eurovision, and Froukje is one of the most well-known younger singers from here. the title means ‘no more regrets’ and i love the Halloween vibes.

🎄seasonal change

Mariah Carey @MariahCarey

IT’S TIME!!! 🎄☃️ #MariahSZN

to me, there should be a case study about mariah carey and this Christmas appropriation, i just love it. her most iconic song has already has entered the top 100 chart and it will keep going up, as we have witnessed the past years. on twitter people are saying how mariah is taking the symbolic claim from jesus and i cannot say that they are lying. interesting to think that once Christmas was once the celebration of the God Sun (nature), then when as religion took over it became the birth of Jesus. now we get mariah carey as capital rules.

🎶cultural production under capitalism

the syllabus always brings brain sparking curated content, and this book recommendation caught my eye:

Our book of the week traces the development of cultural forms from the print age to digital times. It describes the origins of printing, photography, sound recording, newsprint, advertising, film, and broadcasting – exploring the peculiarities of each as commodities – before turning to how culture, too, has dissolved into computer code.

thank you, and see you in a week! 🫀

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