Kafka In Amadora

Ivan Illich asked, “What can I do to survive in the midst of the show?”, before answering his own question with a proposed two-fold approach. First, he calls for “an ethics of vision”, which calls for us to “protect” our “imagination from overwhelming distraction, possibly leading to addiction”. Second, he suggests “ocular askesis”, a discipline by which we train ourselves to perceive the world as we wish to see it. Illich scholar L.M. Sacasas goes further: “Our task, then, would be to cultivate an ethos of seeing or new habits of vision. We should remember, that all the senses can be likewise trained.” [ Ashley Colby (2022)]

The smile of beauty, and the flush of wine, For fops, fools, gamesters, knaves, and lords combine: Each to his humour — Comus all allows;⁠ Champaign, dice, music, or your neighbour's spouse. Lord Byron (1809)

We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl, year after year, Running over the same old ground. What have we found? The same old fears. Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd

We have largely forgotten that the traditional family was usually a business enterprise. The average family was engaged in farming, commerce, light manufacture, or a profession; and the family business was usually conducted close to the home, if not within the home itself. Often both parents were deeply involved with the family business, a custom that is vividly described in the Bible. Parents taught their children their business, and children gained self-esteem as well as practical skills by contributing actively to the family livelihood. Where children went to school, this was balanced against responsibilities to the family business. The traditional family often consisted of three generations (or even four) in daily contact with one another. The bond between parents and children was not yet imagined as something that undergoes a rupture when a child turns 18 or 21, and so the relationship of parents to children continued throughout life. And where there is no rupture between adult ch

Two of the main pillars of Germany’s economic success in the 21st century — cheap imports of raw materials and energy (especially from Russia), and high demand in the rest of the world — have been pulled from under the country’s feet. Looking back on recent events, however, one can’t help but wonder: was this just the result of a series of unfortunate events and, some would say, Germany’s pandering to Russia and myopic obsessions for exports, which left the country extremely vulnerable to external shock? Is Germany just a collateral victim of the United States’ proxy war against Russia? Or could Germany have been a target of economic warfare itself? This latter question is impossible to ignore following the recent attack on the part-German-owned Nord Stream gas pipelines connecting Russia to Germany. Even though Western governments and commentators have been quick to point the finger at Russia, Jeffrey Sachs, the US economist and Columbia professor, recently voiced an opinion shared b