"Censorship is no longer necessary because self-censorship does the dirty work."

In one of the cartoons by Swiss cartoonist Patrick Chappatte , Donald Trump appears seated in an armchair. Beneath his feet, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg can be seen docilely and with a high sense of servitude kissing his black boots. Behind them, waiting their turn, are Sam Altman , CEO of OpenAI; Jeff Bezos , owner of Amazon; and next to him, Elon Musk . In the foreground, as a summary, you can read a 'like!' sign, reflecting that the great magnates of the time are at the service of power.

Chapatte is no ordinary cartoonist. He has worked for The New York Times , Der Spiegel , and the satirical bible, Le Canard enchaîné , and perhaps that's why he knows what's going on in newsrooms like few others. And his is the quote that precedes this article: "Censorship is no longer necessary because self-censorship does the dirty work."

Nor did he say it in just any old place. He said it in Sant Lluís, where one of Camus's grandmothers was born, and where the Trobades & Premis Mediterranis Albert Camus, dedicated to the French-Argentine writer, has been held for the past nine years. His goal is to investigate the Nobel Prize winner's work, but, above all, to understand what drove him to be a beacon against injustice, which, as Mediapart editor Edwy Plenel maintains, means knowing how to say no, which, in essence, is the same as saying yes.

It's not a contradiction, Plenel asserts. Behind the "no" to injustice lies a "yes" to justice, and hence the key is to explore the limits of both concepts, grounded in classic values ​​such as respect for others and the need to share. In other words, Plenel argues, the exact opposite of what the new authoritarianisms propose. "In the world of Trump, Putin, or Netanyahu, there is only imposition, there are no rules." In short, a new world without limits, capable of destroying everything.

"Censorship is no longer necessary because self-censorship does the dirty work."

The Italian thinker Gramsci saw it coming many years ago when he famously said that a crisis occurs when the old world refuses to perish, but at the same time, the new world has yet to emerge. These are moments of transition, like the current ones, marked by that resistance to change in the face of reaction. Today, many see it as the birth of a monster, but among the meanings of this term is also the process of birth of the creative process. That is, the unprecedented, the unknown, which is often the same as saying the transgressive, and hence the importance of freedom as the space—the only possible one—most conducive to creation.

Indifference and defeatism

There are two ways to approach this need: from indifference and defeatism, or, as Camus said, from a non-paralyzing awareness, that is, from activism. “Awareness of tragedy must not paralyze, like a rabbit blinded by the headlights of a car,” he said. Or, to put it another way, tragedy can only be fought “with hope.” Or with courage. But not only by those who write or participate in the creative process. Also by readers, by the world of culture, because courage, he maintained, “is a collective act.” In short, “an act with ourselves.”

And why this activism? To avoid falling into the Medusa myth, that is, the paralyzing gaze that prevents us from responding to politics steeped in evil. Steve Bannon , one of Trump's top advisors during his first term, put it bluntly: "It's about saturating the area with so much shit that, in the end, you don't know what's true and what's false." In other words, the creation of chaos, from which populism emerges as a healing medicine. Of course, through social media or any other tool using algorithms, "which are not innocent," in the words of the Mediapart editor.

"It's about saturating the area with a lot of shit so that in the end, no one knows what's true and what's false."

According to filmmaker Paula Ortíz, director of The Red Virgin , the point is not to transform the world, which is the first thing that comes to mind, but to transform oneself, as German director Wim Wenders said. In other words, it's an indirect way of changing things through individual responsibility. Among other reasons, because imagining for oneself "forces one to ask questions." Noise, however, blinds us to vision, degrades culture, and brings us closer to the servitude that so irritated Camus.

Servitude is, in fact, the opposite of freedom. The opposite of creation, which is the privilege, as linguist Lucía Sesma asserts, of human beings. Only man can imagine the future. Only man, says Nigerian poet Ben Okri, is capable of transforming the universe through play. “To create,” he asserts, “is to create a universe within the universe; it is to transform the spontaneous. It is to impose a new form on the universe. And play is the greatest creation of the mind's transformative power.” Play, in short, is the best medicine against the absurdity that so disturbed Camus.