Antonio Navalón
Since always, men have been attracted to and caused to follow the path of the gods.
Some have even had a special hobby and desire to challenge them and seek to take their place in heaven. The recent history of humanity has made me think that in this world in which we live – in which for the first time the rich have neither ideologies nor notions, but algorithms – we lack a fixed course or a safe route that we lead to sustainable and lasting development. In this world in which, for the first time, the most economically powerful men on Earth seem to have neither a model nor a special identification in the field of humanism, everything and everyone is in the hands of uncertainty. Although these business leaders have been the main precursors of the era of communication and having knowledge available as we have never had it, there is an irrefutable paradox. This paradox consists in the fact that – despite all the achievements made, the innumerable technological advances, and countless, inexhaustible resources – those who have the most in economic terms do not have a political, social, and even cultural endeavor to offer humanity.
Would you please raise your hand who has ever attended an opera paid for by one of the great companies that dominate the world, be it Apple, Microsoft, or Amazon? Raise your hand who – beyond virtual tours of museums – has been able to participate in any work that testifies to civilizational advances, such as the arts, advocated or promoted by these companies. Without a doubt, its leaders are other types of people. Maybe that’s why they don’t know what to do like on Earth. And that is also the reason why despite not having inherited this world – but without a doubt that has not limited them not to alter it and conquer it using their undeniable talents – now they are preparing to assault the heavens.
Seeing a world in which Covid-19 looks at us every month, gestures at us, and attacks with more and more intelligence makes it necessary to reflect on what this moment represents in history since the coronavirus is not the only element that we have to analyze. And it is that in a world in which viruses are increasingly cunning and resistant to vaccines, in which the possibility of returning to the confinement is latent and in which the challenges in the form of variants are constant, there is also another owner who increasingly controls our day to day. By dictating which toilet paper or which cleaning products we have to use in our homes, Amazon has not only managed to position itself as the true owner of our tastes and preferences but now – not content with dominating the Earth – it also seeks to be a kind of God and rule the skies.
To see Richard Branson, Jeff Bezos – in the future Elon Musk and probably also Bill Gates – conquering the universe and becoming the masters not only of this Earth but of the universes that are yet to be discovered is a fascinating spectacle. Watching their intergalactic travels and witnessing this new kind of race to conquer space, I realize how lucky I am, and we are to have been born in an era like this. However, the exposition and consolidation of the teachings on development in all its areas and the establishment of peace are still pending. And the way to achieve this lies in the establishment and consolidation of social balances and in the formation of models that allow coexistence.
At this point, it is necessary to accept, but, above all, to assimilate that, just as we live in a world with a level of concentration of power and wealth as never seen before, we also live in a world in which the domination of the western civilization is – if not giving its last blows – undergoing a matching and adjustment that no one could have imagined twenty or thirty years ago. And now the question is not about how the eastern civilization has managed to consolidate the position previously led by the United States, but that the real issue that now needs to be determined is when the Chinese will consolidate their power in the world’s future. Although, apparently, it is still early for this moment to come.
I feel that it is a matter of time for the Chinese – just as, after giving birth, they managed to dominate Covid-19 – they also manage to conquer spaces. And it is that we cannot omit the fact that at present, China has some duly controlled and ideologized farms in which not only do they have 5G, or they have the Internet of Things, but they are already in a position to dispute the cosmic observation from the universe over the rest of the Earth. I repeat, the question is not how, but when the Chinese will join this spatial dispute.
Today, the Moguls representatives and the masters of the western universe are bent on conquering the heavens. If nobody on Earth controls them; if they barely pay taxes; if they traffic with our feelings; If their world is not one of ideals or emotions, but of algorithms, the question I ask myself is: saved, if one day we manage to save ourselves against Covid-19 and its successors – who apparently will come – who will be in a position to offer a civilizing model that does not consist solely of an application but communication and a restructuring of our social organization?
In the midst of all this technological development that defies the laws of the possible, some emerging countries continue dragging and lamenting our miseries without a solution. In the midst of this crossroads between the extraordinary and the real, we find some sick people because of a coronavirus bug. A bug that is not only capable of cornering us with all our money, our planes, our tanks, or our nuclear weapons, but also has already taken the lives of more than four million people around the world. In the midst of heaven and earth, pity for those of us who truly continue to think that the order we knew will be enough to restore peace in this cosmic disorder that overflows us on all sides.
While our conflicts and failures are taking shape on this Earth, aspects will mark our immediate future and need to be analyzed. On the one hand, there are economic contradictions of the 4T. In this regard, we either develop the program of President López Obrador to the end, isolating ourselves more and more from the world map and without considering the concerns and problems of our neighbors, as is currently happening with the energy issue or the USMCA. Or, on the other hand, we trust that the new Secretary of the Treasury has the truth when he announces that there will be a greater impact on the energy sector in promoting development banking and promoting the necessary stimuli to reactivate the Mexican economy. And if the latter does not happen, the crisis will have a multiplier effect in Mexico. The answer will not be in the wind but the skies of each morning press conference. In this sense, perhaps from space, the answers are clearer.
While all this happens, while some – having controlled the Earth – are determined to conquer the sky and others organize and determine their government schemes, the rest of us will be waiting and suffering from the reactions, for example, of the markets. We will be looking for a way to overcome current crises and those that are yet to come—a crisis caused by an enemy with a thousand faces. At least in the West, an enemy is deadly, circulates without any restriction through our lives, and that scientifically receives the name of SARS-CoV-2, or better known as Covid-19.
