Federico Reyes Heroles
When one becomes accustomed (to horror),
it ceases to be seen, therefore, to exist.
Horror itself leads one to lose the proportions of horror.
Marcela Serrano
The numbers are there every day. Throughout the Republic, almost without exception. Tranquility, as something inherent to life, is in extinction. Dead, missing, clandestine graves, body parts strewn in forests and wastelands, isolated or not, families massacred. The list is endless. 200 dead last weekend. About 80 dead a day. It seems that the numbers are starting to change. Hopefully, but governing without adherence to the truth takes its toll: skepticism, the main one. A laughable example: now it turns out that 350 thousand people could fit in the Zócalo. Coherence is central.
Perhaps as a form of defense of the unconscious, probably as a reaction to the indigestible, what we now call “normalization” appears, we consider it normal to live… in horror. The only way to revive our sensitivity, humanity, and empathy is to pay attention to each case, even if we want to turn our faces away. It was his cousin, 28 years old; he went out to work and never came back. Three weeks later, a few blocks from his house, he was found hanging from a tree, still with his backpack on his back. This happened in Tepoztlán. Salvador told me about it the same day I read a report by Causa en Común, one of the most solid institutions in the fight against violence in our country, directed with passion and strategy by María Elena Morera. The title is an eye-opener: atrocities is the pivotal word. “ Major cruelty,” says the dictionary of the Real Academia de la Lengua de España (Royal Academy of the Spanish Language). That is an atrocity.
From January to December 2024, an average of 12 atrocities were registered every day, with 24 dead on average, 1,186 murders with torture, 652 mutilations, dismemberments, and destruction of corpses. And at least 442 massacres, or 1.2 per day. Gallery of Horror… is the title of the study. It is not an exaggeration. There were 4,708 “crimes of extreme violence”. The daily average is 1.7 cases of mutilation, dismemberment, or destruction of corpses, and 3.2 cases of torture per day. Gender equality? The third most frequent atrocity is the murder of women: 505 cases in 2024, 9.7 per week. What’s next, which does not fit in words: 224 murders of children and adolescents. 18 cases per month. Also babies.
What is in the sick minds of those who perpetrate these atrocities? It is not only the brutal impunity (93% nationally; impunity/zero) that gallops in our country as a permanent invitation to commit crimes: there are no consequences. It is also an ethical, axiological degradation in a country where 89% of the population declares itself a believer in some religion. In theory -Mircea Eliade developed it- religions promote inner peace. What happens then? How do you explain cruelty? Killing children? Is this a product of the confrontation between powerful gangs or maybe we have already crossed an invisible border and Mexico is already a territory dominated by barbarism, the one in which life is “worth nothing”. But we continue with our slogans: in Mexico, the family is a very important value, Mexicans are supportive.. Is that so? Or only in extraordinary events because, in everyday life, the worst enemy of a Mexican is another Mexican. Because of the data, we have lost all prudence before the value of a life; even worse, we are invaded by the joy of the suffering of the other, hence the tortures, mutilations, and dismemberments. That is Mexico today, and the first thing we must do is recognize it.
Are there solutions? They are complex, but yes. However, they all start by recognizing the ethical degradation of many Mexicans. This self-criticism is unpopular but indispensable. The value of life is in crisis. Life, in all its expressions, the destruction of flora and fauna, is a tradition in Mexico. Mexican Humanism” would do well to face the problem.
And now Trump, who says very little about the gun business.
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