A report presented in the International Journal of Person Centered Medicine shows that people who do something for others lead happier and healthier lives than others. "People are happier and healthier, and may even live a little longer, when they are contributing (...)" to their community or organization they believe in, says study author Stephen G. Post , PhD. A majority of the study participants stated that their volunteer activities enrich their sense of having a purpose in life. The survey also showed that those who volunteer are less likely to feel hopeless or lonely than those who don't.
Why waste your free time in shopping malls or in front of the TV? Volunteering is much better: you participate in interesting activities, circulate ideas, have new experiences, leave the house! Just like doing sports, volunteering helps you to get in touch with others, to communicate and to understand others. The main advantage is to be able to overcome shyness, thus learning to socialize immediately, not to be afraid to speak up, to have your say and start a speech in the presence of many people without feeling uncomfortable. Helping others also helps you to reflect on your life, on what you have, on where you are, on your fortunes, on the people around you. So at the end of the day, after dedicating your time to others, take 10 minutes to write down your impressions, how you feel and what you have learned.
“Human beings are social by nature. Maybe that's why our minds and bodies get "rewarded" when we give to others, ”explained lead researcher Eric S. Kim of Harvard T.H.'s Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences. Chan School of Public Health. “Our findings show that volunteering not only strengthens a sense of community, it enriches lives by strengthening bonds with others, helping us feel a sense of well-being and protecting us from loneliness, depression, and despair. Regular altruistic activity reduces the risk of death ”.
“Human beings are social by nature. Maybe that's why our minds and bodies get "rewarded" when we give to others, ”explained lead researcher Eric S. Kim of Harvard T.H.'s Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences. Chan School of Public Health. “Our findings show that volunteering not only strengthens a sense of community, it enriches lives by strengthening bonds with others, helping us feel a sense of well-being and protecting us from loneliness, depression, and despair. Regular altruistic activity reduces the risk of death ”.
Is it more important to know how to repair a car or paint a picture? Is it more important to know how to repair a boiler or create a sculpture? Is it more important to repair a fridge than to sew a bag? If you don't know how to fix certain objects then you can't drive, you can't store food, you can't heat the water. Let's imagine for a moment that there is a black out and you can no longer turn on the TV, the fridge will not be able to turn on, the car batteries will not be able to charge. Therefore it will be necessary to do without everything that requires electricity and repairs. So what will humans do? Will they return to observe the paintings they have in the house and dream? No, because they didn't want to spend money to buy the paintings but only spent money on useful things. And art is not considered useful. But in the future all the appliances will be turned off and whoever has books and paintings will be able to dream. Everyone else will perhaps die of boredom.
I’ve always looked at the sky. Every time I am in a place I have always lost myself looking at the blue of the sky, the white of the clouds. I’ve always had a strange connection with the sky I always feel part of him when I lose myself looking at him. I remain there enchanted. I get lost in thoughts To reflect on everything that goes through my head at that moment. I always leave a piece of my thoughts in those clouds A piece of me in that infinite blue. As if for a moment everything was still there in that sky. As if for a moment all thoughts are dispersed in those clouds. As if for a moment I forgot everything. I slept great tonight. Small in a huge bed, duvet to cover me and two pillows around to protect me. Zero nightmares. I dreamed of my father. He came to wake me up around five. He put his hand on my shoulder and said “I brought you the croissant”. At that point, the information received woke up all those particles of me that dance wildly at the thought of food. Inside of me I jumped up, but in reality the movement was quite slow. I first took off the covers, stretched, yawned as with every awakening, put on the false crocks and went to the kitchen to eat the croissant with cream. But there was nothing and so, a little sad, I only drank some fruit juice like every morning, remembering the time at university when my father came to me and brought me sweets. After breakfast, I opened the bedroom window and saw the white cat, PIPPINEDDA, in the garden eating some herbs. She had a sly, very sweet look. When she noticed me she went away. I cleaned the bedroom by making the bed, sweeping and mopping the floor; then the bathroom by thoroughly cleaning the accessories and all the products on the shelf, my father’s postit still on the mirror and in order not to remove it I cleaned the glass all around. I also tidied up the living room and kitchen by washing the floor and tidying up. While I was in the Cinderella version I listened to the usual songs and hummed perhaps a little too much. After cleaning I prepared the vegetarian meatloaf: minced meat, courgette bread, eggs, parmesan, parsley, salt and pepper, and lactose-free slices for the filling. After that I started writing, and LUIGINA, my black and white kitten, started to watch TV and I to the pc to update the blog. About half past I baked the meatloaf with potatoes. After lunch I did the dishwasher, because I can’t wash the dishes because my wrist hurts right away. There was peace in this house and it seemed to me that my father suddenly opened the door. But it was only this morning’s dream. I was happy to see him again.
The Brazilian TV series 3% is a wonderful science fiction transposition of the logic of the Wasteocene. In the not too distant future, Brazilian society appears divided between a poor and devastated “hinterland” and a utopian and almost heavenly island, called the “off-shore” in the series. Technology is the main dividing factor between the two worlds: while the offshore is full of all kinds of futuristic gadgets, the hinterland has the appearance of a giant favela, where people survive on leftovers. 3% represents the contrast between clean and modern on the one hand and dirty and obsolete on the other. If the guiding principle of offshore is science, DIY seems to be the most important knowledge inland: being able to reuse / reinvent what has been discarded is a crucial skill for those forced to live in a landfill. social and material. So far, the series is not too different from other post-apocalyptic tales; perhaps it is only more explicit in its representation of socio-ecological relationships based on waste. 3% becomes more unique and interesting when explaining the procedures that select those who can move to the island. Using science fiction to describe the neoliberal creed of competition and meritocracy, the authors imagine that every year all citizens who turn 20 can participate in a complex and manipulative series of tests, “the Process”, through which some will be selected. and moved offshore. From the perspective of the Wasteocene, the Process is a key device, because it creatively illustrates, albeit quite realistic, the internalization of wasting relationships that reproduce waste people and places. In this sci-fi dystopia, there is even a sort of religious cult of the Process, which makes all individuals in the hinterland completely “governed” and obedient to the logic of injustice that separates those who deserve more from those who are discarded. At the beginning of the third season, Michele, one of the leaders of the rebellion against the system, openly declares that for the rich who live offshore the rest of the population is simply waste. Violent repression is a key tool in 3% as it is in the Wasteocene: people do not easily accept being treated as waste and forced to live in socio-ecological landfills. Nonetheless, epistemic and cultural repression is also an important tool to keep the system running. In this sense, the idea of the Process is extremely powerful, because it involves all the arsenal of neoliberal lies about deserving “a better life” thanks to one’s skills and hard work. As Bauman (2008, p. 158) argued, this discourse of merit assumes that those living in the global socio-ecological dump are victims not of injustice but of their own inability to build a better life. The Wasteocene is not so much about the rubble of the hinterland, to follow 3%, but rather the extent to which the rubble is the by-product of unjust socio-ecological relations but normalized by an almost religious celebration. At some point in the series, it becomes clear that the devastation of the hinterland is the direct consequence of the prosperity of the offshore. After all, every paradise needs a hell so much that its own is created.
I’m not talking about zombies, I’m talking about Marketing and Government.
EDWARD BERNAYS. Just to get a clearer idea of who we are talking about, you should know that Bernays was on the commission organized by the American government which had the aim of convincing Americans to go to war in the First World War. It was, to be clear, the commission that had produced the famous poster that depicted Uncle Sam with his finger pointing and with the words "I want you for U. S. Army". He was also the one who, through a mass and perfectly organized advertising strategy, led women to love cigarettes; this, of course, behind the request and remuneration of the American Tobacco Company. He was also responsible for many advertising campaigns for companies such as General Electric, General Motors, Procter & Gamble and of course many others.
The people can only delude themselves that they can come to power. In fact, thanks to the new propaganda and manipulation techniques it is not only possible to keep it at bay but, even, its libertarian impulses can be exploited to further increase the advantages of the elite itself. Like? By inculcating in the mass new beliefs and new doctrines of course. And here we finally come to understand, in a definitive way, what propaganda is through the textual words of Bernays:
"Propaganda is the executive organ of the invisible government."
Everything you think you think and then Twitter you may not have thought of it. The influence of the Russians has nothing to do with it: very Italian companies of IT professionals are able to manipulate opinions on social networks, for example by imposing certain issues to the general attention, as if everyone were talking about them, while a network to "push" them of computers. The experiment carried out, in spite of himself, by a reporter from the Agi news agency, was sensational, suddenly and without particular reasons, famous for a day. It was enough for a group of hackers to launch its name on the Net (in the form of slogans, the so-called hashtags) to enter in a flash among the "trend topics" on Twitter, ie the most discussed topics of the moment on the microblog platform. For months Arcangelo Rociola has investigated fake news factories and fake bots, networks of false users who retweet the same message, a digital echo that deceives the social network manager. «David Puente and I, - says the journalist referring to a well-known buffalo hunter on the Net - we discovered that behind one of these networks there seems to be an IT company in Rome. A group of hackers fighting against the manipulation of social networks has hacked their computers and contacted me via the web to let me know. I asked them for proof and in a short time they spread my name thousands of times, making me enter the list of trending topics on Twitter ».
The episode is proof of the disconcerting ease with which people with a certain computer skills can manipulate social networks, which have now become one of the main channels through which the public is informed.
Influencing information on social networks is first and foremost a business.
Even more insidious is the case of fake bots, which endlessly reproduce a tweet, often made by a real person, but attributing it to fake users. "To fabricate these false identities - explains Puente - they also took photos of real users, a consultant from the Ministry of Health, a former candidate from Italy of the values I knew, totally without their knowledge".
Points the finger: «To find out who they work for, we need an investigation by the authorities. It is marketing available to those who pay and I am convinced that it can influence the electoral campaign: it is not necessary to convince everyone, it may be enough for them to move a percentage point ».
THE PRODIGY OF IDEAS 