Tarcísio’s mockery about the methanol crisis takes the gas out of his Coke

“Aiiiiii, but it was just a joke”, many people ran to justify it online. With 12 deaths under investigation, 17 confirmed cases of poisoning, more than 200 notifications related to the consumption of adulterated alcoholic beverages, people afraid to open a bottle of spirits and an economic crisis taking hold in the bar and restaurant sector, we need adults in the room.

At the moment he uttered the unfortunate sentence, Tarcísio was narrating a meeting he had with companies in the beverage industry, explaining that he didn’t know the area very well. On other occasions, he had already told journalists that he does not drink alcohol. But if the governor’s objective was to score points with a teetotal portion of the electorate, he made a big mistake, a rude mistake.

Crises that leave the population in panic need objective, direct, clear communication. Not opinions, jokes, jokes. What we want from the governor is not mockery, but the names of those responsible and the normalization of the situation.

The current beverage contamination crisis is much more serious than one might imagine. A society manages to live with distrust of political power and economic power. But a society that doesn’t know whether what it eats or drinks can kill leads to the erosion of social relationships. You stop trusting what is most basic to keep us together. And that’s no joke.

He didn’t need to have said what he said. It was as out of line as putting on a Make America Great Again cap to celebrate Donald Trump’s inauguration and then covering up the North American’s attacks on Brazil with an eye on the blessing of his godfather Bolsonaro. In this way, crossing the street to slip on a banana peel that was on the other sidewalk, Tarcísio himself becomes his own great adversary.