the iron industry

… Back to TRIX, the party was awesome and lots of our friends came by.

I received an unusual gift: a classic “iron” — as we still call, out of tradition, certain automatic handguns. While the name suggests something old, it wasn’t exactly an antique. The design was peculiar: a metallic pink finish, with luminescent details that reacted to skin temperature. It fired ten rounds per mag, each one with tips coated in uranium or some other high-impact metal alloy, designed to cause significant damage even to armored targets. Reloading was surprisingly fast, almost intuitive, as if the device anticipated the gesture. It wasn’t just a weapon — it was an extension of one’s will. And, in that scene, a gesture of care and protection, as paradoxical as it may seem.

I admit, with a certain embarrassment, that carrying an “iron” — even a stylized, technologically advanced model — is an idea that, from a more humanistic and spiritually grounded perspective, borders on the absurd. I know that, in your time, there are still voices defending civilian armament as a form of protection. But please try to understand: in our time, values have been distorted, and human reactions rose to levels that, in some cases, reach three hundred times the emotional and social impact you’re familiar with.

At a certain point in the future — which is, paradoxically, your future and my past — we, the inhabitants of this fragmented world, gave in to the wave of militarization. And once accepted, the movement became irreversible. Access to weapons and ammunition slipped beyond any institutional control. The corporations that develop them invested unimaginable sums, and the profits became exponential. The privatization of law enforcement only made things worse: weakened and indebted, states maintain only a symbolic fraction of public agents. The rest of security is outsourced, commodified, and often auctioned off to the highest bidder.

The outcome? A society on the brink of collapse. Imagine a leaking tank of nitroglycerin resting on top of an unstable barrel of TATP — both on the verge of blowing up. That’s the closest metaphor to the reality we live in. And in that context, carrying an “iron” isn’t just a choice — it’s a necessity, a desperate response to the failure of the very structures that were supposed to protect us.

Walking around while carrying an “iron” is, at its core, a moral aberration. It’s the institutionalization of fear, the glorification of violence as a response to human fragility. There’s no honor in carrying a weapon; there’s only the confirmation that we’ve failed as a species to build trust, empathy, and systems of mutual care. A weapon doesn’t protect — it keeps going. It doesn’t solve — it silences. And above all, it doesn’t set you free — it traps the individual in a cycle of paranoia and aggression.

It wasn’t inevitability that led us to this point, just plain simple historical negligence. The 21st century had every tool to dismantle this logic. It had access to information, real-time communication, global mobilization. But it didn’t fight hard enough. It allowed the rhetoric of “self-defense” to seep into public policy, let the weapons lobby corrupt institutions, and watched as a culture of violence became normalized — on the screens, in the streets, in people’s minds.

The outcome was a future where having a weapon isn’t the exception — it’s the rule. Where the arms trade is more profitable than investment in education. Where safety has become a purchased privilege, rather than a guaranteed right.

But there’s still time. There’s still a chance to change course. That change won’t come through decrees, but through awareness — through a new generation that refuses to accept fear as the foundation of coexistence. One that understands real strength lies in building networks of solidarity, in restorative justice, in the active presence of the State as a promoter of peace — not merely a manager of conflict.

To disarm yourself is an act of courage. It’s a declaration that you believe in something greater than the instinct to survive. It’s an affirmation that life is worth more than the power to take it. And as long as there are people who believe that, there is hope.

In the world I inhabit, weapons have ceased to be tools of defense. They’ve become objects of desire, symbols of status, extensions of identity. And like any consumer product, there are those who profit — and profit greatly — from their spread.

The weapons industry is the true architect of fear. It doesn’t just manufacture cutting-edge pistols, rifles, and ammunition — it manufactures narratives. It sells the idea that the world is too dangerous to trust, that the other is always a threat, that peace is a naïve illusion. And in the face of that carefully constructed reality, it offers solutions: weapons with facial recognition, ammunition that adapts to its target, patrol drones equipped with moral-judgment algorithms. All patented. All under extended warranty.

Alongside it, private security companies flourish — true corporate armies. Their slogans promise total protection, constant surveillance, and immediate response. But what they actually sell is privilege. The wealthy buy armored peace of mind, while the poor buy hope in the form of cold iron.

Tech magnates also partake in the feast. They develop software that integrates with weapons, tracks, decides when to fire. They build surveillance systems that feed databases of “suspicious behavior,” and sell that information to justify more armament, more control, more profit.

And in the underground layers of the city, the black market thrives. Urban factions, cyber militias, cartels of weaponized implants — all supplied, directly or indirectly, by the same corporations that publicly condemn violence. It’s a well-rehearsed theater, where every explosion creates dividends, every death boosts stock prices, every wave of fear renews contracts.

The elite watches it all from the balcony. For them, weaponry is just another line in a portfolio — a safe investment, guaranteed by the very instability they help sustain. And politicians — or what remains of them — are merely pieces on the board, funded to keep the game running.

In this world, peace is not profitable. Silence doesn’t sell. And hope, whenever it appears, is quickly smothered by advertising campaigns promising safety in three monthly installments.

But I still write. I still record. Because I believe that even in this scenario, there are those who still read. And those who read might think. And those who think might resist.

Unfortunately, in many sectors of the “city,” life was deeply devalued, and I lived in one of those sectors. It was as if existence itself stopped being seen as something precious and became treated with indifference. We coexist with a lack of empathy, with the normalization of suffering, and with indifference toward the pain of others. Curiously, in the middle of all this, there were still resistant spaces where people, in this same landscape, continued to recognize human life as precious — protected, celebrated, and placed at the center of social, political, and cultural decisions.

Do you understand the extremes of my time?

From your time, as far as I can gather through my research here, there already seemed to be a very large difference between safety in certain neighborhoods of your cities and what you might call their “vibration.” They felt like accounts from different eras, yet the city was the same — the vibration was the same — and what changed was the economic and cultural condition of each area.

Here, everything remained structurally the same, but enforcement systems and spaces were controlled by specific groups. Remember the idea of multiplying everything by 300, especially when it comes to harmful or malicious actions.