#Monomad Challenge - A cool gaze

Good evening, #Monomad friends

Here is my entry for the #monomad contest by @brumest and @monochromes.

Earlier this week, I shared some photos I took on my last trip to Sintra with this community. Today, I'm going to share a few more that I took on that same cold but sunny winter afternoon.

One of the photos I am sharing here today, which will be the cover of the publication, captures the pragmatic and relaxed gaze of a famous Sintra doctor named Joaquim Simplício dos Santos.

His gaze, indifferent to those who pass by him, made me reflect on one of the most serious problems of today, in my opinion. Of course, it has nothing to do with the illustrious doctor, only his bronze bust, the immobility and coldness inherent in metal, made me think of the indifference that we so often instil in others, and that we sometimes feel ourselves.

What leads a social animal, such as Man, to adopt an attitude of indifference and contempt towards those around him? What petty feeling leads us to ignore one of our greatest abilities, that of being able to interact with others, and to prefer, for example, to devote our attention and time to something as distant as a mobile phone screen?

Are we losing the true human qualities that we thought were unique to us, while discovering and proving that they do exist in other beings besides the hairless ape that we are?

A true paradigm. Are we opening up our knowledge while closing off our most ancestral form of communication with the outside world and with each other, seeking to find closeness with something that is on the other side of a screen?