Fear

Carla Rodrigues Cardoso

The 9:30 am meeting had begun. Dr Silva was speaking with a bread crumb (from breakfast?) right in the corner of his mouth. The crumb was hypnotising; everyone's eyes, more or less discreetly, were drawn to it. An hour and a half later, the meeting ended, and the crumb remained stoically balanced in the same place, much to the delight of the spectators.

It may be a crumb or a typo in an official document. In 99.9% of cases, the error, oversight or flaw is noticed, but nothing is done. Partly out of laziness, but almost always for fear of offending someone's sensibilities, of seeming to attack someone or of attempting to ridicule them. The truth is that, as a rule, people react badly when confronted with something less than positive.

This difficulty in giving constructive criticism and accepting constructive criticism has consequences. It feeds and perpetuates errors, preventing learning and progress. Seeing what is wrong, turning a blind eye and allowing it to continue is neither good practice nor a sign of friendship, let alone loyalty. Allowing any Mr or Ms X, Y or Z to continue to “go against” when they meant to “move towards” prevents that person from stopping their collision and starting to draw closer.

No one can correct what they do not know is wrong. But there is a fear of hurting others. And a fear of being hurt. Fear. And everything comes to a standstill.

Carla Rodrigues Cardoso
Associate Professor (ECATI)
Scientific Coordinator of J-MagLab (CICANT)
Lusófona University - Lisbon University Centre