The chaos puts our institutionalized bravery and cowardice to the test.

By Moisés Mendes, for 247 

The chaos on the roads isn't just a movement by truck drivers. The friend of Zé Trovão's cousin's uncle knows that's not the case. Truck drivers have their Bolsonaro-supporting motivations, but they're being pushed by various coup plotters.

It's an action involving people from the agribusiness sector and many of the business owners who coerced employees into voting for Bolsonaro. The uncles and aunts on WhatsApp, residents of the blocked cities, know who they are.

It's a network that uses truck drivers, but it encompasses all areas of fascism with some economic power and direct engagement with Bolsonaro. Just talk to the metal-barbecue vendors of the rioters.

The blockades are the last card to be played by those who gambled on the coup bluff, then gambled on the election, and tried to bribe their workers during the election, but failed.

They are small and medium-sized business owners who show their faces, and bigwigs who operate in hiding behind the smaller ones. The government knows who they are. The Public Prosecutor's Office knows too.

Bolsonaro acted methodically when he turned off the lights at the Alvorada Palace and retreated to meetings with his military team. He was warned about what would happen.

The government is now testing the extent of the unrest and the tolerance of Brazilians.

There is unease surrounding the capacity of the entire country to react to the coup, and not only regarding the limits of the fearlessness of the institutions and Alexandre de Moraes.

There are many cowards with some power who have never challenged the rise of the far right, placing all the blame on Moraes.

After the blockades, we will finally know the extent of our institutional and institutionalized acts of bravery and cowardice.

There's a lot of authority without pride, as Gilmar Mendes, one of the great authorities of the Republic, says. Let it be repeated that "without pride" also means without shame.

There are many cowards, who should be acting as authorities, hiding in corners watching the corrupt businessmen advance by riding on the coattails of the truckers.

Bolsonaro will remain entrenched as long as he is certain that the institutions will not be able to handle the blockades and that Brazilians will not react to the coup.

The individual is waiting for a spark to ignite confrontations on the roads and in the cities, leading to widespread violence and death.

The co-opted, silent, or simply alienated authorities will be complicit, through deliberate cowardice, in whatever happens.

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