Hi there, My name is Larissa and I'm a Brazilian Journalist turned into a Canadian Data Analyst. Like many of you, I've been bothered by the current state of political discussions on the internet. More than being bothered by x or y opinions, I'm concerned about the way we're having these discussions. You know the word - polarization. Topics that are crucial for our progress as a society are being disputed in an online battlefield, in which the goal is not to get to the best conclusion and course of action but to defeat the enemy's argument. I'm seeing people labelling the other side of the political spectrum in the same way that religious fanatics label "infidels" or "heretics". I'm seeing people being excluded from events and groups not because of their gender, or the colour of their skin, but because of who they voted for in the last election. Not even their ideas, people might not even check that. It's just by who they voted for. It's becoming unthinkable to exclude people who don't look like us, but it's suddenly ok to exclude those who don't think like us. And I'm also seeing people being ok with it. The problem is that when we exclude people based on their opinions, our community loses thought diversity. In the same way that a company or a party loses something when women and people of colour don't get the same chances of participating, we lose diversity when we exclude people based on their (most of the time perceived) ideas. For a while I had decided to not share my thoughts online anymore, given that I could never trully fit neither in the "us" or the "them" part of the battle. Now I decided to give it another go and shape my thoughts into something useful: hopefully a community that values thought diversity as a way to make us all smater. This blog is a collection of topics and writings that have been on my mind (and Notion) for a very long time, things that I've been thinking about on a regular basis. I occasionally post stories on Instagram with some short insights and data points and I have also a YouTube channel called The Long Answer - the drafts that don't get turned into videos end up here as a blog posts. I hope you enjoy, and that we can build something better here, regardless of where you are in this political world.