The Self DETERMINATOR

In The Self DETERMINATOR, indiCISplinary artist and critical comedian Naya de Souza points comedy as a political “gun”, aimed to surrender the failure of post-truth governance and the collapse of moral coherence in contemporary global politics, still deeply influenced by the fasCISt “nature” of futurist movements. Using found footage from films like Metropolis, the work is presented either in the form of a multimedia cabaret or Stand Up Lecture performance, that draws a satiric parallel between the self-determination law and the narrative timeline of THE TERMINATOR franchise, addressing through politically charged jokes and lipsyncs, how political leaders, billionaires, and even “minorities” aligned with conservative power claim identities they do not enact, while simultaneously denying the reality of trans people. The film took place in 2026 and our landscape reveals an ironic cultural shift: instead of flying cars, we got “TRANSGENDERS”, which the artist argues to be a cultural milestone that has proven to be far more disruptive to established power structures than any technological innovation.