Brazil has a long list of problems which are discussed on a regular basis (Brazilians are very out spoken) such as: poverty, economy, changes in government, hatred towards the Bush administration and so forth. In my opinion the real issues are found in the problems that no one talks about, such as race.
Don’t get me wrong Brazilians are not racist as defined by historic American culture; it’s a different type of racism that this country faces. Equality is not found easily in this country due to its history with a dictatorship and its “machista” cultural decent. Brazil’s whole population has about 50-60% black and most of that population is below the poverty line. Why?
According to the first lecture given to me about race (second day)by a Wilson Honario da Silva a well known socialist professor at USP, taught me that being liberated from slave-hood didn’t necessarily mean that you had it made. (Brazil was forced to abolish slavery because of capitalism) Nothing was promised to these people and automatically they were without jobs, hence birth of favelas (shanty towns). It’s amazing, when driving from the airport to the hotel, the horrible conditions people live in. Some in boxes right off the side of the street.
Racism is shrugged off as, no it’s because they are poor attitude. Yet when one sees a black man walking down the street in the ‘Beverly Hills” of Sao Paulo he is looked at suspiciously; that is the racism that is seen here. If you ask the regular Paulista if racism exist he or she will look at you like your crazy! It is almost impossible to find a “black” man or woman/ family in the upper middle class of Sao Paulo. For every 100R$ that a white man makes a black woman makes 37.5R$, a significant amount.
This also ties in the question of identity. Who do you consider black? Prieto (mulato)? Or white? When someone calls themselves black it is not looked upon kindly. Why? Being black is associated with being bad, dishonest, dirty ect. And being white is considered the opposite. I’ll be the first one to say it; it is very sad and wrong.
You ask: what happened to civil rights movements? Consider the history, it is no secret that what the US does the world to certain extent follows. During 60’s and 70’s US had major civil rights movements, during this time Brazil was controlled by a dictatorship. They which recognized any organized protest a threat to national security. This entailed the treat of life, and of course the basic need for life is far more important the rights lost.
Sadly this is some of the problems not likely talked about by the majority of the people, other than the crazy socialist and communist of course.
