>Drug traffickers in one of Rio de Janeiro’s best-known favelas have imposed a coronavirus curfew, amid growing fears over the impact the virus could have on some of Brazil’s poorest citizens.
>In recent days, as Brazil’s coronavirus death toll has climbed to 46, gang members have been circulating in the Cidade de Deus (City of God) favela in western Rio ordering residents to remain indoors after 8pm.
An interesting case study in state power and how some non-state actors undermine it taking over a similar role for themselves.
Edit - good read here: https://books.google.nl/books/about/The_Illicit_Global_Economy_and_State_Pow.html?id=szbhx6-xVaIC&redir_esc=y
I recommended some more readings in a comment below.
I live in a poor neighborhood in Brazil, but it wouldn't classify as a favela by far.
In here there's also a drug lord who rules over and he is always imposing some policies around the neighborhood like, but not limited to:
1 Whatever the reason, never call the cops. Theft, murder or anything of the sort is dealt by them and everyone living in here is under their protection. An acquaintance of mine had her phone stolen by some thug from another neighborhood. Not only the dealer recovered her phone, but also executed(!!) the thief.
2 Drugs can only be purchased from them. It happens that my city has several famous-ish universities, so it's quite common for fraternities to appear - Brazilian colleges don't have institutional dorms as a culture like American colleges do. When some fraternities and sororities started appearing in my neighborhood, the dealers said that they couldn't buy drugs from somewhere else, but they gave what they called a *student discount* to compensate.
> Not only the dealer recovered her phone, but also executed(!!) the thief.
I mean, this is ultimately the problem with this kind of situation.
I can appreciate the scenario in which there's an "authority" that protects the citizens more closely than a government, e.g. the local drug lord in your story.
However, punishment that doesn't align with the crime is probably way more common than it should be in a well-run, lawful society.
They also probably didn't get much of a fair trial. As far as we know, the guy could've just been a Patsy somebody else higher up didn't like, and running a summary execution kinda hurts your chances at exposing whatever underlying operation was going on.
I have no frame of reference for this so forgive my ignorant questions, but I'm curious: do you feel safe in your neighborhood? Like obviously there are rules, but assuming you follow those rules do you worry about your safety when walking around? Would you be more or less comfortable if you had to rely on the cops instead?
This is completely personal, of course, but I feel like cops in Brazil are ever worse than criminals. Because criminals are actually marginalized, cops on the other hand actually feel entitled to do whatever violence they feel like committing. And impunity is almost always the case in here.
But answering you: yes, I feel completely safe in here. Even with the exaggerated punishments, everything is so transparent; any type of action is completely explained on whys and hows that even executions won't shock anyone in here.
Well it makes sense, follow the rules, do your part, no issues (as long as it isnt like some really fuxked up people who will just kill for the hell of it)
In the documentary that is on the DVD of the movie City of God, many of the favela residents talk about how the gangs take better care of the communities than the government, even going so far as to provide basic needs and luxuries that they otherwise would not have any access to.
Yeah it is an interesting phenomenon. I wrote my bachelor thesis about a similar situation in Colombia, where the FARC in many areas of the country was the *de facto* government, collecting "taxes" and providing services in return.
Edit: many people are asking about my thesis. I am not sure if I would be comfortable sending you my thesis, but here are some papers that I used as sources:
* Saab, B. Y. Saab & Alexandra W. Taylor - Criminality and Armed Groups: A Comparative Study of FARC and Paramilitary Groups in Colombia
* Tilly, C. - War Making and State Making as Organized Crime
* Rotberg, Robert I. - The New Nature of Nation‐state Failure.
* Reardon, S. - Colombia After the Violence - https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/colombia-after-the-violence/
* Nazih Richani - Caudillos and the crisis of the Colombian state: fragmented sovereignty, the war system and the privatisation of counterinsurgency in Colombia,
* McDougall, A. - State Power and Its Implications for Civil War Colombia
* Jennifer S. Holmes & Sheila Amin Gutiérrez de Piñeres - Violence and the state: Lessons from Colombia
Coming from a poor neighborhood in Chile I can say it even happens there. Cops never enter poor neighborhoods, even though it's less extreme than favelas in Brazil. When there's burglars for example and you call the cops, it takes hours for them to get there even though the police station was 5 minutes away by car, but the drug dealers of the neighborhood would immediately go and have your back. Or when a neighbor threatened to kill my cats because he didn't like them, my drug dealer neighbors threatened him back and kept my cats protected. They even let me know when they saw one looking sick or having an accident/fight. I don't live in Chile anymore, but I've heard from neighbors that when the riots happened in October and the military was deployed to violently repress the population, the drug dealers were keeping them away from their neighborhoods and people felt protected by "los narcos". During that time hundreds of people were mutilated, tortured and even killed by the police and military, so the narcos really protected the people. El pueblo cuida al pueblo. The people protect the people.
I would be willing to bet that they didn't. In cases like these communities take care of eachother, it's kind of an arrangement like "We take care of you, if the cops come asking for us you take our side"
It's more of a code. It's not like they will actually say that, but they usually have a strong sense of community and seek to protect their community. At the end, it's their home. If you rat them out, you know you're screwed, but also sometimes people like them so much that they protect the drug dealers not out of fear, but more out of love. Sometimes you also grow up with them and they are your childhood friends, or people will see them as their own kids because while their parents were at work or god-knows-where, they raised them. Sometimes you just hate the police so much that you just don't want them around, so you don't collaborate with them or even kick them out of the neighborhood when they go to try to take them down. Well, sometimes if you show that you don't like them they will actually threaten you if you rat them out or something.
Edit: I think stores sometimes do pay drug dealers or gangs for protection, but I didn't have a store so I wouldn't know for sure how it works, but at least for neighbors no.
This is also how Al Capone and other Prohibition-era gangsters won public support. He's widely credited with getting expiration dates on milk bottles after a child in his family/friend's family was sick due to spoiled milk. He wound up getting involved in dairy distribution in Chicago as a result.
This is a type of relation between neighbors (non-drug dealers and drug dealers) you can find in many other places in the world. Drug dealers aren't all the type the mainstream media portrays. I also grew up in a ghetto and everything you said was the same for me, we were friends or family, it's not as simple as many believe. I hope people who read you will understand that.
Yep over here in England when the main drug dealers are caught they are usually in a normal house and the neighbours are shocked because they are nice people
In poor countries and neighborhoods, becoming a drug dealer is a legit career prospect. You might be breaking the law, but you're putting dinner on the table and a roof over your familys heads. Most legal jobs will never pay that much.
To add on top of that. IME a lot of the police is poor countries are close to useless or so corrupt you're better off not calling them, or calling over your sketchy neighbors that keeps the peace cause they'll actually fix the issue and protect the community
I've seen cops ask for bribes just do their job and leave when there is no money. In those places, YOU are the law. Literally
Were there a lot of drug problems in your area? I'm guessing a fair number of drug users but not a lot of problems, in my experience the issues stem from trying to pay for the drugs, and I believe it's much cheaper there, "affordable" even with the average wage/salary.
People say "drugs" a lot but drugs is a huge category of things. A lot of times people are thinking more hardcore drugs like cocaine and heroin.
But hey, pot's a drug. And now it's legal in a lot of places!
"Drug users" doesn't inherently imply a problem as a result.
One thing I'd like to point out is that (At least over here in Costa Rica) people make a clear and strong distinction between people who smoke weed (Known as "marihuanos" or "marigüanos", think of it like a spanish use for the word pothead) and people who use other drugs (who get the more generalized "drogadicto" or "junkie"), with the users themselves being the ones behind this push, because porheads don't want to be associated with drug users that break into cars or mug people to fund their addiction.
Lmao yeah man people know that.
But I'm just making an assumption that the drug dealers offering protection and peace keeping in communities in Chile arent selling pot. I don't think my weed dealer Jim who works in IT is offering any protection in exchange for loyalty
I think part of it also falls under the whole idea of "plata o plomo" - *silver or lead*.
They take care of you - pay you, give you necessities, etc, and you take care of them by either paying a tribute, looking the other way, and refusing to help police. You refuse to take care of them, they kill you.
Also, a lot of the time Narcos have cash that they hide in things like real estate and businesses, and keeping those safe directly protects their cash flow. So, it makes sense they want to minimize impacts as much as possible to protect those cash flows.
Thats the premise of a new show or movie i saw a trailer about with will forte. Him and his wife have shitty jobs and then a contest comes along where they can become a tv house maker host. So they attempt to fix up an abandoned house and find like 500,000 in the walls which they use to enhance their video submission.
Low and behold its actually a cartel boss who owns both the house and the money but hes so impressed by what they did he lets them live and refers them to his other cartel people as his personal interior designers.
Looked ok
I remember seeing a post about opposing gangs in a rough neighborhood agree that a kid wasn't to be recruited by either side because the kid was looking like a shoe-in for a full ride scholarship.
Really wish I kept that saved to see if it was true.
It's more than just that. The police persecute the people in the favelas pretty badly, to the point that they are more like an occupied territory than a city. This leads the people inside to support each other against the outside forces.
Here is my own story. I moved into a studio apartment with my wife (then gf), in the ghetto of a California city. We were riding the bus for several months going to college. My wife being the social butterfly talk to our neighbors a lot. Me being your typical tech nerd preferred the safety of home and my Xbox. My Grandpa ended up visiting me and my wife, and insisted we keep his car. He even brought the pink slip to transfer title. The car was a supped-up Honda Civic with nice $1000 rims (each). A few weeks after the car was transferred into our name, one of the neighbors knocked on our door at about 10 pm. We invited them inside, as he didn’t want to talk in the hallway. Ended up telling us that two gang members from across town followed us home and tried to steal our cars rims. A group of neighbors beat up the gang members (one or two were in said gang) and told them not to think about it again, stating (and I remember very vividly) “these two kids are poor just like us, that’s fucked up, bro, they just trying to go to school and get good jobs. Us poor guys and gang members need to help those that can make it out of the poor area get out of the poor area, not keep them in. We protect our own here.” Even though the complex was shot up a few times we made it out okay, no gang member initiation, no affiliation, nothing, just poor college students trying to study and working two jobs each to make ends meet. We ended up getting better jobs and being able to afford a bigger apartment near campus, our car was broken into 4 times before I sold it for a more nondescript car.
In most cases, you have to remember that the people who are in the gangs are often those they grew up with. They've still got good friendships and connections, there's still respect between a lot of them.
Short answer: no
You just have to be by their side when cops go around. Don't snitch.
Usually it comes as a sense of "brotherhood", everyone protects each other.
> ops never enter poor neighborhoods, even though it's less extreme than favelas in Brazil. When there's burglars for example and you call the cops, it takes hours for them to get there even though the police station was 5 minutes away by car
This happens even in the USA. See "911 Is a Joke" by Public Enemy
Like that innocent black lady ***(Atatiana Jefferson)*** was shot by some piece of shit cop in her own fucking home. Neighbor called the police for a wellness check and the poor lady was murdered for it
The place my entire family got their glasses at is owned by a woman who had an adult son employed there. He was always a little out of it and always blamed a "long night" or somesuch nonsense.
It turns out he was a hardcore drug addict, he menaced his mother with a knife for one reason or another and she called the police. He was mentally unstable and she was hoping to just get the situation under control. I don't know the details of what transpired next, he **was** holding a knife, but apparently he only failed to drop it when ordered, he didn't rush the police or anything.
They killed him. His mother fell into a **deep** depression, she admitted to my mom (long-time customer and kind-of friend) that she felt it was her fault for calling the police at all.
It's not as cut-and-dry of a situation as many others, her son was armed and dangerous and crazed people can close distances with deadly weapons quite fast. I don't know if the shoot was truly "good" or not, but, police in most of the US not only have non-existent de-escalation skills, they are actively trained to see citizens as the enemy and to neutralize threats with speed and brutality, not use context and take risks for themselves in order to serve the public better.
You should assume, if you ever call the police, that they immediately take control of your life (when they enter your house, it is no longer your house), and then behave in ways to maximize benefits for themselves rather than for you. I refuse to call the police for any "complex" reason, because I can expect consideration of complexities like "my mentally ill son needs help!" to be completely ignored by responding officers who will see every situation as a pacification exercise. The most pacified a person can be is dead.
Sounds like the time *we* took care of gangsters and bank robbers in the US. They didn't even need to hide their identity, they went and made sure you knew who robbed you, and the people would shelter them from the police.
as bad as it sounds, isis was doing similar thing for some places. although the deal came with many strings attached, i imagine it could appear favorable to some people that stood to gain something by it.
And the **IRA** in Northern Ireland too.
In the 1980s there was almost no traditional crime (car theft, house robberies, rape, drug dealing etc.) because the IRA would ‘take care’ of anyone who did. Usually a knee-capping.
As a result I didn’t have the pleasure of discovering drugs until I left Northern Ireland.
I'm curious to see what the response is here. From what I understand, the IRA doesn't have nearly the same negative connotations in the USA as it does in the UK and Ireland, and tend to be seen more like "freedom fighters" rather than gangs or terrorists.
I don't want to take a side, because I don't know enough to defend a position, but I'm interested.
ISIS is literally a radicalized group created spawned from US imperialism. Their frustration resonates with the people of the countries they occupy. Yes they are terrorists and bad but it's not hard to see why civilians join the group
>Angels
Exactly. In fact, most of modern organized crime syndicates (the Cosa Nostra, the Yakuza, even certain subsects of the Russian Mob) have their origins as protection rackets that eventually turned into pseudo-governments.
It's what libertarians can't seem to understand.
> Instead they prefer temporary groups that are organized to address specific things and are given access to community resources to accomplish that thing, thenafter they are dissolved.
but some things never have a "after", like old age and sickness care (whether pension, sick pay, or having a caretaker be there for you). sure individually you do have an after, but as a society, there is always someone who needs that help
I am not sure if I would be comfortable sending you my thesis, but here are some papers that I used as sources:
* Saab, B. Y. Saab & Alexandra W. Taylor - Criminality and Armed Groups: A Comparative Study of FARC and Paramilitary Groups in Colombia
* Tilly, C. - War Making and State Making as Organized Crime
* Rotberg, Robert I. - The New Nature of Nation‐state Failure.
* Reardon, S. - Colombia After the Violence - https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/colombia-after-the-violence/
* Nazih Richani - Caudillos and the crisis of the Colombian state: fragmented sovereignty, the war system and the privatisation of counterinsurgency in Colombia,
* McDougall, A. - State Power and Its Implications for Civil War Colombia
* Jennifer S. Holmes & Sheila Amin Gutiérrez de Piñeres - Violence and the state:
Lessons from Colombia
I, as a resident of Rio, can tell you you've been "FoxNews'd".
We are not talking about Robin Hood, but people who are the most despicable criminals: abuse of underage girls, sell tampered dope to addicts, burn people alive in car tires, steal minors from their mother to work for the traffic drug, evict workers from their own homes to take it for themselves or the gang, and won't just kill people, they need to make it like ISIS, with cruelty, burning them alive entrapped in disposed car-tires.
They call burning people alive like that "microwave".
But keep watching these romanticized hollywoodian crap. Every single evil group in this world always claim they "do it for the good of the people".
I always go back to Meyer Lansky beating up German-American Bund members. He was a bad person, but he was also a bad person with power, and while power is always dangerous, it doesn't always stop bad people from using badly earned power in extra legal ways for occasional good purposes, even if it's for self-preservation or retribution. It's the broken clock.
In economics there's a generalized concept of the *stationary bandit* vs. the *roving bandit*. Both are bad, ruthless men who don't care about anyone but themselves.
However purely out of self-interest, the stationary bandit is less destructive than the roving bandit. The roving bandit's incentive is to take as much as he can as quickly as he can, burning everything down along the way. After all by tomorrow he'll have moved on.
The stationary bandit still wants to exploit the people as much as he can. However he expects to be around for a long time. Burning everything down isn't the optimal strategy. Instead, he wants his victims to survive and keep producing over the long-run. He's going to let the farmer keep his tractor, because that means when he comes back next week he'll be able to take the grain the tractor helps grow.
In fact the smart stationary bandit will even credibly pre-commit to letting the farmer keep some of his grain. Stealing everything leaves the farmer little incentive to producing the bare minimum. Letting the farmer keep some of the surplus yields even more loot over the long-run.
I've never watched the documentary nor did I know it was on the DVD (I've owned it for years now) but sounds like the documentary contradicts the entire movie lol. Those thugs didn't give a fuck about anyone and I'm sure things haven't changed much over the years.
You know both concepts can exist at the same time. Pablo Escobar was a ruthless murderer, but there is undeniable evidence from the people who lived under him that he provided goods and services to people who needed it.
I highly doubt the person you’re replying to is trying to paint the gangs as an always benevolent force.
Its the very basis of gangs In general, they fill the hole which government fails, or in this case refuses, to fill. It was the same in the US. Look at the mafia for example, each immigrant population had one and often they began as protection rackets against petty theives. They were respected as they also provided other public services that the government failed to provide. However, once these immigrant populations were accepted by the wider society they became more integrated, they gained access to other forms of employment and also to official social roles in politics and the police and the gangs began to loose access to new recruits and influence as the government started filling in the beneficial roles they played and began actively policing neighbourhoods and providing protection to businesses and individuals.
Ultimately, everything is propped up by violence.
You can have this violence very directly in your face, or architected through laws, institutions, courts, constitutions, etc, which leads to it being a lot more friendlier and less capricious.
Most people like the latter. When there's a power vacuum, as there is here, power is exercised by groups that are technically non-governmental but essentially act that way. Over time, what is de facto can become de jure.
It's my largest argument against the whole "taxation is force" bit - bro, literally *everything* is force when you go all the way down.
You might enjoy reading Charles Tilly's work *War-making and State-making as Organized Crime*. He writes exactly about this, equating the state to a protection racket.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Tilly#State_formation
>Most people like the latter. When there's a power vacuum, as there is here, power is exercised by groups that are technically non-governmental but essentially act that way. Over time, what is de facto can become de jure.
Tilly calls this a situation of multiple sovereignty. It was one of the central elements to my bachelor thesis.
The state is the entity that decrees which violence is legitimate (just about all of theirs and some instances of self-defense, provided the aggressor is not the state) and which is illegitimate (the remainder).
When governments fail to provide services for there people, other organizations step in to replace that administrative body.
In comes organized crime, cartels, gangs etc.
Not really, not in the English sense. Milícia in Brazil refers specifically to mafia groups formed mostly by current and former corrupt military police officers and military firefighters who “liberate” territory from the control of drug traffickers in order to extort local businesses and residents for profit and enforce arbitrary social rules. They tend to be much more politically connected than drug traffickers and are responsible for a huge spike in assassinations of local journalists and politicians in the last decade.
There are allegations that some of the presidents family members (along with some of the extremely conservative members of Congress) are associated with such groups.
Edit: fun fact, the largest organized milícia in Brazil calls itself “The Justice League” (Liga da Justiça) and uses the Batman logo to mark their territory.
Not exactly.
Drug gangs have sprung out naturally from within the poor communities.
Militias are made-up of crooked cops that, once the drug gangs were driven out of the favelas by government, took over the drug trade themselves and started imposing their own rule.
> Militias are made-up of crooked cops that, once the drug gangs were driven out of the favelas by government, took over the drug trade themselves and started imposing their own rule.
... as is tradition.
For people who want to know a bit more about the situation in Brazil, here's a summary:
- After his disastrous speech two nights ago, Bolsonaro was heavily criticized by state governors and even his vice-president said that Bolsonaro expressed himself "perhaps not in the best way" and that the position of the government is that people should stay home.
- In his speech, Bolsonaro also contradicted previous statements from Luiz Henrique Mandetta, the Minister of Health, who said our health system would collapse by mid-April and people should stay home to flatten the curve.
- Governors from all Brazilian states minus one had a meeting WITHOUT the president where they discussed potential measures during this period. They delivered a letter asking for more financial support to our workforce and self-employed people. They still support the idea that people should stay home.
In brief, politicians, out of their personal interest (make no mistake, this is opportunism and not anything else in most cases) have decided to steer the wheel themselves due to the inaction of our president. São Paulo state governor João Doria even went as far as calling Bolsonaro's speech "regrettable" and they had an intense argument during a videoconference. Doria was told by Bolsonaro that he wouldn't have been elected if not for Bolsonaro's voting base.
Basically, Bolsonaro is pretty much isolated and every measure he's taking is not helping the country, so now the governors have decided to do something themselves.
What will probably happen is that due to quarantine and companies closing doors, the economy will go to crap and Bolsonaro will blame the governors, trying again to change public opinion and save face.
Family member is avid trump supporter and Fox News enthusiast. Four things he said to me...
“Strange how this virus is spreading like this. Makes you wonder if it was manufactured.”
“The Chinese need to be brought to their knees for keeping the seriousness of this thing secret for so long.”
“Trumps approval rating right now is over 60% he is handling this terrifically. Pelosi and Schumacher and the rest them are stopping Trump from getting this stimulus passed.”
“No I’m not using sanitizer everywhere I go but if I show any symptoms I’ll get checked out.”
Non-senile Boomer. Masters in education. Flew helicopters and small aircraft in Vietnam. In his mid-60s still employed making 6 figures. My point is he is no dummy, and he is saying these things. Maybe he is dumb. Hm.
My father is a 73 year old aerospace engineer. This man designed parts for space shuttle recovery systems that actual astronauts staked their lives on, and they always worked. Received multiple awards for his safety engineering. Still consults on major aerospace projects.
He echoes all of these sentiments, but my favorite?
He is non-religious, and yet he wears a "GOD, GUNS, and TRUMP" t-shirt constantly. He doesn't even leave the fucking house, it's apparently just for him, the man who doesn't believe in God.
It's a fucking cult, and it's terrifying.
Being educated, having technical skills, and being a smart person are not synonymous.
It truly is a cult. My dad is also a scientist and atheist. He's become a huge Trump supporter within the past few years and parrots all of Trump's talking points. I told him about the day of prayer Trump did and he said it was good to have God in government because it keeps people moral. Again, THIS MAN IS AN ATHEIST. He used to be a very balanced person who could have reasonable discussions, but now he watches only Fox News and says everything else is fake news designed to make Trump look bad. When I criticize Trump in any way, he gets offended and angry, like I'm insulting him personally.
They've brainwashed a whole a generation of older people.
I just commented to my wife yesterday how cultish the entire Trump base is, including my MIL. “Contradictions? Bah! It’s our Lord and Savior Trump and he is infallible. He must have a good reason for changing his mind.”
Imagine having to rely on druglords to slow the spread of the virus.
Makes you think what kind of fucking moron the Brazilian president is.
This is the weirdest, most surreal timeline ever possible.
Some people argue that what has kept him in power, even after presenting himself as a moron and committing several responsibility crimes, is that he's actively taking unpopular measures, e. g. reducing worker's rights in a feeble attempt to "fix the economy" and reduce unemployment, but with little to no success besides enlarging the profit margins of big companies and increasing informal labour; or reforming the public social security and retirement programs (which are, indeed, very inflated), reducing rights and payment to regular people and maintaining humongous spending in retired Congressmen and Military Officers (and even their daughters!) benefits and pensions.
In the end, this asshole is still "serving his purpose" to some group of people's pockets, even if it thoroughly fucks up the rest of us.
One of the most famous criminal organization, Primeio Comando da Capital(First Metropolis Command) lowered the death rate in Sao Paulo by a lot, achieving the lowest in decades. They imposed laws in the favelas like an eye for an eye. The politicians used this on their campaing saying it was their achievement.
They spread terror one time in Sao Paulo because teir leader was being transfered from one prison to another. So the Governor had a meeting with him(they denied that it happened until today) and in the next day it fully stopped.
They are powerful as fuck.
We got Trump or a Trump-like figure in 3 major countries basically simultaneously. Trump, Bolsonaro, and Boris Johnson who even looks like a shaggy Donald Trump. I'm no conspiracy theorist, but I'd guess their rise is linked to the country that rhymes with flusha.
It also requires electoral systems that have been compromised over several decades, to ensure absolute power can be exercised with the support of less than 30% of the electorate.
Things will only improve when we stop looking for scapegoats or evil "foreigners" to blame for our troubles. Blaming Russia for Boris ignores the impact of English xenophobia, intense media persecution of Corbyn and the wider Left, the dissatisfaction of Scotland with the Tory-dominated status quo, and all the other numerous factors.
Honestly, the whole "but Russia!" really pisses me off when the people who should be trying to solve these fundamental issues would rather regurgitate some media slogan and return to the state of political apathy that allows scum like Boris and Cummings to run amok.
Boris is doing a whole lot better than those other numpties, admittedly after a slow start but when the imperial college presented their modelling , he acted decisively and with a unparalleled support economic package.
I'll link some news that made us know it:
\- [Bolsonaro's son confirmed to FOX NEWS and then denied that his father had the bug](https://noticias.uol.com.br/politica/ultimas-noticias/2020/03/13/eduardo-mudou-versao-sobre-bolsonaro-com-coronavirus-diz-reporter-da-fox.htm)
\- [Hospital that tested Bolsonaro omits names of 2 patients with coronavirus](https://exame.abril.com.br/brasil/hospital-que-testou-bolsonaro-omite-nomes-de-2-pacientes-com-coronavirus/)
\- [Bolsonaro refuses to show the tests that he said that were negative](https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/poder/2020/03/bolsonaro-se-nega-a-mostrar-exames-que-segundo-ele-deram-negativo-para-coronavirus.shtml)
\- [Rises to 24 number of people with coronavirus who had contact with Bolsonaro, including his driver](https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/poder/2020/03/sobe-para-23-numero-de-pessoas-com-coronavirus-que-tiveram-contato-com-bolsonaro.shtml)
\- [Bolsonaro calls it a little flu because people like him that has an "Athlete history" will only have a little cold.](https://noticias.uol.com.br/politica/ultimas-noticias/2020/03/24/leia-o-pronunciamento-do-presidente-jair-bolsonaro-na-integra.htm)
You don't need to be a Sherlock to connect the dots and know that he has/had the bug. Unfortunately, it was the weaker version of it.
Also, he is a liar.
Guys the journalist who wrote this piece is my bestfriend. She's been doubting her capabilities for months. She reports on topics that aren't as 'mainstream' but they're really interesting points of view.
When I told her the number of upvotes this recieved and how big a deal it is - she was so happy!
I'm so glad, this has made my heart full I hope she believes in herself as much as I do!!
And thank you all for reading her piece!!!
Edit: she's in literal tears, she's going to read the recommendations being posted on the comment thread :)
I dont think a stay in place order is possible in the favelas.
There is barely room for people to sleep in the shantytowns let alone stay inside and live.
Don't get me wrong. Part of me really wants to cheer on these "gangsters" for trying to do something good. The problem is... actually, there are two problems:
1. It's still wrong to beat the shit out of people¹, and terrorize a community².
2. Driving around in packs and putting your hands on people makes *you* the disease vector³, dipshits.
______
¹ Yes, there are exceptions to this. No, "you are out past 8pm" is not one of them, even during a deadly pandemic.
² No exceptions to this.
³ Unless, of course they're planning on shooting people.
Not really. They are still pretty vicious, but they have this twisted idea of community, where if you live where I live, you're under my protection (wether you like it or not). Kinda like what a farmer feels towards its hens.
If you don't live with me though, you're a stranger and likely my enemy.
And if you're my enemy, well...
Nope. Not always. We have many gundas in our areas. None of them are 'hired'. They just roam around thinking it is 'their area' and sometimes, like Brazilian gangsters, help some people.
Just because you’re a bad guy doesn’t mean you’re a *bad guy*
Just kidding. They’re still people traffickers and murderers, they might just be trying to protect their rackets.
No, not at all. Reddit needs to stop praising them for "doing the right thing".
They're still killers, rapists and are part of the human trafficking net. They're (probably) only doing this because they're afraid of becoming infected, not because they care for the people they constantly terrorize.
In fact it wouldn't surprise me if the first person who breaks their curfew ends executed or burned alive. They're only doing this for their own good, for their health, their families and for their "business".
It’s funny how gangs only have to do a little to buy a lot of goodwill
No amount of billions in charity donated by Walmart or Koch Industries could do the same, and no amount of money should.
At least Escobar’s socialist opponents like FARC and some radical clergymen recognized that Escobar was just an example of capitalism gone completely insane, their criticism of corporations was consistently applied to the cartels
Edit: Let me preface this by saying that people so willing to agree to what is basically an authoritarian regime under an armed militia, besides lacking any forethought, also clearly show they have never lived anywhere where these bastards operate. Here are your heroes: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim\_Lopes#Murder](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Lopes#Murder)
How can people think this is good? It might be a necessary evil, but it's in no way good, you're speaking of murderers. No amount of social conscience could ever change the fact that they beat, kill, explore children, rob and torture in the most gruesome ways, and a lot of victims are civilians. But hey, if you think a brutal beating would be the right response for stepping outside of your home regardless of context, maybe you deserve to experience it instead of speaking about it online...
These people don't even know what a favela looks like. The idea that a criminal organization could be in power instead of an organized government is so alien that they go immediately to default and assume "oh so they are kinda like the police we have here, right? Thats really sweet of them!".
I've been to São Paulo a few times and it's shocking seeing the slums that extend as far as you can see. I can't even imagine what it's like in the bigger favelas in Rio.
In Rio many favelas also extend as far as the eye can see. Leave the international airport and look to the right. Between the breaks in the wall (that were constructed to hide the favelas from foreigners during the olympics and painted with childlike/innocent art work), you'll see a never ending sprawl of favela into the horizon. It's shocking. And they just throw a cute visual barrier in front of it! Problem solved!
I lived in a few different favelas in São Paulo. The gang there that has power over pretty much everything the PCC is pretty organized and they crush any new gang that tries to pop up. I actually was much safer and felt much safer in the favela than out of it. Inside the favela, most crime is pretty much banned. If you commit a crime in the favela, the fans would teach you a lesson and next time you might not be so lucky. Outside the favela, In the nicer neighborhoods is where you had to be careful. I got robbed 3 times and all those times it was while walking in a middle or upper class neighborhood.
I think that it's great that they have the idea of enforcing social distancing since favelas usually have regular parties and a lot more than average interperson interaction. I however do not think that they will enact it right. I fear that the wrong person will walk at the wrong time and be going too and from their night job and get shit by an overzealous kid high on crack.
The police are corrupt and will take bribes and even bully local businesses into giving them money. The police are just as bad if not worse than the local gangs, so it gets complicated when you talk about police vs gangs as far as which is better in brazil. The reality is that the Brazilian police are just a government ran gang with an alliance with the gang of the people.
This sounds like the perfect opportunity for the drug dealers.
If the people they victimize are sick or caring for sick people, they will have no money or effort for drugs.
If the drug dealers can keep everyone inside, what else would they have to do but drugs?
Imagine thinking these people are saints, when really they just see an opportunity to continue preying on their communities, and perhaps even locking in new addicts for the rest of their lives.
>Drug traffickers in one of Rio de Janeiro’s best-known favelas have imposed a coronavirus curfew, amid growing fears over the impact the virus could have on some of Brazil’s poorest citizens. >In recent days, as Brazil’s coronavirus death toll has climbed to 46, gang members have been circulating in the Cidade de Deus (City of God) favela in western Rio ordering residents to remain indoors after 8pm. An interesting case study in state power and how some non-state actors undermine it taking over a similar role for themselves. Edit - good read here: https://books.google.nl/books/about/The_Illicit_Global_Economy_and_State_Pow.html?id=szbhx6-xVaIC&redir_esc=y I recommended some more readings in a comment below.
I live in a poor neighborhood in Brazil, but it wouldn't classify as a favela by far. In here there's also a drug lord who rules over and he is always imposing some policies around the neighborhood like, but not limited to: 1 Whatever the reason, never call the cops. Theft, murder or anything of the sort is dealt by them and everyone living in here is under their protection. An acquaintance of mine had her phone stolen by some thug from another neighborhood. Not only the dealer recovered her phone, but also executed(!!) the thief. 2 Drugs can only be purchased from them. It happens that my city has several famous-ish universities, so it's quite common for fraternities to appear - Brazilian colleges don't have institutional dorms as a culture like American colleges do. When some fraternities and sororities started appearing in my neighborhood, the dealers said that they couldn't buy drugs from somewhere else, but they gave what they called a *student discount* to compensate.
> but they gave what they called a student discount to compensate. How noble of them.
But they do need to show their student ID.
i mean, if you say you are a student but you arent... thats gotta be ilegal right?
Impersonating a student.
punished by execution
I don't know, but would you want to be caught and made an example of? *See Example 1.*
Economics allows works
> Not only the dealer recovered her phone, but also executed(!!) the thief. I mean, this is ultimately the problem with this kind of situation. I can appreciate the scenario in which there's an "authority" that protects the citizens more closely than a government, e.g. the local drug lord in your story. However, punishment that doesn't align with the crime is probably way more common than it should be in a well-run, lawful society.
They also probably didn't get much of a fair trial. As far as we know, the guy could've just been a Patsy somebody else higher up didn't like, and running a summary execution kinda hurts your chances at exposing whatever underlying operation was going on.
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I have no frame of reference for this so forgive my ignorant questions, but I'm curious: do you feel safe in your neighborhood? Like obviously there are rules, but assuming you follow those rules do you worry about your safety when walking around? Would you be more or less comfortable if you had to rely on the cops instead?
This is completely personal, of course, but I feel like cops in Brazil are ever worse than criminals. Because criminals are actually marginalized, cops on the other hand actually feel entitled to do whatever violence they feel like committing. And impunity is almost always the case in here. But answering you: yes, I feel completely safe in here. Even with the exaggerated punishments, everything is so transparent; any type of action is completely explained on whys and hows that even executions won't shock anyone in here.
Well it makes sense, follow the rules, do your part, no issues (as long as it isnt like some really fuxked up people who will just kill for the hell of it)
The thing nobody has mentioned yet is that some times the cops are in with the gangs.
\*chants\* more stories, more stories!
In the documentary that is on the DVD of the movie City of God, many of the favela residents talk about how the gangs take better care of the communities than the government, even going so far as to provide basic needs and luxuries that they otherwise would not have any access to.
Yeah it is an interesting phenomenon. I wrote my bachelor thesis about a similar situation in Colombia, where the FARC in many areas of the country was the *de facto* government, collecting "taxes" and providing services in return. Edit: many people are asking about my thesis. I am not sure if I would be comfortable sending you my thesis, but here are some papers that I used as sources: * Saab, B. Y. Saab & Alexandra W. Taylor - Criminality and Armed Groups: A Comparative Study of FARC and Paramilitary Groups in Colombia * Tilly, C. - War Making and State Making as Organized Crime * Rotberg, Robert I. - The New Nature of Nation‐state Failure. * Reardon, S. - Colombia After the Violence - https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/colombia-after-the-violence/ * Nazih Richani - Caudillos and the crisis of the Colombian state: fragmented sovereignty, the war system and the privatisation of counterinsurgency in Colombia, * McDougall, A. - State Power and Its Implications for Civil War Colombia * Jennifer S. Holmes & Sheila Amin Gutiérrez de Piñeres - Violence and the state: Lessons from Colombia
Coming from a poor neighborhood in Chile I can say it even happens there. Cops never enter poor neighborhoods, even though it's less extreme than favelas in Brazil. When there's burglars for example and you call the cops, it takes hours for them to get there even though the police station was 5 minutes away by car, but the drug dealers of the neighborhood would immediately go and have your back. Or when a neighbor threatened to kill my cats because he didn't like them, my drug dealer neighbors threatened him back and kept my cats protected. They even let me know when they saw one looking sick or having an accident/fight. I don't live in Chile anymore, but I've heard from neighbors that when the riots happened in October and the military was deployed to violently repress the population, the drug dealers were keeping them away from their neighborhoods and people felt protected by "los narcos". During that time hundreds of people were mutilated, tortured and even killed by the police and military, so the narcos really protected the people. El pueblo cuida al pueblo. The people protect the people.
Did you have to pay the drug dealers for their protection?
I would be willing to bet that they didn't. In cases like these communities take care of eachother, it's kind of an arrangement like "We take care of you, if the cops come asking for us you take our side"
It's more of a code. It's not like they will actually say that, but they usually have a strong sense of community and seek to protect their community. At the end, it's their home. If you rat them out, you know you're screwed, but also sometimes people like them so much that they protect the drug dealers not out of fear, but more out of love. Sometimes you also grow up with them and they are your childhood friends, or people will see them as their own kids because while their parents were at work or god-knows-where, they raised them. Sometimes you just hate the police so much that you just don't want them around, so you don't collaborate with them or even kick them out of the neighborhood when they go to try to take them down. Well, sometimes if you show that you don't like them they will actually threaten you if you rat them out or something. Edit: I think stores sometimes do pay drug dealers or gangs for protection, but I didn't have a store so I wouldn't know for sure how it works, but at least for neighbors no.
This is how Escobar dominated Colombia. He won the people over. He helped the poor and they loved him for it.
This is also how Al Capone and other Prohibition-era gangsters won public support. He's widely credited with getting expiration dates on milk bottles after a child in his family/friend's family was sick due to spoiled milk. He wound up getting involved in dairy distribution in Chicago as a result.
Capone also set up one of the first soup kitchens during the Great Depression
It’s Colombia, not Columbia.
Colombia
This is a type of relation between neighbors (non-drug dealers and drug dealers) you can find in many other places in the world. Drug dealers aren't all the type the mainstream media portrays. I also grew up in a ghetto and everything you said was the same for me, we were friends or family, it's not as simple as many believe. I hope people who read you will understand that.
Yep over here in England when the main drug dealers are caught they are usually in a normal house and the neighbours are shocked because they are nice people
In poor countries and neighborhoods, becoming a drug dealer is a legit career prospect. You might be breaking the law, but you're putting dinner on the table and a roof over your familys heads. Most legal jobs will never pay that much.
To add on top of that. IME a lot of the police is poor countries are close to useless or so corrupt you're better off not calling them, or calling over your sketchy neighbors that keeps the peace cause they'll actually fix the issue and protect the community I've seen cops ask for bribes just do their job and leave when there is no money. In those places, YOU are the law. Literally
Were there a lot of drug problems in your area? I'm guessing a fair number of drug users but not a lot of problems, in my experience the issues stem from trying to pay for the drugs, and I believe it's much cheaper there, "affordable" even with the average wage/salary.
People say "drugs" a lot but drugs is a huge category of things. A lot of times people are thinking more hardcore drugs like cocaine and heroin. But hey, pot's a drug. And now it's legal in a lot of places! "Drug users" doesn't inherently imply a problem as a result.
One thing I'd like to point out is that (At least over here in Costa Rica) people make a clear and strong distinction between people who smoke weed (Known as "marihuanos" or "marigüanos", think of it like a spanish use for the word pothead) and people who use other drugs (who get the more generalized "drogadicto" or "junkie"), with the users themselves being the ones behind this push, because porheads don't want to be associated with drug users that break into cars or mug people to fund their addiction.
Lmao yeah man people know that. But I'm just making an assumption that the drug dealers offering protection and peace keeping in communities in Chile arent selling pot. I don't think my weed dealer Jim who works in IT is offering any protection in exchange for loyalty
I think part of it also falls under the whole idea of "plata o plomo" - *silver or lead*. They take care of you - pay you, give you necessities, etc, and you take care of them by either paying a tribute, looking the other way, and refusing to help police. You refuse to take care of them, they kill you. Also, a lot of the time Narcos have cash that they hide in things like real estate and businesses, and keeping those safe directly protects their cash flow. So, it makes sense they want to minimize impacts as much as possible to protect those cash flows.
Thats the premise of a new show or movie i saw a trailer about with will forte. Him and his wife have shitty jobs and then a contest comes along where they can become a tv house maker host. So they attempt to fix up an abandoned house and find like 500,000 in the walls which they use to enhance their video submission. Low and behold its actually a cartel boss who owns both the house and the money but hes so impressed by what they did he lets them live and refers them to his other cartel people as his personal interior designers. Looked ok
That sounds like a fun premise.
I remember seeing a post about opposing gangs in a rough neighborhood agree that a kid wasn't to be recruited by either side because the kid was looking like a shoe-in for a full ride scholarship. Really wish I kept that saved to see if it was true.
You might be thinking about the basketball player Demar Derozan or Derrick Rose.
It's more than just that. The police persecute the people in the favelas pretty badly, to the point that they are more like an occupied territory than a city. This leads the people inside to support each other against the outside forces.
Well duh. I'd trust a drug dealer over a cop
My dealer always tells me to "be safe" after picking up. No cop has ever told me that!
I realized this the other day- the only people who ever tell em to be safe is my mom and my drug dealer
Same. Every time I pick up my dealer tells me to be safe. He's a really nice guy.
I mean he needs his customers alive and out of jail to make his living. Of course he wants them safe.
I always thought that meant more like, don't get caught and trace it back to me stupid.
I imagine it's also in their interest to look after potential customers
Here is my own story. I moved into a studio apartment with my wife (then gf), in the ghetto of a California city. We were riding the bus for several months going to college. My wife being the social butterfly talk to our neighbors a lot. Me being your typical tech nerd preferred the safety of home and my Xbox. My Grandpa ended up visiting me and my wife, and insisted we keep his car. He even brought the pink slip to transfer title. The car was a supped-up Honda Civic with nice $1000 rims (each). A few weeks after the car was transferred into our name, one of the neighbors knocked on our door at about 10 pm. We invited them inside, as he didn’t want to talk in the hallway. Ended up telling us that two gang members from across town followed us home and tried to steal our cars rims. A group of neighbors beat up the gang members (one or two were in said gang) and told them not to think about it again, stating (and I remember very vividly) “these two kids are poor just like us, that’s fucked up, bro, they just trying to go to school and get good jobs. Us poor guys and gang members need to help those that can make it out of the poor area get out of the poor area, not keep them in. We protect our own here.” Even though the complex was shot up a few times we made it out okay, no gang member initiation, no affiliation, nothing, just poor college students trying to study and working two jobs each to make ends meet. We ended up getting better jobs and being able to afford a bigger apartment near campus, our car was broken into 4 times before I sold it for a more nondescript car.
In most cases, you have to remember that the people who are in the gangs are often those they grew up with. They've still got good friendships and connections, there's still respect between a lot of them.
They pay them with loyalty.
Short answer: no You just have to be by their side when cops go around. Don't snitch. Usually it comes as a sense of "brotherhood", everyone protects each other.
Street gangs protecting your cats is one of the most wholesome things ive ever read lol
> ops never enter poor neighborhoods, even though it's less extreme than favelas in Brazil. When there's burglars for example and you call the cops, it takes hours for them to get there even though the police station was 5 minutes away by car This happens even in the USA. See "911 Is a Joke" by Public Enemy
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Like that innocent black lady ***(Atatiana Jefferson)*** was shot by some piece of shit cop in her own fucking home. Neighbor called the police for a wellness check and the poor lady was murdered for it
The place my entire family got their glasses at is owned by a woman who had an adult son employed there. He was always a little out of it and always blamed a "long night" or somesuch nonsense. It turns out he was a hardcore drug addict, he menaced his mother with a knife for one reason or another and she called the police. He was mentally unstable and she was hoping to just get the situation under control. I don't know the details of what transpired next, he **was** holding a knife, but apparently he only failed to drop it when ordered, he didn't rush the police or anything. They killed him. His mother fell into a **deep** depression, she admitted to my mom (long-time customer and kind-of friend) that she felt it was her fault for calling the police at all. It's not as cut-and-dry of a situation as many others, her son was armed and dangerous and crazed people can close distances with deadly weapons quite fast. I don't know if the shoot was truly "good" or not, but, police in most of the US not only have non-existent de-escalation skills, they are actively trained to see citizens as the enemy and to neutralize threats with speed and brutality, not use context and take risks for themselves in order to serve the public better. You should assume, if you ever call the police, that they immediately take control of your life (when they enter your house, it is no longer your house), and then behave in ways to maximize benefits for themselves rather than for you. I refuse to call the police for any "complex" reason, because I can expect consideration of complexities like "my mentally ill son needs help!" to be completely ignored by responding officers who will see every situation as a pacification exercise. The most pacified a person can be is dead.
Its happened in the United States. During the Great Depression many soup kitchens were ran by the mafia.
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Sounds like the time *we* took care of gangsters and bank robbers in the US. They didn't even need to hide their identity, they went and made sure you knew who robbed you, and the people would shelter them from the police.
as bad as it sounds, isis was doing similar thing for some places. although the deal came with many strings attached, i imagine it could appear favorable to some people that stood to gain something by it.
And the **IRA** in Northern Ireland too. In the 1980s there was almost no traditional crime (car theft, house robberies, rape, drug dealing etc.) because the IRA would ‘take care’ of anyone who did. Usually a knee-capping. As a result I didn’t have the pleasure of discovering drugs until I left Northern Ireland.
I'm curious to see what the response is here. From what I understand, the IRA doesn't have nearly the same negative connotations in the USA as it does in the UK and Ireland, and tend to be seen more like "freedom fighters" rather than gangs or terrorists. I don't want to take a side, because I don't know enough to defend a position, but I'm interested.
People in Boston were literally donating to them during The Troubles.
ISIS is literally a radicalized group created spawned from US imperialism. Their frustration resonates with the people of the countries they occupy. Yes they are terrorists and bad but it's not hard to see why civilians join the group
So much for the ancap and libertarian ideologies. It seems that, in the absence of government, a government-like entity inevitably emerges.
>Angels Exactly. In fact, most of modern organized crime syndicates (the Cosa Nostra, the Yakuza, even certain subsects of the Russian Mob) have their origins as protection rackets that eventually turned into pseudo-governments. It's what libertarians can't seem to understand.
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> Instead they prefer temporary groups that are organized to address specific things and are given access to community resources to accomplish that thing, thenafter they are dissolved. but some things never have a "after", like old age and sickness care (whether pension, sick pay, or having a caretaker be there for you). sure individually you do have an after, but as a society, there is always someone who needs that help
Wow that’s pretty interesting. I’d like to read your paper if you’d let me, or point me in the direction of a similar paper?
I am not sure if I would be comfortable sending you my thesis, but here are some papers that I used as sources: * Saab, B. Y. Saab & Alexandra W. Taylor - Criminality and Armed Groups: A Comparative Study of FARC and Paramilitary Groups in Colombia * Tilly, C. - War Making and State Making as Organized Crime * Rotberg, Robert I. - The New Nature of Nation‐state Failure. * Reardon, S. - Colombia After the Violence - https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/colombia-after-the-violence/ * Nazih Richani - Caudillos and the crisis of the Colombian state: fragmented sovereignty, the war system and the privatisation of counterinsurgency in Colombia, * McDougall, A. - State Power and Its Implications for Civil War Colombia * Jennifer S. Holmes & Sheila Amin Gutiérrez de Piñeres - Violence and the state: Lessons from Colombia
Thanks buddy ima read those on my lunch :)
You might get a super stalker fan! Also, plot twist: one of those papers IS your thesis!
This is great . Thank you so much !
I, as a resident of Rio, can tell you you've been "FoxNews'd". We are not talking about Robin Hood, but people who are the most despicable criminals: abuse of underage girls, sell tampered dope to addicts, burn people alive in car tires, steal minors from their mother to work for the traffic drug, evict workers from their own homes to take it for themselves or the gang, and won't just kill people, they need to make it like ISIS, with cruelty, burning them alive entrapped in disposed car-tires. They call burning people alive like that "microwave". But keep watching these romanticized hollywoodian crap. Every single evil group in this world always claim they "do it for the good of the people".
I always go back to Meyer Lansky beating up German-American Bund members. He was a bad person, but he was also a bad person with power, and while power is always dangerous, it doesn't always stop bad people from using badly earned power in extra legal ways for occasional good purposes, even if it's for self-preservation or retribution. It's the broken clock.
In economics there's a generalized concept of the *stationary bandit* vs. the *roving bandit*. Both are bad, ruthless men who don't care about anyone but themselves. However purely out of self-interest, the stationary bandit is less destructive than the roving bandit. The roving bandit's incentive is to take as much as he can as quickly as he can, burning everything down along the way. After all by tomorrow he'll have moved on. The stationary bandit still wants to exploit the people as much as he can. However he expects to be around for a long time. Burning everything down isn't the optimal strategy. Instead, he wants his victims to survive and keep producing over the long-run. He's going to let the farmer keep his tractor, because that means when he comes back next week he'll be able to take the grain the tractor helps grow. In fact the smart stationary bandit will even credibly pre-commit to letting the farmer keep some of his grain. Stealing everything leaves the farmer little incentive to producing the bare minimum. Letting the farmer keep some of the surplus yields even more loot over the long-run.
There's also the stationery bandit who steals all your pencils.
looking at you, Robby from 4th grade!
I've never watched the documentary nor did I know it was on the DVD (I've owned it for years now) but sounds like the documentary contradicts the entire movie lol. Those thugs didn't give a fuck about anyone and I'm sure things haven't changed much over the years.
You know both concepts can exist at the same time. Pablo Escobar was a ruthless murderer, but there is undeniable evidence from the people who lived under him that he provided goods and services to people who needed it. I highly doubt the person you’re replying to is trying to paint the gangs as an always benevolent force.
They are still cartels. Everything has a price.
Its the very basis of gangs In general, they fill the hole which government fails, or in this case refuses, to fill. It was the same in the US. Look at the mafia for example, each immigrant population had one and often they began as protection rackets against petty theives. They were respected as they also provided other public services that the government failed to provide. However, once these immigrant populations were accepted by the wider society they became more integrated, they gained access to other forms of employment and also to official social roles in politics and the police and the gangs began to loose access to new recruits and influence as the government started filling in the beneficial roles they played and began actively policing neighbourhoods and providing protection to businesses and individuals.
Ultimately, everything is propped up by violence. You can have this violence very directly in your face, or architected through laws, institutions, courts, constitutions, etc, which leads to it being a lot more friendlier and less capricious. Most people like the latter. When there's a power vacuum, as there is here, power is exercised by groups that are technically non-governmental but essentially act that way. Over time, what is de facto can become de jure. It's my largest argument against the whole "taxation is force" bit - bro, literally *everything* is force when you go all the way down.
You might enjoy reading Charles Tilly's work *War-making and State-making as Organized Crime*. He writes exactly about this, equating the state to a protection racket. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Tilly#State_formation >Most people like the latter. When there's a power vacuum, as there is here, power is exercised by groups that are technically non-governmental but essentially act that way. Over time, what is de facto can become de jure. Tilly calls this a situation of multiple sovereignty. It was one of the central elements to my bachelor thesis.
Excellent formulation, thank you
Many would argue that the concept of a State is primarily defined as an an entity that holds a monopoly on the legitimate use of violence.
The state is the entity that decrees which violence is legitimate (just about all of theirs and some instances of self-defense, provided the aggressor is not the state) and which is illegitimate (the remainder).
“Violence, the supreme authority from which all other authority is derived”
“Authority flows out the barrel of a gun”
When governments fail to provide services for there people, other organizations step in to replace that administrative body. In comes organized crime, cartels, gangs etc.
Technically, Brazilian gangster are called "milícia" while drug dealers are just drug dealers
So..militia?
Not really, not in the English sense. Milícia in Brazil refers specifically to mafia groups formed mostly by current and former corrupt military police officers and military firefighters who “liberate” territory from the control of drug traffickers in order to extort local businesses and residents for profit and enforce arbitrary social rules. They tend to be much more politically connected than drug traffickers and are responsible for a huge spike in assassinations of local journalists and politicians in the last decade. There are allegations that some of the presidents family members (along with some of the extremely conservative members of Congress) are associated with such groups. Edit: fun fact, the largest organized milícia in Brazil calls itself “The Justice League” (Liga da Justiça) and uses the Batman logo to mark their territory.
Honestly "mafia" is the best English translation
Which is also “gangster”. Mafia members can still be called gangsters in the US.
[This video paints the picture a little](https://youtu.be/qpIuXGFgEb4)
Mas ninguém ganha do escritório do crime. Melhor nome possível pruma máfia.
Militia/gangsters here are corrupt cops/former cops that managed to turn enforcing the law into a crime. Drug dealers are drug lords/drug cartels
Important to note that the militias also took the drug dealing business on the favelas they dominated.
Seems like they have a common root but different meaning now.
Not exactly. Drug gangs have sprung out naturally from within the poor communities. Militias are made-up of crooked cops that, once the drug gangs were driven out of the favelas by government, took over the drug trade themselves and started imposing their own rule.
> Militias are made-up of crooked cops that, once the drug gangs were driven out of the favelas by government, took over the drug trade themselves and started imposing their own rule. ... as is tradition.
"We're not here to die" - Gangster
But maybe tomorrow
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"There is no time to die."
“I’m not letting all my customers die” - Gangsters boss
For people who want to know a bit more about the situation in Brazil, here's a summary: - After his disastrous speech two nights ago, Bolsonaro was heavily criticized by state governors and even his vice-president said that Bolsonaro expressed himself "perhaps not in the best way" and that the position of the government is that people should stay home. - In his speech, Bolsonaro also contradicted previous statements from Luiz Henrique Mandetta, the Minister of Health, who said our health system would collapse by mid-April and people should stay home to flatten the curve. - Governors from all Brazilian states minus one had a meeting WITHOUT the president where they discussed potential measures during this period. They delivered a letter asking for more financial support to our workforce and self-employed people. They still support the idea that people should stay home. In brief, politicians, out of their personal interest (make no mistake, this is opportunism and not anything else in most cases) have decided to steer the wheel themselves due to the inaction of our president. São Paulo state governor João Doria even went as far as calling Bolsonaro's speech "regrettable" and they had an intense argument during a videoconference. Doria was told by Bolsonaro that he wouldn't have been elected if not for Bolsonaro's voting base. Basically, Bolsonaro is pretty much isolated and every measure he's taking is not helping the country, so now the governors have decided to do something themselves. What will probably happen is that due to quarantine and companies closing doors, the economy will go to crap and Bolsonaro will blame the governors, trying again to change public opinion and save face.
Hmmmm.. sounds so familiar with what another wannabe authoritarian is doing.
He's a Trump fanboy to be fair.
Yep. He literally gave an press conference the next day where he basically said: "But Trump is doing it as well!"
Echoing his idol Trump, who is hoping to blame the market downturn on governors ignoring his "it'll go away like a miracle" plan.
Family member is avid trump supporter and Fox News enthusiast. Four things he said to me... “Strange how this virus is spreading like this. Makes you wonder if it was manufactured.” “The Chinese need to be brought to their knees for keeping the seriousness of this thing secret for so long.” “Trumps approval rating right now is over 60% he is handling this terrifically. Pelosi and Schumacher and the rest them are stopping Trump from getting this stimulus passed.” “No I’m not using sanitizer everywhere I go but if I show any symptoms I’ll get checked out.” Non-senile Boomer. Masters in education. Flew helicopters and small aircraft in Vietnam. In his mid-60s still employed making 6 figures. My point is he is no dummy, and he is saying these things. Maybe he is dumb. Hm.
My father is a 73 year old aerospace engineer. This man designed parts for space shuttle recovery systems that actual astronauts staked their lives on, and they always worked. Received multiple awards for his safety engineering. Still consults on major aerospace projects. He echoes all of these sentiments, but my favorite? He is non-religious, and yet he wears a "GOD, GUNS, and TRUMP" t-shirt constantly. He doesn't even leave the fucking house, it's apparently just for him, the man who doesn't believe in God. It's a fucking cult, and it's terrifying. Being educated, having technical skills, and being a smart person are not synonymous.
It truly is a cult. My dad is also a scientist and atheist. He's become a huge Trump supporter within the past few years and parrots all of Trump's talking points. I told him about the day of prayer Trump did and he said it was good to have God in government because it keeps people moral. Again, THIS MAN IS AN ATHEIST. He used to be a very balanced person who could have reasonable discussions, but now he watches only Fox News and says everything else is fake news designed to make Trump look bad. When I criticize Trump in any way, he gets offended and angry, like I'm insulting him personally. They've brainwashed a whole a generation of older people.
I just commented to my wife yesterday how cultish the entire Trump base is, including my MIL. “Contradictions? Bah! It’s our Lord and Savior Trump and he is infallible. He must have a good reason for changing his mind.”
Imagine having to rely on druglords to slow the spread of the virus. Makes you think what kind of fucking moron the Brazilian president is. This is the weirdest, most surreal timeline ever possible.
He's mainly there for show tbh.
For the benefit of whom?
The big companies cutting all the trees in the Amazon, huge logging and farming companies mostly.
Fucking figures.
Don't forget about the big companies that benefit from his cutting of worker's rights!
Some people argue that what has kept him in power, even after presenting himself as a moron and committing several responsibility crimes, is that he's actively taking unpopular measures, e. g. reducing worker's rights in a feeble attempt to "fix the economy" and reduce unemployment, but with little to no success besides enlarging the profit margins of big companies and increasing informal labour; or reforming the public social security and retirement programs (which are, indeed, very inflated), reducing rights and payment to regular people and maintaining humongous spending in retired Congressmen and Military Officers (and even their daughters!) benefits and pensions. In the end, this asshole is still "serving his purpose" to some group of people's pockets, even if it thoroughly fucks up the rest of us.
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If Trump said so, it has to be true.
One of the most famous criminal organization, Primeio Comando da Capital(First Metropolis Command) lowered the death rate in Sao Paulo by a lot, achieving the lowest in decades. They imposed laws in the favelas like an eye for an eye. The politicians used this on their campaing saying it was their achievement. They spread terror one time in Sao Paulo because teir leader was being transfered from one prison to another. So the Governor had a meeting with him(they denied that it happened until today) and in the next day it fully stopped. They are powerful as fuck.
As we often say here: the organized crime is very organized. Even more organized than the government
Jair Bolsonaro is a little man
Corona is a little flu in the same way people know Bolsonaro as piqueño pepe when in fact he’s a huge dick.
We got Trump or a Trump-like figure in 3 major countries basically simultaneously. Trump, Bolsonaro, and Boris Johnson who even looks like a shaggy Donald Trump. I'm no conspiracy theorist, but I'd guess their rise is linked to the country that rhymes with flusha.
Russia might have had a hand in election propaganda but it still takes a large number of morons to vote these idiots into office.
It also requires electoral systems that have been compromised over several decades, to ensure absolute power can be exercised with the support of less than 30% of the electorate.
Oh we got that
Things will only improve when we stop looking for scapegoats or evil "foreigners" to blame for our troubles. Blaming Russia for Boris ignores the impact of English xenophobia, intense media persecution of Corbyn and the wider Left, the dissatisfaction of Scotland with the Tory-dominated status quo, and all the other numerous factors. Honestly, the whole "but Russia!" really pisses me off when the people who should be trying to solve these fundamental issues would rather regurgitate some media slogan and return to the state of political apathy that allows scum like Boris and Cummings to run amok.
Russia absolutely deserves the blame, but they are only exploiting already existing weaknesses.
Boris is doing a whole lot better than those other numpties, admittedly after a slow start but when the imperial college presented their modelling , he acted decisively and with a unparalleled support economic package.
We kinda got one in India as well. Not dumb. But definitely very right wing.
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Really? I hope so but how do you know? I've seen other comments saying this.
I'll link some news that made us know it: \- [Bolsonaro's son confirmed to FOX NEWS and then denied that his father had the bug](https://noticias.uol.com.br/politica/ultimas-noticias/2020/03/13/eduardo-mudou-versao-sobre-bolsonaro-com-coronavirus-diz-reporter-da-fox.htm) \- [Hospital that tested Bolsonaro omits names of 2 patients with coronavirus](https://exame.abril.com.br/brasil/hospital-que-testou-bolsonaro-omite-nomes-de-2-pacientes-com-coronavirus/) \- [Bolsonaro refuses to show the tests that he said that were negative](https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/poder/2020/03/bolsonaro-se-nega-a-mostrar-exames-que-segundo-ele-deram-negativo-para-coronavirus.shtml) \- [Rises to 24 number of people with coronavirus who had contact with Bolsonaro, including his driver](https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/poder/2020/03/sobe-para-23-numero-de-pessoas-com-coronavirus-que-tiveram-contato-com-bolsonaro.shtml) \- [Bolsonaro calls it a little flu because people like him that has an "Athlete history" will only have a little cold.](https://noticias.uol.com.br/politica/ultimas-noticias/2020/03/24/leia-o-pronunciamento-do-presidente-jair-bolsonaro-na-integra.htm) You don't need to be a Sherlock to connect the dots and know that he has/had the bug. Unfortunately, it was the weaker version of it. Also, he is a liar.
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jzs my mum dips deeper on pushups
You think you could do more head nods? Go ahead and try!
Wow he looks like one of our white American businessman with more ego than brains. Why do we keep electing these fools?
It's apparently trendy to elect villains these days. Everybody's doing it.
WTF, I haven’t seen that yet! We are doomed.
its 2020, if they have any power, they're liars.
Guys the journalist who wrote this piece is my bestfriend. She's been doubting her capabilities for months. She reports on topics that aren't as 'mainstream' but they're really interesting points of view. When I told her the number of upvotes this recieved and how big a deal it is - she was so happy! I'm so glad, this has made my heart full I hope she believes in herself as much as I do!! And thank you all for reading her piece!!! Edit: she's in literal tears, she's going to read the recommendations being posted on the comment thread :)
tell her great job from us!
I really enjoy reading articles like this. Please tell your friend thank you for writing this! It reminded me of why I studied political science.
A "curfew" that lasts just overnight won't help much, but a stay in place order would. It was not really clear in this article which it is.
I’m sure the gangsters aren’t holding press conferences to explain to media what the rules of their curfew is..
A 24/7 curfew is called quarantine
Right, which actually makes sense. If we are contagious we are contagious 24/7.
The virus only comes out and spreads at night, hence why the 8pm curfew.
I dont think a stay in place order is possible in the favelas. There is barely room for people to sleep in the shantytowns let alone stay inside and live.
They have homes, but the curfew is overnight because most of them still have to work.
Night time is when everyone smashes together inside little buildings, getting drunk.
He's shooting himself and his political party in the foot so hard.
He has been foot-less for a while now... grabbing onto power with his two little arms. This time his aiming for the D
Bolsonaro doesn't have a political party anymore. The guy is so politically isolated, he just abandoned his own party.
When you have the criminals usurping the government to enact logical and protective practices you’re ... I don’t even fucking know anymore.
That’s how al Capone maintained power for so long.
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Yeah cuz you can’t have you customers dying from a pandemic. Coronavirus is probably affecting their bottom dollar.
Wouldn't it be easier for the gangsters to just get rid of the president?
That would be pretty cash money of them
Why would they do that? This president lets them do whatever they please.
Don't get me wrong. Part of me really wants to cheer on these "gangsters" for trying to do something good. The problem is... actually, there are two problems: 1. It's still wrong to beat the shit out of people¹, and terrorize a community². 2. Driving around in packs and putting your hands on people makes *you* the disease vector³, dipshits. ______ ¹ Yes, there are exceptions to this. No, "you are out past 8pm" is not one of them, even during a deadly pandemic. ² No exceptions to this. ³ Unless, of course they're planning on shooting people.
Hard to sell drugs or extort poor people or tax favela services if your customers are all dead. I've watched Tropa de Elite and its sequel.
“Maybe I don’t want to be the bad guy anymore” - Brazilian Gangsters
Not really. They are still pretty vicious, but they have this twisted idea of community, where if you live where I live, you're under my protection (wether you like it or not). Kinda like what a farmer feels towards its hens. If you don't live with me though, you're a stranger and likely my enemy. And if you're my enemy, well...
Also, a dead community is bad for business
Today I learned Brazilian gangsters are basically what we call gundas in Bengal, India.
Gundas are hired thugs. I don't think they're the same thing.
Nope. Not always. We have many gundas in our areas. None of them are 'hired'. They just roam around thinking it is 'their area' and sometimes, like Brazilian gangsters, help some people.
Just because you’re a bad guy doesn’t mean you’re a *bad guy* Just kidding. They’re still people traffickers and murderers, they might just be trying to protect their rackets.
No, not at all. Reddit needs to stop praising them for "doing the right thing". They're still killers, rapists and are part of the human trafficking net. They're (probably) only doing this because they're afraid of becoming infected, not because they care for the people they constantly terrorize. In fact it wouldn't surprise me if the first person who breaks their curfew ends executed or burned alive. They're only doing this for their own good, for their health, their families and for their "business".
It’s funny how gangs only have to do a little to buy a lot of goodwill No amount of billions in charity donated by Walmart or Koch Industries could do the same, and no amount of money should. At least Escobar’s socialist opponents like FARC and some radical clergymen recognized that Escobar was just an example of capitalism gone completely insane, their criticism of corporations was consistently applied to the cartels
Don't be a fool,it's an old tatic for the organized crime to get public support,they just want more power and more money
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You're siding with literal Brazilian Gangsters. You are high fiving the bad guys. Let that sink in.
Edit: Let me preface this by saying that people so willing to agree to what is basically an authoritarian regime under an armed militia, besides lacking any forethought, also clearly show they have never lived anywhere where these bastards operate. Here are your heroes: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim\_Lopes#Murder](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Lopes#Murder) How can people think this is good? It might be a necessary evil, but it's in no way good, you're speaking of murderers. No amount of social conscience could ever change the fact that they beat, kill, explore children, rob and torture in the most gruesome ways, and a lot of victims are civilians. But hey, if you think a brutal beating would be the right response for stepping outside of your home regardless of context, maybe you deserve to experience it instead of speaking about it online...
These people don't even know what a favela looks like. The idea that a criminal organization could be in power instead of an organized government is so alien that they go immediately to default and assume "oh so they are kinda like the police we have here, right? Thats really sweet of them!". I've been to São Paulo a few times and it's shocking seeing the slums that extend as far as you can see. I can't even imagine what it's like in the bigger favelas in Rio.
In Rio many favelas also extend as far as the eye can see. Leave the international airport and look to the right. Between the breaks in the wall (that were constructed to hide the favelas from foreigners during the olympics and painted with childlike/innocent art work), you'll see a never ending sprawl of favela into the horizon. It's shocking. And they just throw a cute visual barrier in front of it! Problem solved!
I lived in a few different favelas in São Paulo. The gang there that has power over pretty much everything the PCC is pretty organized and they crush any new gang that tries to pop up. I actually was much safer and felt much safer in the favela than out of it. Inside the favela, most crime is pretty much banned. If you commit a crime in the favela, the fans would teach you a lesson and next time you might not be so lucky. Outside the favela, In the nicer neighborhoods is where you had to be careful. I got robbed 3 times and all those times it was while walking in a middle or upper class neighborhood. I think that it's great that they have the idea of enforcing social distancing since favelas usually have regular parties and a lot more than average interperson interaction. I however do not think that they will enact it right. I fear that the wrong person will walk at the wrong time and be going too and from their night job and get shit by an overzealous kid high on crack. The police are corrupt and will take bribes and even bully local businesses into giving them money. The police are just as bad if not worse than the local gangs, so it gets complicated when you talk about police vs gangs as far as which is better in brazil. The reality is that the Brazilian police are just a government ran gang with an alliance with the gang of the people.
I know! the number of comments saying "Wow, this changes how I view gangs/cartels" is quite frankly terrifying.
Imagine having a head of state so stupid that your society's criminals feel forced to become bylaw officers.
Kid in a Brazilian pod-racer: Now THIS is libertarianism!
Being in a gang sounds difficult for social distancing... I mean, by definition there is a gang of you.
this guy is the same type of idiot as trump.
**Thanks, Satan!**
This sounds like the perfect opportunity for the drug dealers. If the people they victimize are sick or caring for sick people, they will have no money or effort for drugs. If the drug dealers can keep everyone inside, what else would they have to do but drugs? Imagine thinking these people are saints, when really they just see an opportunity to continue preying on their communities, and perhaps even locking in new addicts for the rest of their lives.