Charivari Time.

Being a brief discourse upon the practice of SONICK PROTEST otherwise known as ROUGH MUSIC, PANELAÇO or CHIVARI, that was latterly revived in the PORTUGUESE COLONIES of BRAZIL born of a most UNGODLY CONTUMELY against their DULY APPOINTED MASTERS, accompanied by sundry philosophical disquisitions upon that most heathen abomination, DEMOCRACY.

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The Perfect Indictment of Capitalism.

From the closing scenes of The Constant Gardener (the movie):  

So who has got away with murder? Not, of course, the British government. They merely covered up, as one does, the offensive corpses. Though not literally. That was done by person or persons unknown. So who has committed murder? Not, of course, the highly respectable firm of KDH Pharmaceutical, which has enjoyed record profits this quarter, and has now licensed ZimbaMed of Harare, to continue testing Dypraxa in Africa. No, there are no murders in Africa. Only regrettable deaths. And from those deaths we derive the benefits of civilization, benefits we can afford so easily... because those lives were bought so cheaply.

Postcolonial Dictatorship Blues.

Updated on Saturday, February 1, 2014 at 10:01AM by Matt Phipps

Following yesterday's piece about the weekend’s protests against the World Cup, I decided to work up a piece about what I perceive to be an endemic lack of accountability in Brazilian culture, with some speculation as to how it arose.

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Não Vai Ter Copa

As you may have seen or read in your own national media, there were more protests in central São Paulo on Saturday night. This time they were against the World Cup being staged in Brazil (as opposed to the hike in bus fares that was the flashpoint for last year’s protests), and, as with the previous demonstrations, they didn’t come off peacefully.

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Pax Brasilia.

Are the current protests the end of Brazil as we know it? And how did Brazil get into this state in the first place? I argue that one reason for the current anger might be a newfound ability to protest against decades, if not centuries, of rigidly demarcated social stratification resulting from a history that is, by contrast with other countries around the world, relatively unaffected by the traumas of war.

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