sábado, 15 de junho de 2013

Winter is [NOT] coming - A dream of spring



The Starks used to say: "Winter is coming". If you have ever watched and/or read the series of books from George Martin, you know what it means. However, winter is not coming in Brazil. It is not even ending. So, how can spring be coming? We can say that the "spring equinox" in the arabic world was December 18th, 2010. The Arab Spring was marked by protests, conflicts, and civil wars. The main causes are the dictatorial regimes, the violation of human rights, corruption, economic problems, unemployment, etc. Certainly the two main goals of the Arab Spring were to bring down the dictatorships and preserve human rights, and these goals demanded popular mobilization and an armed conflict, since obviously whoever was in power would not give it up without a fight.

"It is not only 20 cents", say the mobs about the real cause for these protests. In the beginning it was only 20 cents, the real cause for the mobilization. It is nice to say that the 20 cents were not the cause, but they were. Nevertheless after the violent [re?]action from the police the movement changed. New goals arose, and what once was a protest against the increase of the bus price by 20 cents became the dissatisfaction of the people with their (mostly) corrupt government, the low quality of the health, educational and transportation systems, and public safety problems.

These may have been the most expensive 20 cents of the brazilian history. It may have tiggered what many have been referring to as "Brazilian Spring". This may be the beginning of a popular revolution, and a landmark upon which new conquests will be built. Yet this is not spring. Spring is not coming in Brazil. Many people would like to fight for a better world. I sincerely admire their idealism, and pray that they go on, but we do not have a government killing millions. We do not have a government censoring the internet. We do not have a dictatorship restricting out individual freedom.  [We have Marco Feliciano tough] We do have public safety problems, corruption scandals, low quality health and educational systems. It is worth fighting for all this, but let's not compare our fight with the arabic one. Let's not bring their revolution down to the level of our protests by making this kind of comparison. We are not in winter as they once were, and therefore we can not expect spring to come.

Postado por às