Heterosexual pride day in Sao Paulo

[imrthr]

What next -

 

Has anyone seen this article?

 

Brazil is suppose to be so gay friendly. This article seems to say otherwise:

 

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Americas/Latin-America-Monitor/2011/0804/Heterosexual-Pride-Day-in-Sao-Paulo

[trilingual]

There's been some coverage of this in the last week by the Folha de São Paulo, Brazil's largest paper. (Now available in English and Spanish editions.) It's ridiculous, of course. EVERY day is Heterosexual Pride Day! Hopefully the mayor won't sign this legislation. Brazil is like any other country -- they have right-wing politicians and evangelicals are an important voting bloc. But they seem to be the minority viewpoint. Most Brazilians seem to subscribe to the live-and-let-live point of view!

[imrthr]

snip snip

 

- - Brazil is like any other country -- they have right-wing politicians and evangelicals are an important voting bloc. But they seem to be the minority viewpoint. Most Brazilians seem to subscribe to the live-and-let-live point of view!

 

While I agree that most Brazilians seem to "live-and-let-live" it is difficult to ignore statistics. In the article cited, this section is not very comforting -

 

"While São Paulo is home to a vibrant gay scene, homophobia is a constant concern. The legislation comes just a few weeks after a conservative congressman in the capital Brasilia courted controversy by apparently calling blacks promiscuous, and then declaring himself proud to be prejudiced against gays. And last month a group of youths attacked and maimed a father they thought was gay because he hugged his teenage son.

 

A homosexual is killed every 36 hours in Brazil, according to the Gay Group of Bahia, Brazil’s oldest homosexual rights organization. The number of gays killed has risen 113 percent over the last five years, the group said."

 

If the statistics are correct, and if there really is an increase in the killing of gays in Brazil, that cannot be a good sign.

 

Fortunately, during my many trips to Brazil, I have never seen any distain like is reported in the article.

-

[excelntsvc]

cannot imagine why you find this so shocking

 

while there have been advances in gay rights in Latin American countries, remember that they are overwhelmingly Catholic and that the Church exercises great leverage. In Buenos Aires last year both the Catholic and Mormon churches extensively funded the opposition to gay marriage ... and thankfully lost, tho visible gay activities are limited to major metropolitan centers

 

the US does not own the "patent" on homophobic bigotry

 

enjoy Brazil or any country ... and take measure to ensure you are safe

[trilingual]

Brazil is officially a secular nation and has been for more than a century. The Church isn't established, the way it is (or has been) in Argentina and some other Latin American countries. The number of people calling themselves "Catholic" has eroded substantially. (Unfortunately, many have migrated to evangelical churches.) The Church still has an important voice in Brazil, but on the whole it doesn't have that much leverage, especially in matters of personal morality. As Church records demonstrate, sexual promiscuity and same-sex relations have been popular pastimes in Brazil since it was settled by Europeans in the early 1500s. Members of the clergy were eager participants in the fun! Hypocrisy has run rampant, as well, but the bottom line is that Brazilians have been merrily having sex just about every which way since it has existed, and with few adverse consequences! The Portuguese Church itself was pretty lax -- it was never as rigid as Spanish Catholicism, which was extremely puritanical and uptight. When the Portuguese clerics got to Brazil, it was pretty much anything goes! You can read all about it in João Silverio Trevisan's "Perverts in Paradise," a magisterial history of homosexuality in Brazil. (In Portuguese it's called "Devassos no Paraíso," and there's a revised edition that hasn't been translate to English yet.)

[trilingual]

The mayor of SP vetoed this inane proposal. The city council could override his veto, but I have a feeling this will just die. It was sponsored by one of the evangelical councilors, but I don't think the rest of the council considered this very carefully before voting for it the first time.