Somewhere between the first
protest over transit fare hikes in Sao Paulo and president Dilma Rousseff’s
public address three weeks later, football and the Olympic Games found
themselves swept into the heart of Brazilian anger.
The outcry had centered around
failed social services, corruption, and misplaced expenditure. As the crowds
grew from tens of thousand to a million-strong on June 20, Brazil’s two biggest
sporting show pieces—the 2014 World Cup football and the 2016 Olympic
Games—were turned into symbols of everything wrong with the government and the
country’s elite.
On the day of the Confederations
Cup (a preparatory event for 2014) semi-final, between Brazil and Uruguay in
Belo Horizonte, 50,000 clashed with police a few miles from the stadium. In
Brasilia, a peaceful yet more symbolic protest took place as the crowds kicked
footballs over a police cordon—and toward the Congress.
Until Brazil’s winter of
discontent, most criticism in countries hosting football World Cups or the
Olympics tended to emanate from a relatively small fringe group protesting escalating costs and
tax burdens.
In Brazil, though, what the world
saw was protest against the world’s two biggest sporting events on a gigantic,
unprecedented scale. On a scale that fittingly almost belonged to the dizzy
perch that the Olympics and the World Cup occupy in the hierarchy of
“eventism.”
The roar of outrage against the
World Cup has come from a nation tied into the sport, which writer Alex Bellos
calls, “the strongest symbol of Brazilian identity.” In Futebol; The Brazilian
Way of Life, Bellos writes, “no other country is branded by a single sport … to
the extent that Brazil is by football.”
The June demonstrations proved
that Brazilians have put their beloved football in its place. Firmly behind
what eventually matters more: education, jobs, health services, security.
Rousseff and FIFA president Sepp
Blatter were booed during the Confederations Cup opening. The world’s most
celebrated footballer Pele was shouted down after his taped video message said,
“Let’s forget all of this mayhem that’s happening in Brazil, all of these
protests, and let’s remember that the national team is our country, our blood.”
On social media, Reuters reported scathing responses: “Pele, your ignorance is
in proportion with your footballing genius.”
“Go to the hospitals, take a bus with no security, then I want to see if
you keep saying stupid things.”...
No comments:
Post a Comment