A group of our local artists decided to march by the Pataxó camp at Rio +20 this afternoon singing "Indians want whistles", a somewhat racist song from Carnaval 60 years ago, while dressed up as Indian clowns.
The Pataxó, naturally, took offence.
The Pataxó leader explained that there are no indigenous songs which make fun of other cultures and peoples. "Indians do not make music mocking other peoples. These people do not know Indians. In other states [of Brazil] many people do not know Indians, but know these songs."
"It's over with," said the band's leader, actor Luang Dacach said. "It was no big deal. I'll go talk to them later".
Dacach just couldn't keep his mouth shut beyond that, however. He just had to go and give the excuse white (or lighter-colored) Brazilians always give when they are caught being racist:
"I bought all the trinkets I'm wearing at the Indians' tent. I've got relatives who are Guarani..."
Yep, folks. You got that right. Here in Brazil, since we're all mestiços, after all, we can be as racist as we want to be. It's all just a god-damned joke, so why worry about it?
Oh, yeah. Almost forgot. Dacach went on to say he wasn't really making fun of the Pataxó, but of society itself. Y'know: it's ironic. That's it.
Well, take a look at the pictures and judge for yourself. I mean, we don't want to be condemning the lad out of hand...
Maybe he can find a new career as the public relations guy for Spinal Tap, ya reckon?
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Hey you guys. How are ya? I have to admit that I think that there's a place for violence. So, I vicariously would love to have seen someone slap the shit out these guys. The only problem is that, that slap might have been the only thing that made it on the evening news. I remember being part of a protest in Philly in a white neighborhood who were not letting black kids use the playground. I hate to take a page from racists but something they did was very effective. When we marched through their neighborhood, they turned out in force, concentrating on several blocks. As we marched down those blocks, they simply and silently turned their backs. No on spoke. No one yelled. No one cussed. Every man, woman and child simply turned their backs. Like I said, it's from a racist playbook but it was effective. The news media couldn't have turned that around on the Pataxos. **adrian**
ReplyDeleteHey, Adrian! I'm holding out for pieing Dacach, myself and then saying,"Dude! It's just a joke! Why so serious?"
ReplyDeleteWhat a GREAT idea! (duly noted in the EFFECTIVE REACTIONS notebook)
ReplyDelete