As everyone knows by now, Brazil, “the sleeping giant,” is in a state of popular revolt. Surely this revolt has been simmering for a long time, and like a faulty pressure cooker, has finally exploded.
It seemed to have started with an increase in public transportation fares, but really that was just the proverbial tip of the iceberg. Once public frustration about the fares started to push the escape valve, the whole thing blew up quickly and powerfully.
Downtown Rio
The streets of many of Brazil’s major cities are packed with demonstrators—most of them orderly, with the exception of a few vandals. The word on the street is that some of these vandals are being paid in order to shed a bad light on the protestors. I don’t know whether that’s true or not, but what I do know is that the Brazilian population overall has had it up to “here” with political corruption, poor health care, faulty education, and now the excessive spending to host the World Cup—for which Brazil is ill-prepared. Many people feel that since the country is in a state of transition, it just isn’t ready to tackle an event of this size.
Facebook is loaded with photos of huge crowds filling the downtown areas of major cities like São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, and Recife. Everyone has an opinion, but overall there seems to be a strong sense of solidarity—the time has come, we’re ready, this is IT.
Well, I’ve been watching all of this activity in the news and the social media, and I think what’s going on in Brazil reveals to a great extent what’s going on in the rest of the world. There’s nothing unique about it. After all, what is the source of global problems? When you get right down to it, it’s human selfishness, lack of compassion, egotism, greed, fanaticism, fear, and so on. These are the same traits responsible for global warming, famine, and everything else that’s wrong in the world. Where do these things start? With individual human beings, in their thinking. And thinking leads to actions.
So in all fairness, I can’t help but ask myself: Am I contributing to any of these problems with my own thinking and/or behavior? Am I? Are we?
finallygettingdowntobrasstacks 