8
street roots
Aug. 1, 2014
9
street roots
Aug. 1, 2014
the people who actually live (in Brazil)
mistreat the people who actually live in
favelas... I’ve got to tell you, going back to
the favelas for the research I did for the
book was actually kind of harrowing,
because homes I sat in are now piles of
rubble.
people to understand, and I think Americans
largely, in my experience, don’t really know
anything about it. You’re lucky if you know
they speak Portuguese in Brazil, and I don’t
think I’m exaggerating. The other thing in
the story of Brazil is the story of the United
States. Think about the public funding of
the stadiums for the Seahawks, the
H.H.: Where did those people go?
Mariners, the snatching away of the Sonics,
the fact that the Sonics are only gone
D.Z.: That’s the big question. We don’t
because (NBA Commissioner) David Stern
know in every case. What we do know for
insisted on the socialization of debt and the
sure is that the
privatization of
organizing and the
profit..The book is
resistance of the
really about the
favelas has made a
resistance of Brazil
"The resistance is historic,
difference. People who the resistance is an example
and why people are
are (evicted) either get
protesting soccer. I
to us all, and the resistance
(significantly higher)
try to explain that to
cash payouts than they is something we should take
the U.S. audience
would’ve gotten
and I think people
very close to heart."
otherwise or they get
should know that
moved to government
because the
housing. The
resistance is historic,
government housing is much more tiny and
the resistance is an example to us all, and
sterile, but that’s better than being kicked
the resistance is something we should take
out on the streets.
very close to heart.
Blame
it on
H.H.: In your book, you mention some
success in fighting the evictions. Do you have
any updates on this?
The World Cup is over, hut the
2016 Olympics are already
rolling into Rio. Journalist Dave
Z irin talks about the
consequences o f “celebration
capitalism ”
D.Z.: Fighting the evictions has proven to
be very difficult. I think in the book I take
pains to try to make it open-ended so no one
thinks anyone is (claiming) victory. As a
writer I’m relieved that I made that choice
because that was a tough question. It looked
like this one favela I visited was on the
brink of victory but a lot of people told me,
“Don’t be too triumphalist about it, because
it could be snatched away from us at any
time.” And it looks like it’s being snatched
away from them. So, I think one thing we’re
seeing with the favelas is a redefinition of
the term victory ... The fight is for better
BY HART HORNOR
C O N T R IB U T IN G W R IT E R
illions of Americans witnessed
Brazil’s $11 billion World Cup party
on television. But few will see the
hangover.
In his new book, “Brazil’s Dance with the
Devil: The World Cup, the Olympics, and
the Fight for Democracy,” sports journalist
Dave Zirin reveals the country outside the
ESPN camera frame — its growing wealth
disparity, neighborhoods turned into parking
lots and $900 million worth of military
surveillance centers.
In a recent conversation with Zirin, the
writer talks about the rise of Brazil’s
financial status in sports entertainment even
as its citizens fall further into economic
despair.
M
H a rt H orner: I know you’ve reported on
mega sporting events in Athens, London,
Vancouver, South Africa. Why did you decide
to write a whole book about Brazil?
Dave Zirin: The fact that Brazil was
going to host both the World Cup and the
Olympics is very rare, and it’s the first time
this has happened since 9/11, when the
security issues (became) so crazy and
paramount to hosting these events... That
plus the fact that at the time I decided to
write the book, Brazil had this amazing
economic growth boom, the fifth largest
economy in the world.... I was curious about
how it would be able to host these mega
events.
H.H.: I know soccer is a big deal in Brazil.
Why?
D.Z.: When we say soccer is big in Brazil,
take it with a grain of salt. There’s a lot of
diversity regionally in term s of how much
people love it. But certainly it is not only a
national obsession, but also a cultural
marker of how people in the country define
themselves. Brazilian soccer has become
this international standard. Instead of saying
“beautiful soccer” or “poetical soccer,” you
say “Brazilian soccer.” Brazil has won the
World Cup more than any other country...
After Brazil ended what was then the largest
slave operation in the Western Hemisphere
in the 19th century, soccer came to the
Above, one o f the largest favela's in Brazil outside o f Rio dejanero. Thousands o f residents were relocated from their homes in favelas like this one to develop space for the 2014 World Cup. A t left, sports
journalist Dave Zirin. His new book addresses what happened in Brazil and the “hangover o f celebration capitalism" in the form of international debt, economic stagnation and police surveillance.
country, and it became a way Brazil started
to imagine itself as a post-slavery nation...
Even though the early decades of the sport
were segregated, it was still seen as a place
where people could come together and
share in this thing that Brazil did better
than any other country in the world.
H.H.: When you talk about the Brazilian
way of playing soccer, what do you mean?
D.Z.: The Brazilian way of playing soccer,
which frankly one could argue the current
Brazilian team does not play, has to do with
a lot of passing, a lot of feints and fakes
when dribbling the ball, a lot of use of the
hips and a huge effort to basically dance
through raindrops ... The roots of it have to
do with the influence of capoeira, the martial
arts dance of the slaves, which was very
prevalent on the plantations before former
slaves came into the city. The roots of it
were also very strong in the fact that when
players of African descent started playing
the sport, because of the legacy of white
supremacy, there was an effort to not touch
the Englishmen they were often playing
against and who first brought the sport to
the country. The effort to actually avoid
contact with whites sort of morphed into its
own style.
H.H.: Is there a link between Brazilian
soccer and politics?
D.Z.: There is an almighty link and there
has always been a link between Brazilian
soccer and Brazilian politics. Not the least of
which, you look at the names of politicians
in Brazil and they all have nicknames, the
way the great soccer players have
nicknames. They are Lula and Dilma, and
before them there was FHC, and that comes
from soccer. But that’s very superficial.
Also, what team you root for in Brazil is a
political marker. And the fact that the
dictatorship used soccer was very political.
H.H.: How did the dictatorship use soccer?
D.Z.: The dictatorship used soccer as a
form of legitimization, not to mention they
used the power of the greatest player of
them all, Pelé. If they were supporting
soccer, it was a way to make them look like
they had the best interest of Brazil at heart.
The Brazilian dictatorship put a ton of
money into soccer... The day of the moon
landing, July 20,1969, that was also the day
Pelé scored his 1,000th goal. And the
Brazilian press, which was very dominated
by the interest of the dictatorship, put those
two headlines on equal footing on the cover
of the newspaper. I think that kind of says it
all: landing on the moon, Pelé’s thousandth
goal. Same difference.
H.H.: In your book it seems like you’re
critical of Pelé. Why?
D.Z.: I’m critical of Pelé because his place
in Brazilian sports was unparalleled and
instead of trying to use that to do something
about poverty, about dictatorship, he chose
instead to cozy up with dictatorship and say
things like, “Poverty is just God’s will.”
There’s so much more that Pelé could’ve
done and this was particularly proven in
1982 when the Brazilian World Cup team,
led by a player named Socrates, was openly
anti-dictatorship, even wearing slogans
around his head and on his uniform, but the
dictatorship couldn’t do anything because
the power of soccer was more powerful than
the power of the dictatorship. That to me is
just a window into what Pelé could’ve done
but chose not to do.
H.H.: You talk about Brazilians in the past
learning to play soccer in the streets with
soccer balls made o f socks. How does Brazilian
soccer today compare?
D.Z.: One of the main differences
between now and years past is the
elimination of public space because real
estate has become a fetish in much of Brazil,
particularly in the cities. It’s not that
different from what’s been happening in
other cities around the world, like around
the United States. I mean, my God, I’m
talking to someone from Seattle. Of course,
you know what I’m talking about. Like when
a city becomes too expensive for people who
work there to actually live there.
H.H.: One o f your big themes is Naomi
Klein’s idea of “disaster capitalism.” You apply
it to the World Cup and call it “celebration
capitalism." It seems like the basic/idea o f
disaster capitalism is that people in power
benefit from disasters. Who's benefiting from
the World Cup?
D.Z.: The same interests who benefit
from the disasters, but the difference is that
it’s much easier to regiment and implement
if you’re implementing something like the
World Cup or the Olympics because it’s
scheduled and it’s on time. If you want to
push through these neo-liberal reforms as a
leader of the country and bow down to the
wishes of the marketplace, then a sporting
event can be a way to ... displace the favelas
and (push through) agendas around
surveillance that would otherwise be very
difficult to push through... Why can you do
it? Because people are excited about hosting
the event And that’s what makes what
happened in Brazil so historic: People
haven’t just lied down and taken i t They’ve
stood up. Brazil of all places was the first
country to ever really stand up to the
(organizers) of the World Cup.
H.H.: So what’s an example o f someone
who’s benefited from the World Cup?
D.Z.: You almost can go by industry. Do
we want to talk about construction, the
people who are building the stadiums Brazil
doesn’t need? You can look up a
construction company called Oden Brecht
You can look at the surveillance industry,
and that is, by the way, an international-
based industry. You can look at an Israel-
based company called Rafael that is
(providing) a good deal of Brazil’s drone and
surveillance operations...for the purpose of
monitoring the Olympics, but the Brazilian
state gets a much more (beefed up) security
culture out of i t You can look at real estate
speculation and getting people off the
favelas and some of the most valuable real
estate, not just in Rio but across the
country. These are things that mega events
introduce. And one of the most nefarious
parts of it all is debt. We saw this in Greece
very clearly. You build these debts and what
happens when these debts have to be paid
for?
H.H.: What’s going to be the full hangover
for Brazil?
D.Z.: A debt, a creeping surveillance
state and probably a quarter of a million
fewer people living in the favelas. But we’re
not going to know for sure until the 2016
Olympics. Then we can really make a full
assessm ent
H.H.: Twenty-two percent of the people in
Rio live in favelas. What’s happening to these
people?
D.Z.: Some of them are getting directly
kicked out of their homes. They are getting
moved clear across the city, and for those
who don’t have access to transportation, it’s
disastrous for their jobs. A lot of people
chose to move to favelas because they’re
close to work. A lot of work is in expensive
areas and the favelas are these pockets of
poverty in very expensive areas. It’s a
national disgrace. And we’re seeing at the
same time that the favela culture is being
used, expropriated and exported. The
treatm ent of the favelas reminds me a lot of
what (author and activist) bell hooks once
said — I believe it was bell hooks: America
loves black culture but hates black people.
You see the way in which Brazil uses the
favelas as a way to brand its country. It’s
like: Look at all the happy poor people. Yet
H.H.: Seems like you end your book pretty
optimistically. There are all these walkouts and
occupations and protests and now that the
games have finished, has anything challenged
that optimism?
D.Z.: No. Not at all. A lot of people have
pointed out that the protests are much
smaller now than they were right before the
Cup, when you had 20,000 people in the
streets or a year ago when you had hundreds
of thousands, if not millions, of people in
the streets. That’s why I was so glad I was
there for the couple of weeks I was there
just recently because I saw with my own
eyes that people are still mad. There’s still
graffiti everywhere that shows their
dissatisfaction and anger. There are still
public housing. And the fight is for a fairer
stickers everywhere, and there are still
cash payout to leave.
They’re uprooting the trees; they’re not
collecting people’s trash. They’re trying to
make it as uninhabitable for people as
possible, so what are you supposed to do?
They can’t legally kick them out without
compensation, because of Brazil’s squatter’s
rights laws, but they can make the favelas as
awful as they can to force them out.
protests almost every day.
H.H.: So how are people fighting this?
D.Z.: They are fighting it in a lot of very
interesting ways. There are standard
demonstrations, rallies, confrontations with
the military, all of which you might expect
But they’ve also raised money to get
planners to draw alternative plans they can
present about how favelas can stay (during)
the World Cup and the Olympics. They’ve
also pooled their money to hire lawyers to
sue the city. They’ve done art projects.
They’ve done media projects. They’ve done
a lot of cutting-edge activism. A huge
percentage of the favela (residents) are
online. So people have been using online
resources. They’ve also taught themselves
how to make films online and do media.
Very inspiring.
H.H.: Can you tell the story o f the guy who
placed the photos on the sides of the houses?
D.Z.: Yes. Amazing. A professional
photographer (known as JR) just blew up
these huge photos of the faces of the people
who were going to be evicted, and the
favelas are just a very public part of Rio, so
you’re confronted with seeing them, you
have to willingly unsee them. And frankly,
that’s what a lot of the middle class and the
wealthy in Brazil consciously do: They
choose not to see them. And by putting up
the faces of all (the evicted) families and
children...he forced people to confront the
social cost (of the World Cup).
H.H.: What do you hope American readers
gain from your book?
D.Z.: Two things. I hope they get a sense
of what’s happening in Brazil. I think Brazil
is an incredibly important country for
H.H.: Have the protests had any big,
enduring impact or is business back to usual?
D.Z.: The Brazilian government has been
forced to actually give in on a lot of stuff and
make promises about things like the
fulfillment of public housing. So, all of that
matters. There are going to be
improvements to people’s lives because they
chose to protest the World Cup. There have
been promises to develop the big (plot of
land) next to the Corinthian stadium into
public housing in return for homeless and
landless workers and peasants not marching
on the opening day of the World Cup. That’s
a big deal.
H.H.: Have you felt guilty for watching the
World Cup?
D.Z.: Not at all. Soccer is a beautiful
thing. Why should any of us let them take it
away from us just because the people who
run it try to exploit its beauty for their own
nefarious ends? So, absolutely, I watch the
World Cup. And the most important thing:
There’s no organization inside of Brazil
that’s called for an international boycott of
the World Cup. It’s very important that
when we consider boycotts we don’t act on
conditions of guilt but on conditions of
political solidarity.
H.H.: You mentioned there are a lot of
parallels between what went on in Brazil and
Seattle. What are some other parallels between
Brazil and the United States?
D.Z.: There’s a lot of creeping
surveillance culture, the idea of using sports
as a mechanism of corporate and social
welfare, the gentrification of our cities, the
suburbanization of poverty; the similarities
are all over the place. One of the things
you’re seeing is Brazil — a very diverse,
huge country — came together in an act of
national resistance and one hopes we can do
something similar in the United States
against a very similar agenda.
Reprinted from Real Change Newspaper,
Street Roots’ sister paper in Seattle, Wash.