[News] Brazil 'Genocide' of Black Youth Kills 1 Every 23 Minutes

[Anti-Imperialist News]

http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Brazil-Genocide-of-Black-Youth-Kills-1-Every-23-Minutes--20160607-0005.html 



  Brazil 'Genocide' of Black Youth Kills 1 Every 23 Minutes

June 7, 2016

The crisis of fatal violence against Afro-descendents in Brazil that 
sees one Black youth killed every 23 minutes in what some have called an 
“undeclared civil war,” according to a new Senate committee report 
announced on Monday, is leading experts to raise alarm over a “genocide” 
suffered by young Black people in the South American country.

    *GALLERY:
    Brazilian Youth Rise Up Against Police Brutality
    <http://www.telesurtv.net/english/multimedia/Brazilian-Youth-Rise-Up-Against-Police-Brutality--20151204-0018.html>*


The report, carried out over the past year by a Senate commission on 
youth murder in consultation with victims of violence and their 
families, counsellors, researchers, lawyers, police, and other 
representatives, finds that over 23,000 Black youths are killed in the 
country every year, BBC Brazil reported. That’s more than three quarters 
of the total 50,000 annual youth murders.

According to the commission, some participants in the study referred to 
the crisis as the de facto “extermination of poor and Black youth.”

The report, based on data from the Violence Map compiled by sociologist 
Julio Jacobo Waiselfisz using official figures, found that the vast 
majority of victims are men, and that Black men are three times more 
likely to be killed than white men. Close to half of the 50,000 youth 
deaths per year are suffered by teenage victims just 16 to 17 years old.

Waiselfisz told BBC Brazil that the homicide rate in the country 
increased nearly 600 percent between 1980 and 2014. Meanwhile, the 
rapporteur of the commission, Senator Lindbergh Farias of suspended 
President Dilma Rousseff’s 
<http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Brazilian-Senate-Votes-for-Rousseff-Impeachment-Trial-20160510-0055.html> 
Workers’ Party, told the newspaper that the findings of the new report 
highlight the “true genocide” against Black youth.

    *RELATED:
    Black Women March Against Violence in Brazil
    <http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Black-Women-March-Against-Violence-in-Brazil-20151118-0049.html>*


The report aims to respond to “what is considered by many to be a 
culture of violence based on racism and prejudice” and points to a key 
role for the state in addressing the crisis through effective policy on 
issues including drug reform, public security, and policing.

One such suggestion arising from the report is a proposed review of the 
ability of police to claim that they acted in self-defense in order to 
justify injuries or deaths. Advocates argue that such a step could help 
reduce victim blaming and hold perpetrators of police violence and 
brutality 
<http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Brazilian-Police-Fire-Rubber-Bullets-at-Protesters--20160121-0046.html> accountable. 


The report also found lesser-educated groups are more vulnerable to 
violence and that youth who neither go to school nor have jobs are the 
most likely to face criminalization and get caught up in gang 
activities. The findings highlight the need for education initiatives 
and social programming for underprivileged youth, according to the 
commission.

The results of the study come as an all white male government 
<http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Brazils-New-Coup-Imposed-Government-Set-to-Be-All-White-Men-20160512-0014.html> 
with a fierce neoliberal austerity agenda has been installed in Brazil 
after the suspension of Dilma Rousseff, which one prominent Black woman 
leader dubbed a multi-dimensional coup 
<http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Black-Woman-Leader-Slams-Multidimensional-Coup-Against-Brazil-20160526-0032.html> 
with race, gender, and class consequences.

The commission's findings on youth murders in Brazil is set to be 
released in full later this week.

-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 www.freedomarchives.org
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