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Notes -
Mike Pesca interviews a reporter during the 2010s in Brazil on his new book, If We Burn: The Mass Protest Decade and the Missing Revolution
https://open.spotify.com/episode/62QiTDxfwA0g5WBD4RMXO6?si=8a7f222ee5124b7d
My brief summary of his account: In 2013 Brazilian leftists, anarchists and punks take to streets to protest bus fares. After about 4 protests things become violent/rowdy and police crack down, the media switches to become sympathetic with the protest. Millions enter the streets with various demands. Among those are right-wing soccer hooligans (the Brazil national football jersey becomes their uniform), who physically expel the original leftist protestors. Like, manhandling them off of the streets.
All protester criticisms are aimed at the popular left-leaning ruling party of the time, despite the president being somewhat sympathetic. Two years later, she's gone and far-right Bolsonaro takes power.
My commentary: These protests swelled to contain numerous amorphous groups from everywhere on the political spectrum. Social media, traditional media, and the government all had different levels of sympathy at different times. Though the chaos is unpredictable, the leftists started a chain of events that contributed to a far-right demagogue taking power.
The current thing: Similarly, the pro-Palestine protestors contain many overlapping subfactions. A Muslim may start chanting "From the river to the sea" believing it to mean "Kill all Jews", his cousin and a college student may join in thinking it's only about equal rights for Palestine. Another college student might join in knowing what the chant means, but not want to cause a fuss and shift focus away from the bombings. A third college student may think violent revolution is actually pretty cool and American Jews who don't speak up against Israel are valid targets.
I have no hot takes, the various overlapping factions make things chaotic and hard to draw lessons from. However, Western nations in 2023 are looking a lot like Brazil 2013, maybe this is our future. I would like to see Metaculus posts for "Will over 1 million protestors take to streets on any given day before 2025?"
We’re starting to see the contagion of mimetic violence that Girard predicted. Except our myths are so fragmented that it’s difficult for people to even agree on a narrative - the violence for its own sake is becoming naked, stripped of its justifications.
Who do you (you plural, anyone can answer) think the Girardian scapegoat will be? Is it impossible to predict?
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