The Black Lives Matter Movement Is Heading To The Rio Olympics

[B2G]

The trip will highlight the “globalization of police brutality,” activists say.
07/14/2016 12:15 pm

As protests continue throughout the country over the police killings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, the latest African-American men to die at the hands of police, a coalition of Black Lives Matter activists will take their movement to a new place next week: Rio de Janeiro.

It’s the latest effort to expand the Black Lives Matter message across the globe, and it comes at an important time. With less than a month to go before Rio hosts the 2016 Olympic Games, the activists hope they can take advantage of the spectacle to highlight the city’s rising levels of police violence and connect with Brazilian activists who are fighting a similar struggle.

“Police brutality is global. And Brazil has its own form of ruthlessness,” Daunasia Yancey, the founder of Black Lives Matter’s Boston chapter, told The Huffington Post. “The movement that came before and during and after Ferguson has been really intentional about a global struggle and understanding that our freedoms are all tied to each other.”

Yancey, one of the organizers who met with presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton in October, is part of a coalition of activists that plans to meet with organizations fighting police violence in Rio. The group will also include Rev. John L. Selders Jr. and Pamela Selders, who together led Moral Monday protests against police violence in Connecticut, and other activists who have worked with the Black Lives Matter movement.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/black-lives-matter-rio-brazil-olympics_us_5786f996e4b08608d332f81f?utm_hp_ref=2016-summer-olympics

[romanic]

1. Will they be blocking highways down there too?

[B2G]

3. They need to be very careful about protesting down there.

From the article:

"But the Black Lives Matter activists who travel to Brazil this month will encounter a comparable and perhaps even more widespread problem in Rio. Brazil is home to some of the world’s deadliest police forces, and escalating violence in the years before the Olympics has only worsened the situation.

Police in Rio de Janeiro state have killed more than 2,500 people since the International Olympic Committee chose Rio as the 2016 host in 2009, according to Amnesty International. Police-related shooting deaths increased 40 percent in the state from 2013 to 2014, the year Brazil hosted the FIFA World Cup, according to Amnesty’s numbers. They rose yet again in 2015, when police in the state killed 645 people.

Seventy-nine percent of the victims of police killings in Rio state between 2010 and 2014 were black men, and 75 percent were between the ages of 15 and 30, according to Amnesty’s figures. More than half of Brazilians claim African heritage, with 7.6 identifying as black and 43.1 as mixed race."

[romanic]

5. It will be interesting.

I don't think BLM activists will be pulling stunts like they've done here, but if they do then they're in for one hell of a response it seems.

[TipTok]

14. I suspect they won't find the restraint that American police usually have...

[cwydro]

2. Um. They're gonna be in for a rude awakening.

Good luck to 'em.

[B2G]

4. Yep. This could be interesting. nt

[cwydro]

12. Hope they take a lot of bug spray.

And yeah, should be interesting.

I can only imagine the cost of hotel rooms there.

[Dreamer Tatum]

6. I hope they think long and hard about that.nt

[B2G]

7. Yeah. It seems like a REALLY bad idea.

Those cops aren't going to put up with blocked streets and other disruptions.

[Dreamer Tatum]

8. Of course, neither your words nor mine

Constitute any desire whatsoever for violence to befall any Americans that travel there for any reason.

It is simply that the Brazilian police are known to kill with little provocation.

[B2G]

9. God no. It just seems pretty dicey. nt

[NaturalHigh]

10. Good deal. I look forward to seeing one of their "protests' over there.

[demmiblue]

11. I wish them luck and safety. n/t

[mwrguy]

13. Good for them!

They can reach a world audience.

[Bernielover357743]

15. This won't end well.

But hopefully they don't go in large numbers and can stay in the Olympics main area. That way they are safer from retaliation

[brettdale]

16. Hope they stay safe

The police force down there, might be a bit more vicious.

[MowCowWhoHow III]

17. Similar kit, smaller qualms