Brazil's Culture Minister Fired After Echoing Goebbels
Source: BBC News
Brazil's culture minister has been sacked after using parts of a speech by Nazi Germany's propaganda chief Joseph Goebbels in a video, sparking outrage. In the clip posted on the ministry's Twitter page, Roberto Alvim detailed an award for "heroic" and "national" art. Lohengrin by Wagner, Hitler's favourite composer, played in the background. Earlier, Mr Alvim said the now-deleted video was a "rhetorical coincidence".
Far-right President Jair Bolsonaro said the speech had been "unfortunate". "I reiterate our rejection of totalitarian and genocidal ideologies, such as Nazism and communism, as well as any inference to them. We also express our full and unrestricted support for the Jewish community, of which we're friends and share many common values," the president said on Twitter. ◾How Brazil's culture wars are being waged in classrooms
In the six-minute video detailing the National Arts Awards, Mr Alvim said: "The Brazilian art of the next decade will be heroic and will be national, will be endowed with great capacity for emotional involvement... deeply linked to the urgent aspirations of our people, or else it will be nothing."
Parts of it were identical to a speech quoted in the book Joseph Goebbels: A Biography, by German historian Peter Longerich, who has written several works on the Holocaust. "The German art of the next decade will be heroic, it will be steely-romantic, it will be factual and completely free of sentimentality, it will be national with great pathos and binding, or it will be nothing."...
Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-51149224
- Brazil's Culture Secretary Roberto Alvim
Joseph Goebbels led the Ministry of Enlightenment and Propaganda, designed to brainwash people into obeying the Nazis and idolising leader Adolf Hitler. Its methods included censorship of the press and control of radio broadcasts, as well as control of culture and arts.
- Goebbels (L) awards the Iron Cross to a 16-year old Hitler Youth member, March 1945. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Goebbels
The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jan/17/brazil-culture-minister-goebbels-roberto-alvim-nazi
Since taking office last year, Bolsonaro has been repeatedly criticized by opponents for pushing a conservative Christian cultural agenda while cutting funding to arts and cinema projects. Bolsonaro's culture war allies have lashed out at what they call "cultural Marxism" and condemned everything from climate change to feminism.
The night the video was recorded, Bolsonaro had said of Alvim: "Now we have a real secretary of culture." Alvim, a born-again Christian, only took the job in November last year, and had previously been criticised for suggesting rock music encourages abortion and Satanism.
- France24 news report.
= new reply since forum marked as read
