The Truth (A Verdade) by Arnaldo Jabor

I’ve been a fan of Arnaldo Jabour ever since I read his book Amor é Prosa, Sexo é Poesia. Here’s his latest diatribe on Brazilian politics, which I translated.

- Brazilians are a solidary people.

That’s a lie. Brazilians are simpletons. They elected a guy to the most important position of the State who doesn’t have schooling nor preparation to even be a public street cleaner, only because he has had a hard life. They pay 40% of their wages in taxes and to still assist the poor in place of having the government find a solution to poverty. They accept that human rights NGO’s keep giving guesses about how we should treat our problems of criminality. That they do not protest each time the government buys mattresses for prisoners who burned theirs on purpose, isn’t a trait of a solidary people. It’s a trait of a stupid people.

- Brazilians are a happy people.

That’s a lie. Brazilians are ridiculous. To make light of the filth that we see on a daily basis is the same thing as taking a punch in the face and then laugh about it. To listen to José Simão make a joke in regards to a massacre that lasted four days in São Paulo, is the same thing as telling a joke at your father’s funeral. Brazilians have a serious problem. When a scandal happens, instead of protesting and finding resolutions as a citizen, they laugh it off.

- Brazilians are a working people.

That’s a lie. Brazilians are as lazy as it gets. Brazilians try to fool themselves, pretending that the politicians which hold public office in Brazil magically landed there from Mars, when in reality, they are a representative of the people themselves. Brazilians, at the same time that they become disgraced upon seeing a deputy receiving 20 thousand dollars per month, for working 3 days and scratching their balls the rest of the week, also feel envy. They know that deep down, if they were in the deputy’s place, they would do the same thing. A people that agree to receive 90 dollars monthly from government assistance for not doing anything, much less taking advantage of this to improve their lives (a reality of the vast majority of beneficiaries of the Bolsa Família program), can’t be anything but lazy.

- Brazilians are an honest people.

That’s a lie. They were; today, it’s a much needed quality. If you were to offer 50 euros to a European policeman for him not to write you up, you’d probably get nailed. Not for fear of being caught, but because he knows it to be wrong to accept a bribe. The Brazilian, at the same time that he’s disgraced by government corruption, secretly thinks about what he would do if he got in such a pickle, when in reality bribing a policeman would come as an option.

- Ninety percent of slum dwellers are honest and hard-working people.

That’s a lie. They were in the past. Historically, the slums started in the hills of the city of Rio de Janeiro when the blacks and mulattos returned from the Paraguayan War to settle there. At that time, those who lived there were honest people, who had no other living options and didn’t accept criminality. Today the reality is different. Many fathers dream that their son would be accepted as a drug-runner to earn some good money. If the majority of the slum was honest, they would have already kicked out the bandits, who could retaliate by killing a few people, but never millions of them. Aside from this, they could cooperate with the police in the identification of the criminals, stopping them from setting up shop in their slums.

- Brazil is a democratic country.

That’s a lie. In a democratic country, the will of the people is the law.
The majority of the people think that a good criminal is a dead one, but they also succumb to a noisy few that hurry to say that a criminal who died in the crossfire was coldly executed. In a country where everyone has rights but no one has obligations, there doesn’t exist democracy, only anarchy. In a country where the majority blindly succumb to the noisy few, there isn’t democracy, only an imperfect hypocrite. If we take away the idea of political correctness, we would see that we live in a feudal society: a king that retains the central power (the President and his military police), followed by the dukes, counts, archdukes and feudal men (ministers, senators, deputies, mayors and the town council). All of them sustained by the people that pay taxes with one possible end, to pay for the privileges of such power. And still we are obligated to vote. This is democracy? Think about it!

- The Brazilian way.

The famous Brazilian way of exchanging favors in my opinion, is one of the biggest reasons for the chaos that is Brazilian politics. Brazilians think of themselves as sly and very smart. They steal their neighbor’s cable television and think they’re laying it all on the line. On a different day, the cashier at the bakery mistakenly gives back 6 dollars extra, and wouldn’t you know it, silently he sneaks away as happy as if he had won the lottery…sly bastards, they forget that they pay the highest interest tax on the planet and the return is zero. Zero health, zero jobs, zero education, but then again, who really cares? In the end we are five-time World Cup champions, right? What an accomplishment.

- Brazil is the country of the future.

Man, my grandpa used to say that in 1950. A lot of times I start to imagine how they would be revolted and ashamed if my grandparents were still alive today. They escaped this particular shame…Brazil, the country of the future?! Today the future is here and we already had one of the worst tax growths in the world.

- God is Brazilian.

Wow, this one I won’t even comment on…
What leaves me the most saddest and uncomfortable is to see everyday the headlines of the newspapers. They speak of the victories of the dirtiest government ever seen in Brazilian history.

- To wrap things up, here’s my conclusion:

The Brazilian is deserving! As the popular Brazilian saying goes, it’s like the lowlife’s woman, she’s with him because she likes to get spanked. If you don’t fit the example of the type of Brazilian cited above, my apologies, friend. Keep doing your part and one day good people will assume power in this country again. Then for sure, we will have all the chances of being the biggest potential on the planet. At least here we don’t have earthquakes, tsunamis nor hurricanes. We have petroleum , alcohol, bio-diesel, and without a doubt the most important of them all: Sweet water! The only thing lacking is the will, is getting that really so hard?

Author: Arnaldo Jabour

English Translation: Adam Charles

Sou um fã do Sr. Jabour. Já li todos os livros dele e eu o acho muito inteligente. Eu votaria nele se fosse possível.

Tags: amor, amor é prosa, arnaldo jabor, arnaldo jabour, brasil, brazil, brazilian politics, diabtribe, jornalista, journalist, poesia, prosa, truth, verdade