Brazil | ‘It was absurd, a collective delusion’ say Brazilians a week after the attack

It has been a week since protesters clashed with police and stormed the Brazilian government buildings in the capital, Brasilia. A day that will remain engraved in the collective memory of the country.

“I followed what was happening that day and then I stopped looking,” says a woman. disgusting, outrageous. I felt bad that night and to be honest I decided to stop watching the news.”

“I seemed absurd, disrespectful. It was a lack of everything, of democracy. I had never seen anything like this,” adds another Brazilian.

“My reaction was astonishment,” explains one man. “It was like a collective deliriuma crime that must be punished once it is investigated (who allowed it, who financed it…) and find the real culprits”.

There are several open investigations to try to find out who was behind what happened on January 8. For the professor of History and Sociology Leo Puglia what happened is evident.

“Actually it was an attempted coup. We don’t know exactly who was behind it, that’s being investigated, or what the plan was. But it was a coup attempt,” he says.

“This strengthened Lula as leader of the movement for the defense of democracy at a time of serious historical threat, but, on the other hand, it was a very serious event that shows the resistance capacity of the radical fringes of Bolsonarismo, how far they can go. We can expect anything from these people. There is an important part of the population that is disconnected from reality and radicalized”adds Leo Puglia.

Now Brazilian President Lula da Silva finds himself facing what may become his most difficult task: dealing with whatever the anger of Jair Bolsonaro’s supporters might bring about.

“I think it’s a growing thing… I don’t think it’s diminishing, I think it’s growing. A single person managed to implant such a huge hate speech in the heads of millions of people and that speech is increasingly violent and that is what we are seeing now. The democracy we talk so much about disappeared last Sunday“concludes a young woman.

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