Environmental Nazism: How to effectively mask human rights violations with environmental concerns

While the notion of returning to 1940’s Nazi Germany would be a horrendous idea to entertain, the government of Rio de Janeiro seems to be taking a page from Hitler’s play book with the enactment of the state’s latest environmental protection legislation. Deforestation of the Amazon rainforest is a huge concern and a major contributor to the global warming problem. However, walling in the slums of the area to prevent the poor and destitute citizens from sprawling into the rainforest and cutting down trees for personal consumption or sale seems like a less than subtle way to recreate a class based version of the Warsaw ghettos or the Japanese internment camps that still mar the history of our society. Whether or not this type of action is a necessary evil for the protection of the environment, erecting walls throughout a city to separate different classes of people violates these individual’s human rights and beckons us to question the true motives of the Brazilian government which seem to be cloaked by environmental interests.



The majority of Rio de Janeiro’s population lives in extreme poverty which, in turn, has a unique yet distinct effect on the preservation of the adjacent Amazon rainforest. The favelas that plaster the hillsides of Rio de Janeiro house continue to house the masses, however, space is not unlimited. As the impoverished population continues to grow, the slums are forced to sprawl out into the rainforest that it borders, clearing its trees and shrinking its size more and more each year. Additionally, one source of income for some in the slums are the trees themselves. Logging in the Amazon rainforest is not permitted, however, the forest produces valuable wood resources that some are willing to obtain illegally for a price. Poorer citizens are willing to enter the forest and harvest trees to sell illegally as one of the few means they have of making money. These two reasons among others are contributing to the loss of 60 million acres of rainforest each year.



The situation is becoming increasingly dire for the environment as global warming becomes more and more of an issue; however, the solution that the government of Rio de Janeiro has developed will ultimately hurt the poor population of the city as well as the environment. The state government has already begun to erect over seven miles of concrete walls that stand at about 10 feet high around 11 different slums in the region. According to Icaro Moreno, president of Rio de Janeiro’s state public works department, the only objective of this project is to protect the rainforest.


However, the situation has generated mass amounts of controversy being that the walls are only being erected around the slums of the region, which some would consider to be a class driven policy play from the government of Rio de Janeiro. The ulterior motive for walling off the slums from the wealthy areas of the city would be to segregate the two groups and increase the aesthetic look of the rich Rio coastline. Obviously, there is no way this reason could justify the essential boxing in of millions of poor individuals living in the slums, so the environmental protection twist is necessary to carry out this project. However, lack of political power is what is really allowing this ill-conceived plan to be carried out along with the disenfranchisement of the poor in Rio de Janeiro.


The real problem in this situation is poverty rather than the destruction of the natural environment. Clearly, if the poverty problem were addressed in Rio de Janeiro then the rainforest would not be in jeopardy the way it is now. The government of Rio de Janeiro is more concerned with its image than it is with the welfare of its citizens. While it is necessary to protect the environment, we shouldn’t do it at the expense of human rights. There are other options to curb deforestation that don’t involve walls around people such as investing in programs sponsored by the UN to treat the deforestation problem under the carbon trading system already established to slow global warming. But as long as Brazil is content with handling global issues with an isolationist and uncompassionate attitude, the walls will continue to stand.

Saturday, April 11, 2009

3 Comments:

Jeff the Pen said...

This is a really interesting post, and I'm actually really curious about the opinions of people living inside the city. Have you found any quotes by actual citizens of either the wealthy or lower classes?

Britney Baker said...

Yes. The people are more concerned with how they are going to put food on the table rather than these walls. They have no political power and they are completely aware of it. The only real comment they had on the situation was that they hope that they are selected as one of the 600 households that will receive alternate housing from the government who will have to demolish these homes to build the wall. This article highlights the attitude of some of the residents.
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=7222727

Unknown said...

The government should be using the money it is spending on building this wall to help the poor residents of the slums it is attempting to enclose. They should also look into healthy ways of foresting and profiting from the rich natural resources of the rainforest such as acai harvesting, which I dicuss in one of my posts: http://cosmopolitannie.blogspot.com/2009/02/ahhhh-i-seeee.html

 
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