Brazil and its people didn’t find a joke made by a U.S. Olympic Committee worker funny. A USOC worker wrote “Welcome to the Congo!” on a whiteboard in the organization’s Rio de Janeiro media center for the Pan American Games. Once that pic hit the front pages of Brazil’s papers the message was labeled “full of prejudiced” The now fired worker, Kevin Neuendorf, said he wrote it because it was hot in Rio.
Forget the fact that Brazil and much of South America is in the middle of winter, I can’t help but wonder if Brazilians felt insulted because of the fact that the Congo is an African nation that has ::gasp:: blacks. Despite the fact that Brazil is overwhelmingly black, racism is still deeply entrenched. Part of me feels that maybe the Congo deserves an apology.
Via / MSNBC.com
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1 Response to Brazil Isn’t the Congo
An
July 23rd, 2007 at 6:50 pm
I am not sure what kind of site this is, but I hit this on the web and I felt that this article was so ridiculous that it deserved a response.
The suggestion that the comparison of Brazil to Congo was because it is hot does not make any sense. South america is in winter and temperatures here are below the ones you find in most of U.S. during this same period of the year.
The statement was obviously a comparison based on the fact that Brazil has a large population of blacks.
Now, the article suggests that it is ok to compare countries because of the color of the people’s skin, which is ridiculous. This statement only goes to show that Americans have a serious issue with racism, and that is not welcome in Brazil.
I just hope that Mr. Neuendorf was not making reference to worse things such as the movie congo.
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