Another black life was taken today in my country, Brazil.
This time, not by the white supremacist police force, but still because of racism.
Miguel was a 5 years old little boy from Recife, son of a domestic worker, who went to work with his mother.
Yes, his mother was still working as a domestic worker during a worldwide pandemic, just as MANY other women and black folks who have not been liberated of their non essential jobs in white and rich people’s homes.
Miguel’s mother left the apartment to walk her employer’s dogs, leaving her son behind with the apartment owners. The young child was scared and started crying for his mother. Somehow, he was so terrified he went after his mother, made his way to the elevator and ended up on the 9th floor where he fell from the great height. According to the investigators of the case, the apartment owner is responsible for allowing Miguel in the elevator as she is seen doing so in surveillance cameras.
His mother’s employer didn’t talk to the child. She didn’t comfort him. She didn’t keep an eye on him and protected him from going into an elevator by himself. He was neglected because she didn’t see him as a child. But how could she, if she didn’t even see his mother as human enough?
The media is hiding the apartment owners names. They are white, rich and, apparently, involved in politics in Recife. The woman who employed Miguel’s mother was taken by the police but has paid a 20k Reais (brazilian currency) bail out. Twenty thousand Reais. And they couldn’t pay Miguel’s mother her salary to allow her to stay home during COVID-19 pandemic?
This is what structural racism does. Slavery has never ended in the Americas, it just evolved into something that is “maskable”, “acceptable” and normalized.
Please sign this petition and share if you can to help bring Miguel’s life to justice.
We need visibility. We are done seeing black folks becoming statistic numbers. It is horrifying that we had to wait for USA to revolt against racism for white rich Brazilian folks to “decide they were anti racist too” and start talking about it more on social media.
If you are Brazilian or would like to help Brazilian BLM movement, please access this website.
You can also go here for some worldwide BLM resources.
His name was Miguel, he was 5 years old. Say his name.
Justice for Miguel. Justice for João Pedro. Justice for Marielle Franco. No justice, no peace.
