“The eyes of the world are on Brazil” is an expression often used to represent the popularity of the country and its appearances in the media, for reasons such as the World Cup 2014 and the Olympic Games of 2016. The country’s image in regards to violence and poverty is still really strong, and the government is trying to prepare for these big upcoming events. Rio de Janeiro is the city where are lot of the events will take place, and what is often emphasized is the contrast between nature and the city. There is another contrast, the one between the upscale neighborhoods and the favelas, or slums of the city.

Because of the favelas’ factors, which involve a highly populated area with the poorest people of the city living on top of the Rio de Janeiro Mountains, for many years it has been the perfect place for drug dealers and criminals to hide themselves. The police has had a lot of trouble trying to get inside, and the government is trying to change this reality through “pacification” actions. Many favelas have already gone through this process and nowadays provide a safer life and better infrastructure. But this is not the case with the Maré Complex, formed by 16 slums and located between the main access routes to the city. More than 130,000 people live there. This makes up to 2.3% of the total population of Rio de Janeiro.

One big problem has to do with children and the youth of the community. They don’t see opportunities outside of the favela and crime is for them a chance to get some money or status inside the community. As the government still hasn’t brought the pacification process to the Maré Complex, one good initiative offering good possibilities for its inhabitants is created by non-governmental organizationsn such as CEASM (Centro de Estudos e Ações Solidárias da Maré, in english: Centre for Studies and Solidarity Actions of Maré). This NGO is focused on contributing to the value of the slums and poor communities as an expression of the plurality of the city, changing ideas and guiding public policy. Since 1998 the NGO offers support courses helping young people get into the public universities. Entrance is based on a highly competitive test that usually favors people who can afford a good basic education.

These days, CEASM offers 14 different projects involving education and cultural emphasis. The population faces low self esteem issues, and many people think that there is no way out of the violence. CEASM wants to change this.

It already offers a library, computer rooms, journalism rooms and classrooms. Everything was built with the support of donations and community help. CEASM has about 100 volunteers, both paid and unpaid. Lourenço Cezar da Silva (pictured above) is the oldest brother of five siblings, and was one of the first students who was able to get into one of the most competitive universities of Brazil: PUC-Rio (Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro).

The economic support is based on donations and funding, but in the past year help has been cut for different reasons. The NGO is facing many problems to keep offering a better chance to the community. The CEASM volunteers usually try to apply to get some help from the government but say that lately many has been direct to culture and not to education.. He started as a student of the support course for university applications and today is proud and eager to help others starting out like he did.

Of course, the eyes of the world cannot easily see everything that happens in the daily life of poor communities in the big city of Rio de Janeiro, but maybe looking inside it will make it possible to change from the outside, instead of trying to hide the problems. CEASM and the Maré Community Complex need help in order to change from inside; it needs eyes to look where it matters. The number of young people who cannot benefit from the services is increasing, and consequently, so is the number of them who engage in crime and violence.

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To celebrate National Marriage Week (Feb. 7-14), Family Research Council’s Marriage and Religion Research Institute has released a new paper entitled 162 Reasons to Marry. This important new study demonstrates that marriage is beneficial across a wide range of personal outcomes, including family, religion, education, finances, crime and health.

162 Reasons to Marry shows that married persons:

• enjoy stronger relationships with their children;
• worship more regularly;
• participate more actively in their children’s education;
• work more productively;
• enjoy greater financial stability;
• have better mental and physical health; and
• are less likely to commit crime or abuse or to be victims of domestic violence.

Furthermore, those raised in intact married families are more likely to practice sexual chastity, to worship more regularly, to expect and attain more educationally, and to exhibit better physical and mental health. They are also less likely to experience poverty as children or to experience or commit violence.

Dr. Patrick Fagan , Director of the Marriage and Religion Research Institute, writes:

“Marriage is the foundational relationship for all of society, and therefore we can be sure that there are many more than the 162 reasons for marriage enumerated here. All other relationships in society stem from the father-mother relationship, and these other relationships thrive most if that father-mother relationship is simultaneously a close and a closed husband-wife relationship.”

Fagan says the outcomes evaluated (family, religion, education, marketplace and government) represent all five of the major institutions, or tasks, of society.

Fagan said:

“The family is one of the five major institutions of society. Within a family built on a good marriage, the child gradually learns to value and perform the five fundamental tasks of every competent adult and of every functional society – raising a family, practicing religion, receiving an education, working in the marketplace and participating in government.

Children raised in strong families are mentored in all these areas, often unconsciously, and gradually they learn to act similarly. That is how we grow a great society.  There is no short cut on this one.”

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On the streets of Rome, Italy’s capital, up to 200.000 demonstrators took the streets to join the global protest called from one side to other of the world. Among those, a group of Black Bloc protesters – between 100 and 200 people – hijacked the peaceful march with an explosion of violence against stores, banks, cars, police and other protesters.

October 15th was the day of worldwide demonstrations. In 951 cities in more than 80 countries hundreds of thousands of people took the streets and the squares to protest against financial elites, capitalists, bankers and governments’ austerity measures and to claim rights and real democracy for all.

Although the massive participation in most of the cities, reports on violence are rare and the protests were peaceful and quiet even in the European capitals which are the epicenter of the crisis and where the anger and the frustration are stronger.

In this scenario of collaboration and solidarity the exception has been Rome. Here just half an hour after the peaceful march of the Italian “indignados” started – at around 2.30 pm Italian time –, a small group of demonstrators with covered faces and clad totally in black broke away from the main rally and began to throw bottles, stones and incendiary devices at stores, banks, and police.

Numerous cars and trash bins were set on fire in the streets of downtown, offices of the Defence Ministry were assaulted and set on fire as well, banks and stores’ windows were smashed, journalists crew were attacked and many other damages were caused by the group of Black Bloc rioters. Pictures and videos report images of urban guerrilla, terrified people, bloody faces, fire, smoke, destruction and violence. They show the “total black protesters” breaking away from the main group and attacking police and peaceful demonstrators on their way.

The estimated number of injured people is around 70. Two protesters and one policeman have been seriously hurt, one of them – a 52-years-old man who tried to stop the violents – lost two fingers for the explosion of a firecracker thrown by one of the Black Blocs – as it’s shown in one video.

During a high tension moment of clashes between riot police and the violent group, a police armour-plated car was set on fire and police charged repeatedly the protesters and used tear gas and water cannons to stop the riots. The peaceful part of demonstrators, that is the big majority of them, ran away and fled the violence. Some of them who turned against the small violent group trying to stop and push them away were attacked and injured.

Around 12 people have been arrested. Rome’s mayor Gianni Alemanno, ministers and leaders of all parties blamed the violence. Some leader of the opposition questioned on how it was possible that the police was not able to stop such a small and well identifiable violent group for so many hours.

Meanwhile, on the web and on social media some users are rising the question on whether the Black Blocs could be real protesters or infiltrated policemen. Some suggest also that those protesters could have been paid and supported by “men of power”, who have strong interests in a violent hijacking of the peaceful protest to boycott it and manipulate the consequent news for condemning the demonstration. At the moment there is no proof for these conjectures to be true.

What it’s sure is that the news of the violent riots spread easier and stronger than the actual and true mass event which was this global peaceful protest covering it up. Though this has been a serious and blameworthy violence episode, we should also look to the importance and the strength of a worldwide movement that gathered 200.000 people just in Rome who are claiming for a future and protesting against a heavy economical crisis which is not the people’s fault. Also in a country which is standing on bended knees such as Italy, people answered to the call “People of the word: rise up!”.

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By now, London is in a state of collective hangover, but the recent week’s mayhem could just as well have swept through Athens, Madrid or Rome. The year 2011 will be remembered as the year of youth revolt; where the youth of Europe realized generations before them did not leave much for their future.

But lawmakers around Europe can’t really say that the protests, which most recent turned into arson and looting, were all that surprising. Danish newspaper Morgenavisen Jyllands-Posten reported that the generation that took to the streets in European capitals are the first in decades who cannot expect to reach a higher living standard than their parents. The rioting in Britain underlines this with socio-economic irony; the underbelly of society has been ignored for years while leaders scrambled to save the economy under the global financial crisis. A breakdown was unavoidable.

The initial problem has played out in several countries. In Spain, a staggering 40 percent youth unemployment led to mass protests in Madrid in May. Demonstrators, despite a ban, gathered to express their anger at the unbearable unemployment rate, the recent austerity measures and political corruption. In Athens, demonstrations and strikes led to violent clashes between police and protesters and last weekend saw a protest in Tottenham, UK, against the shooting of Mark Duggan turn into a weeklong street riot that destroyed so much more than materials.

The English anarchy was a display of societal meltdown — the media and politicians were quick to point their finger at fault but the explanation is straightforward. What it comes down to is a generation, raised in the economic boom of the 90s with all its optimism, but held back as they were about to enter society themselves as workers. A strained labor market and an increasingly nervous financial climate prevents many from looking to the future. No wonder those with the least hope, financially or socially, will break first and most furiously. It may be a terrible and upsetting situation, but it shouldn’t be a surprising one.

According to Chris Roycroft-Davis, a British political commentator, Prime Minister David Cameron’s harsh words in the wake of the recent riots will achieve nothing without direct, unrestrained consequences.

“Society is being destroyed because for decades we’ve gone soft on a underclass of lawbreaking, drug dealing layabouts who treat with contempt a world which they think owes them a living,” Roycroft-Davis said.

Though Roycroft-Davis’ words are hard, they voice the tension between the have’s and have-not’s which triggered the violence in London. One part is that young people have no jobs and no future to plan for – another is that some of the European welfare states have taken such good care of their people that they have forgotten society is a two-way agreement.

Some countries have nothing to give and the opportunity to give back is equally limited. The unemployment rate in Greece climbed to 14.2 percent by March and Spain was at a staggering 20.9 percent in the second quarter of 2011. In comparison, Germany only had 7 percent unemployment as of July.

But on the other hand, many western European countries continue their generous benefit systems despite numbers showing that only half of the population is employed. With the deduction of children, students and elderly, Morgenavisen Jyllands-Posten found that there were still a large amount of people who simply lived off the state — a vicious circle that many of the newest generations on the labour market will drop into by default.

In comparison with other decades and areas, the youth of Western Europe was arguably spoiled rotten by optimistic and protective states. Whether they achieved academically or was raised on the streets, there was always some sort of security net that tried to catch them if they fall.

There comes a point where people stop being grateful and start expecting more: ‘we want jobs’ or ‘we’re entitled to benefits’. The point is when they truly believe the world owes them just because they were born into it. The people who had no problem destroying their fellow citizens’ livelihood in the last week should be considered the fruit of society’s unrelenting labor. Kids down to eight years of age were out smashing windows and grabbing all they could get because society kept telling them that they were “entitled”. On the other hand, students and graduates want governments to take responsibility for creating jobs for them, while blaming people at the top for everything without fully appreciating the complicity of their parents, the greater society — not to mention the world.

The lost generation of Europe is in the end a motley bunch. All layers of society, educated or not, face bleak prospects in the coming years. While the student camps in squares with eloquently written protest banners, the mobster throws stones and steals designer hoodies but none of this can really change the probability that economic order will not be stabilized before our most important years on the labour market have passed. Governments will ask for patience and restraint but the revolting youth will not be silenced with words and they may spend the rest of the year proving this.

Image Courtesy of Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/64742792@N05/6026530372/

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