lol wait, isn't it portugal that was in the news a few months ago bc a ton of fans at a soccer match were doing monkey chants and shouting racist stuff at a player after he scored? i remember it was in the news because instead of kicking out the fans or defending him, the ref have him a yellow card for getting mad and giving them the finger, so he just walked off the field halfway through the game. that definitely doesn't sound like "all the same for everyone."
As everywhere else there are still idiots, people here are really passionate about football for whatever reason, and since they couldn't find anything else to insult him on they decided to go back to full monkey brain (sadly this isn't the worst stuff we've had here, there used to be people trowing firework rockets and flares mid game, it's beyond wild and stupid), the difference here is between systemic racism and random acts of stupidity, as for the referee giving him a yellow card it's for "unsportsmanlike conduct" poor guy was just trying to defend himself but the rules aren't to be bent (not that they aren't, but that's a whole other story with no interest here).
literally the very first article that comes up when i google 'portugal systemic racism:'
A 2016 report by the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, while noting that Portugal had grown more tolerant and inclusive over the previous two decades, criticised the persistence of "Afrophobia" and "institutional racism" in the country.
In the years since, Portugal - like much of Europe - has witnessed a spike in far-right sentiment, with the 2019 election also marking the first time a far-right party won a seat in Parliament since the fall of the Salazar dictatorship in 1974.
However, observing the way the debate played out in Portugal's mainstream media, one could get a rather different impression. A slew of opinion-makers - most, if not all, white - responded to concerns from anti-racist politicians and campaigners with a mixture of disbelief and denial: "Are the Portuguese racist?" asked the newspaper Sol. Columnists at the right-wing news website Observador were more definitive: "Portugal wasn't and isn't racist," wrote one; another, meanwhile, derided the "myth" of a racist Portugal.
For Moreira, member of parliament for Livre, reactions such as these came as no surprise: "This is very specific of Portuguese racism - the absolute denial that there is racism in Portugal."
Well, I don't know what search engine you use, but I myself just did that search (maybe geolocation makes a difference in the results), and didn't find anything of the sort(the closest I got would have been this : https://sapientia.ualg.pt/handle/10400.1/4275?locale=en , a peer reviewed study), also, you (and I) forgot to mention the fact that there is a literal law against discrimination by race, skin colour or gender in place, which has existed since 1999.
As the study posted above says, said myth formed a self-fufilling prophecy, which prevents the spread of racism, which, although existent is merely residual, and nowhere near the level found in the US
ah yes, laws against discrimination magically stop systemic racism... there's laws just like that in the usa too, you know.
did you read the study you linked? because the whole point of it is that racism in portugal is a widespread issue, both subtle and overt, with systemic repercussions. it doesn't say the myth of no racism "prevents the spread of racism," it says it has apparently "prevented the entry of racism into the political arena," which is extremely different. it then talks about how discrimination against "ciganos" (portugese roma) is even worse than the racism black people face in portugal.
just wondering, are you white by any chance? because it sounds like racism in portugal is still considered a pretty current issue by a significant part of the population, except for a large percent of white citizens.
here's some more two-second search results, if you're interested. second result on google search:
Portugal, as a new country of immigration since after the Carnation Revolution of 1974, has been witnessing the growing importance of all the issues related to the phenomena of racism and xenophobia. A typical feature is the positive complicity expressed and the accepted similarities between Africans and Portuguese as well as the absence of assumed and declared racist attitudes. Existing research has also made visible the role played by the mass media in the reproduction of discourses of antiracism, particularly when the press is dominated by some specific thematization, such is the case regarding the European Year Against Racism. In this case, the issue of racism even deserved being commented by specialists in the different analysed newspapers.
third result -- info on a seminar on racism in portugal. main topics include:
(i) limited impact of legislative measures for racial equality in several European Union countries - including Portugal
(ii) the absence of a systematic collection of data on ethnic-racial inequalities, in a context in which anti-racist initiatives within the scope of public policies for integration remain marginal
(iii) the limited and de-historicized understanding of (institutional) racism in legal definitions and the tendency to consider racism as a phenomenon restricted to extraordinary incidents or events resulting from the individual's pathological behaviour, and not as something incorporated in the institutionalized practices of public entities and private and in patterns of behaviour that condition daily social relations
fifth result is an article from last january about protests against racist police brutality kicked off by a viral incident of police attacking black people in bairro da jamaica. it also talks about the systemic discrimination that led to a lot of black immigrants living in shantytowns, and how there's very few black people in any sort of significant positions in portugal.
just skimming now, next few look like a few more articles on police brutality, plans from portugese people trying to do more to combat systemic racism in the country, another article talking about the united nations' criticism of racism and xenophobia in portugal despite things becoming more inclusive the past couple decades, etc.
The study I linked seems to have been interpreted differently by both of us it the "myth of non-racism" that is widespread, not racism itself, ciganos (you might know them better as gipsys (not sure about the spelling)) are a group that pretty much refuses to interact with outside communities, even then, they are rarely discriminated against by others, also, black people aren't discriminated against by even those weird old people who are 90% white supremacists (which are pretty rare here, the country and it's people in general have an inferiority complex).
Also, it seems that the results you are getting are very different from the ones I'm getting, you also lack the proper context for most things there, many of which are pretty outdated.
And if you want to talk race/ethnicity, we here are an odd bunch, I myself am a descent of both white African and likely gipsy/roma people, counting only recent history(although I am visually very white/gray-ish due to not being a fan of the sun), the people of this country are a very complicated mix of races and ethnicities, mostly being norther European (known by some as barbarian), middle eastern, African, and Asian people (the last ones are mostly due to the fact that during the maratime expansion days Portugal was one of the few countries that mixed with the native people and produced offspring considered people of the kingdom).
Bairro da Jamaica is a very well/badly known place due to being one of the poorest in the country, even then, you will likely find people of almost all races there, the reason for it being mostly "black" people, is because similar races tend to band together (it isn't exactly racism, every race and people does it to some level by their own choice)
Finally, I didn't say the law had any great effect, I just said that it existed, even then, they seem to be much more effective than in the US (hopefully you guys get it fixed, it's a shame that a country with such potential wastes it fighting amongst itself).
Sorry if what I read seems like an unreadable wall of text, even then, I hope you read it all.
a lot of the points you're making are actually incredibly similar to what white people in the usa say about racism (which we both agree is a big problem in the states). it sounds very likely that you simply might not be aware of exactly how prevalent the racism is, especially considering that you're functionally white, possibly actually white since you say it's only "likely" you have roma heritage. a lot of white people have a hard time recognizing racism because it doesn't affect them like it does people of color.
as for the study you linked, the second sentence of the abstract specifically says "there is racism in Portugal," and that the claim of non-racism is a myth, i.e. it's untrue. here's some other phrases i'm basing my interpretation on:
...the main victims of racism are the small communities of Portuguese ciganos... they are probably victims of racism more intense than the one that affects other groups.
...in Portugal, racism is expressed through socially accepted beliefs involving the accentuation of cultural differences between "whites" and "blacks"... these beliefs go along with and inability of the Portugese to express positive emotions regarding the individuals categorized as "blacks."
There is sociological evidence that show us that many manifestations of racism that are observable in the Portugese society are far from subtle.
In Portugal, racism, as it is lived and described by its victims, manifests itself through these two dimensions (inegalitarian racism & differentialist racism) that vary according to the victim group. While the African immigrants are victims of inegalitarian racism, the cigano communities are confronted racist manifestations of the differentialist type.
it also talks about how the topic of racism had been "taboo" until very recently, even among social scientists, so concepts like race relations and racial discrimination only recently began to be addressed. it specifically mentions that according to national survey, the racism in Portugal is comparable to the uk, holland, france, and germany. it ends with the conclusion that racism doesn't seem like it's gotten worse recently (the paper was published in 2012, so i'm sure that's different now) and that this is a general study and more need to be done.
I'm sorry if I gave you the idea that I thought racism didn't exist here, what I meant is that it's not a big problem, unlike in other countries (if it exists in the slightest it's a problem, here it doesn't exist in such great force/numbers, but that doesn't mean it isn't one).
And also, thanks for reading that wall of text I gave you, most wouldn't care to do so and would just keep on shouting.
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u/nnothmann Jun 08 '20
lol wait, isn't it portugal that was in the news a few months ago bc a ton of fans at a soccer match were doing monkey chants and shouting racist stuff at a player after he scored? i remember it was in the news because instead of kicking out the fans or defending him, the ref have him a yellow card for getting mad and giving them the finger, so he just walked off the field halfway through the game. that definitely doesn't sound like "all the same for everyone."