This article, “The Macaquitos Affair” by Jeffrey Richey, is about the poor treatment and portrayal of dark-skinned Brazilians, specifically in sports media. Argentine sports writers would have extremely racist stories printed in their papers. The main newspaper article being discussed was a story titled “Monkeys In Buenos Aires” that was published in Argentine newspaper “Critica” and was written by one of the top sports writers in the country at the time, Palacio Zino. The article came the same day as an exhibition versus Brazil and many of them decided to not to participate out of protest, and there was so much outrage that the Argentinian government was forced to take action and arrest the writer and the EIC of the newspaper.
As stated in the article, racism of Afro-Brazilians has subsided when speaking about their treatment from their South American neighbors, but it still remains a problem in the sport of soccer and for Brazilians. Just earlier this year, fans of Spanish club Atletico Madrid hung a doll of Real Madrid and Brazilian national team star Vinicius Jr from a bridge ahead of their rivalry match. The year before, Atletico supporters were also heard chanting “Vinicius is a monkey” and making monkey noises. In a World Cup tune-up match last year, Brazilian national team member Richarlison had a banana thrown at him after scoring a goal against Tunisia in a match played in France. Despite the “Macaquitos affair” taking place over 100 years ago, Brazilian footballers of darker complexions still face racism in association with “macaquitos” which is Portuguese for “little monkeys”. I’m not saying the article printed in “Critica” in 1920 started this racist movement, but its effects are still sadly being felt today.
