Harassment of Educators

One of the main political issues for Brazil’s growing far-right has been the criminalization of human rights and leftist ideas. Professors and teachers have been especially targeted through harassment campaigns and, increasingly, death threats. Débora Diniz, professor and researcher at the University of Brasília, was put under protection by the Human Rights Defenders, due to the backlash she received through her work defending women’s reproductive rights. After speaking in public hearings about abortion in the Supreme Court in August 2018, she began to be threatened through phone calls and social media. Diniz left Brazil at the end of 2018, fearing for her safety. In another high-profile case, a professor of philosophy at the Federal University of the State of Rio de Janeiro (UNIRIO), Márcia Tiburi, was forced to leave Brazil in December 2018 after years of harassment by the far right. School teachers are also under attack, harassed and threatened daily, and there have been several cases of teachers being filmed in the classroom and exposed on social media by their students responding to alleged “leftist indoctrination.” This surveillance is in direct response to a call put out by state representative Ana Caroline Campagnolo, who, in the immediate aftermath of the Bolsonaro election, urged students to film their teachers who would be “discontented and revolted” by Bolsonaro.