“How can anybody own any part of Earth? You can own only what you made with your own hands which is also doubtful because you need materials produced by Nature (God) to make anything, even a child. This “civilization” will end like many similar before.”

No, Robi, not like many before. The end of this civilization will be so much worse than anything that’s been recorded by man. Blame overpopulation and complete lack of regard for this bubble which is all that supports us.

My main question to all you “conservatives” (as in, I conserve everything for myself) is: how many Brazilians who work hard have enough money to buy land? It’s a near universal truth that those who work hardest cannot climb out of poverty. Unless you call sitting in an office where your dad got you a job “hard work”. Even in the US, that’s pretty much a bad joke.

Go get a soul.

[...] Uma mulher indígena detém o seu filho durante a tentativa de resistir ao avanço dos policias que expulsavam a mulher mais cerca de 200 outros membros do Movimento Sem Terra perto de Manaus, no Coração da Amazonia no 11 Março de 2008. Oa camponeses sem terra tentaram , em vão resistir ao despejo com arcos e flechas contra policias usando gás lacrimogênio e cães treinados. esta imagem não pode ser mais realiste da situação que se vive hoje em certos pontos do Brasil. link [...]

“Where is the story about the person who worked hard to buy this land and then watched it get trampled and used by these squatters from the Landless Movement? Perhaps I could feel more supportive if they settled on Public Lands rather than stealing resources from another individual human being.”

This comment is so ludicrous that I think it may be a joke, but I’m going to treat it as though it is someone’s actual opinion. Any land that was “purchased” by anyone was at one time stolen from indigenous Brazilians. Period. The natives are the rightful “owners” of the land, although “stewards” may be a better choice of words, since indigenous people traditionally have no concept of ownership or individual property.

This photo is incredible. I didn’t knew that reuters has it’s own blog.

Wow. Amazing photo. To anyone that has blamed this woman for her actions. She’s doing this because she’s desperate. Where is she meant to leave her defenceless child whilst she’s being evicted from land? Why is she squatting on private land in the first place? Because 2/3rds of the arable (land that has potential for planting crops) land in Brazil is owned by 3% of the population.

So 97% of the population are forced to share 30% of the land.

Some people may call the MST Terrorists, I’d call them Revolutionaries.

powerful indeed. the image is not threatening to the governments, corporations and the wealthy elite because it blatantly exposes the inhumane injustices they inflict on the women, children and people of the world.

this women didn’t put her child in danger. it is the government and wealthy, corporate-privatizing-fat-cat-greedy individuals who harm, displace, impoverish, steal, and mass murder million of people all around the world.

out of the 6.4 billion people in the world, half live on less than $2 a day. one-fourth of the world live on less than $1 a day. 70% of those living on less than a dollar a day are women.

the landless movement along with the other oppressed people of the world have a right to live a life with justice, dignity and freedom of violence.

[...] Photographers » Blog Archive » This one is worth a thousand words | Blogs | Reuters.com via Boingboing (tags: government public-policy activism photography oppression news via:boingboing) [...]

“It is easy to an European to call the Landless movement ’semi-terrorist’”

(Sorry for the broke english I will use.)

I am brazilian and it´s easy to me also call the MST (Landless movement) a ’semi-terrorist’ movement.

I am son of a farmer and I a saw a neighbor of our farm being invaded by the MST. My neighbor’s farm wasn’t a big farm and wasn’t unproductive by any means. The MST stole my neighbor cattle, his house and destroyed his truck and tractos before some judge send the police to help him.

A lot of those ‘landless guys’ were known criminals from the closer city and a lot of others were only poor people the MST recruit on the favelas (that have 99,99% of urban persons who simply don’t know how to raise vegetables of take care of farm animals).

Another stuff a saw with my own eyes is how fast the MST people sells the land the goverment give then. I saw a farmer from nearby my dad’s farm, literally double his lands by buying more lands from the ‘landless’ (much of then engage at the MST again, seeking for raise the money with the next land).

I’m a son of a farmer and I am pro land distribution reform, as well my dad, but it must be made by the right channels, not by ’semi-terrorist’ acts.

Another little thing I think you don’t know, the MST tortured and killed a police captain in the northeast region here in Brazil, their former-leader was on jail by some murders too. They are involved with hundreds of other murders, property robbering, vandalism and other crimes. The MST is in truth a kind of proto-FARC from Brazil, we really worry about the evolution of that.

MST is so NOT a terrorist organization. They are a movement that does do things like “squat” on land that isn’t being used, and use it for farming or self sustaining. These are people that have no homes and are largely shut out from the urban cores of Brazil, and are doing anything they can to survive. As a movement, there have been tiffs between the police and them when they raid encampments trying to force people to go some where else, but I can assure the police always are the ones who are injuring people and leaving behind a body count. For many of these people, the MST is the only voice and political organization, and source of food there is.

Anyone who has been to Brazil knows that it is a highly divided society, and it has built literal walls between the rich and poor segments.

Finally, for those people talking about stealing land, land in brazil, particularly in acre and amazonas is getting stolen by large companies in Brazil and abroad and being re-appropriated for there own use. If there is a rule of law, it is unilaterally being applied to people who can afford to wield the system.

I don’t know anything about the landless movement, but I doubt most of the posters do either, and it is in that spirit that I respond:

Damn, what disgusting capitalist sentiment in the comments here. I believe in free markets too, but not at the expense of all compassion. You are like the cops in some cities, harassing the homeless wherever they happen to be: public property, private property, developed or undeveloped, it doesn’t matter because no matter where they are, they don’t own the land. How dare a person that cannot afford land go to sleep anywhere! What are those “terrorist” homeless people thinking?