Cite As: Geisler, Luisa. The SlutWalk protest marches started in Canada on April 3, , and since have become a worldwide, annual event. The SlutWalk in Porto Alegre was happening while other public demonstrations were beginning across the city. Judging by the dates, I thought it was just a coincidence.
A friend of mine even joked about the fact that we had a busy schedule that week; there were a pro-marijuana rally on Saturday, the SlutWalk on Sunday and camping to protest the cutting of trees during the week. It was only in June—when the protests got bigger nationally—that I realized there was no such coincidence.
As the protests that were initially about the bus fares grew along with their agenda , feminists themes reached the surface. Of course, feminism is always a public interest, but common sense dictates otherwise.
Feminism is sometimes seen as nagging, as complaints of unhappy and annoying women. The common denominator in both cases was the secularity of the state. Marco Feliciano a racist evangelical minister and federal deputy was chosen as head of the Minority and Human Rights Commission. This same man came to public with a bill project that would allow psychologists and psychiatrists to treat homosexuality as a mental illness. And the SlutWalk and the July movements were both demanding political answers to those questions.
Of course, by August the protest numbers had come drastically down. However, the bus-fare riots and the SlutWalk still echoed the same complaints. From a complete system revolution to a revolution in the bus-fare prices, I heard the word revolution so many times. From complaints about better schools to better gender understanding, I read the word education so many times. In other words, the protesters wanted to show who was in charge.
