typical religious bigotry? well, maybe it's more complicated.
The Small Wars Journal has an article on how this fits into the geopolitical situation there, and has links for anyone interested in the problem of crime and gangs controlling the poor neighborhoods in the cities of Brazil,
the "religious" aspect is because some gang members have become Christian, and take it very seriously: They attack pagan churches as evil. And alas too often they see themselves as vigilante peace keepers, including collecting "taxes" from local businesses to keep them safe.
The interconnection between gangs and religious sects is dynamic and complex. In many cases, religious movements are an avenue out of gang life and crime. In others, the two become intertwined. Sometimes the outcome is “evangelical gangsters.” Sometimes this occurs when a religious movement seeks to purge gangs and drugs from their community. Over time, these efforts become corrupted and the members become ‘vigilantes,’sort of like the Mafia, which originally was a grass roots movement to protect people from the cops and the rich guys who harmed you. Or like the communists here, which fought unjust landlords, but later morphed into gangsters (Magsaysay wrote classic book on how to fight such insurgencies here).
Given the connection of the murderous Mexican cartel and the "saint death" cult, one might suspect that the gang members in Brazil could suspect a similar sinister influence by these cults. Or maybe they are just being iconoclasts.
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I had posted a longer and a poorly written and disjointed post early this morning before the brownout started, but moved it here.
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