Controversy in Brazil: Promoting adoption with a parade of orphaned children | Chronic

It started as a good intention to promote adoption. But it did not take long to spark criticism. In Brazil, the Bar Association of this country, with the support of several public organizations, has organized a parade with boys awaiting adoption.

The event has been held in recent days in a shopping center of Cuiabá, in the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso. With the models of a fashion show, and promoted by shopping brands, several miners have made the rounds of the podium before the attentive glance of their "future future adoptive families".

"It's an evening for aspiring adopters to meet children and teens. The general population will have more information about the adoption and the children themselves will have a different day, in which they will produce, brush, make up and wear clothes for the parade. "he pointed Tatiana of Barros Ramalho, president of the Commission on Children and Youth (CIJ), in the BBC World Brazil.

However, the deep criticisms overshadowed the good intention. "This parade looks like an old slave fair, where the gentlemen saw the teeth of Africans negotiate the price", Said the criminal lawyer Mato Grosso Eduardo Mahlon.

Then, interviewed by BBC Brazil, he thought about the inadequacy of the chosen place: "If a parade can already lead to a double interpretation, the idea of ​​the organizers was unfortunate to do in a shopping center, which is essentially a place of consumption".