Argentina’s ‘European’ self-image under renewed scrutiny after racist incidents in Brazil
A woman celebrating her 32nd birthday on a train journey in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais was horrified when a fellow passenger alerted her that an unknown man had been secretly filming her seven-year-old son. When confronted, the man – an Argentinian tourist – initially refused to show his phone. But after being pressed by other travellers, the man admitted he had sent the images to a WhatsApp contact. Police later revealed that under the photos, Eduardo Ignacio Murias, 63, an architect from the Argentinian province of Santiago del Estero, had written: “He’s Black but very cute. I could take him as a slave. I’m thinking of taking a slave, there are many here.”
The child’s mother photographed the phone screen and passengers kept Murias inside the the train until it reached its destination, where he was arrested for “racial insult”, a crime under Brazilian law. The case has reignited debate in both countries about racism, national identity and Argentina’s longstanding pride in its European heritage. Murias was the third Argentinian to be arrested for racism in Brazil this year, at a time when record numbers of Argentinian tourists are travelling to the country. In April, José Luis Haile, 67, was arrested after allegedly directing racist insults at a food delivery worker at a supermarket in Rio. He is awaiting trial.
In January, Agostina Páez, 29, was arrested in Rio after being filmed mimicking a monkey towards a waiter at a nightclub. Although later released, she was barred from leaving Brazil for two and a half months while the investigation continued. During that time, she claimed on social media that her rights were being violated and she was facing “persecution” – a narrative echoed by parts of the Argentinian media. The waiter is suing Páez for moral damages. “The claimant is a Black man who daily faces a society that insists on pushing him backwards simply because of the colour of his skin,” his lawyers wrote in the filing. “And yet, while carrying out his work, he was forced to hear words that diminished him and animalised him.” When Páez returned to Argentina in April, while still facing legal proceedings in Brazil, she was welcomed by the far-right senator Patricia Bullrich, a close ally of Argentina’s president, Javier Milei. Paéz’s father, Mariano Páez, was later filmed in a bar imitating a monkey to celebrate his daughter’s return.
The political scientist and African-Argentinian activist Federico Pita said none of the recent cases came as a surprise given Argentina’s long history of racism. “Racism is inscribed within the very project of the Argentine nation. Argentina is constitutionally a supremacist country,” he said, citing article 25 of the constitution, which states: “The federal government shall promote European immigration.” Pita said Argentina continued to see itself as a “European” country while denying the existence of African-Argentinians and Indigenous peoples who, according to the 2022 census, make up about 1% and 3% of the population respectively. Activists and researchers, however, argue that those figures are likely to be underestimates. Experts believe the majority of the population has Indigenous ancestry, even if they do not identify as such. Pita said: “An Aymara descendant born in the north of Argentina is treated as Bolivian, a Mapuche born in Argentine Patagonia is treated as Chilean; and an African-descendant from Buenos Aires is treated as Uruguayan or Brazilian, because the only thing considered truly Argentine is whiteness.” In March, Argentina was the only Latin American country to vote against a UN resolution declaring the transatlantic slave trade “the gravest crime against humanity”. The US and Israel were the only other countries to oppose the measure.
Although slavery was abolished in Argentina in 1853, the descendants of enslaved Africans – and their influence on the country’s culture, from tango to language and food – remain. Pita said comparisons between Argentina and Brazil were complex. While Black Brazilians make up a far larger share of the population, they also experience disproportionately high levels of poverty, police violence and social exclusion. “I don’t know what is more serious: a country like Argentina, which says its Black population does not exist, or Brazil, where a young Black man is killed every few minutes. They are equally grave,” he said.
Cases of racism by Argentinians against Brazilians are not new – in 1920, players from Brazil’s national football team refused to play a friendly match after being depicted in an Argentinian newspaper as “monkeys”. To this day, fans imitating monkeys are caught in virtually every match involving clubs from the two countries. Although there is no evidence that such incidents are becoming more common, social media has helped put them in the spotlight. Meanwhile, thanks to the overvalued peso, more Argentinians are travelling to Brazil and account for a third of the 9.3 million foreign tourists in 2025. Pita said it was also important not to generalise about Argentinians. “Most of the Argentinian population not only never travel to Brazil, but most likely have never left the country,” he said. “But they do represent a deeper Argentina” that still struggles with racism.
