Christianity politics and the criminalization of homophobia in Brazil

This paper discusses the parliamentary debates that took place in Brazil between 2006 and 2012 on the proposal to criminalize homophobia brought to the agenda by bill PLC 122/2006. Using discourse analysis from Michel Foucault's perspective the author seeks to understand how these discursive battles reflect profound power games and trigger different statements with a preponderance of supposedly scientific discourses although religious discourse is at the center of these analyses. The Federal Legislature is taken here not only from its strictly political function but as a stage where archaic views of society are legitimized. The prejudice present in these practices is analyzed for example by the hypotheses that the author raises about a state racism present in certain parliamentary practices of our Federal Legislature. At a time when religious fundamentalism and politics are intertwined in public-political spaces in Brazil this book arrives at a very opportune moment.