“Cortina de Fumaça” - Negacionismo ambiental e imaginário colonial no YouTube

Taking in consideration the role of YouTube in the dissemination of scientific denialism and the radicalization of audiences, this essay analyzes the movie Smoke Screen, Lucas Ferrugem. Produced by “Brasil Paralelo”, the audiovisual work was intends to “prove” the fasehood of the environmental cause. More than misinforming, it organizes beliefs, ideas and discourses of the anti-environmentalist agenda in Brazil, offering an ideological ammunition for the dismantling of environmental protection and the advance of extractivism. Although the movie presents itself as a defense of “the Indians” [sic] and the national sovereignty, Smoke Screen bases itself on an inherently colonial rationality, which reduces the environment to resources to be claimed and indigenous peoples to subjects who need “to evolve” and “to progress” as "us".