“I was also that left-wing rocker, against the system...”: white complicit masculinity, performed hypermasculinity, neoconservatism, and heavy metal in digital environments of the Belém-PA heavy metal scene during the Bolsonaro administration (2019-2022)

Based on song lyrics, recorded interviews, magazine interviews, social media pages, and comments on YouTube and Facebook, this article analyzes the music video “Ditador do Metal” (2020), published on the YouTube channel of R. Bala, leader of Stress, a pioneering band in Brazilian heavy metal. The study argues that this audiovisual production of the Belém-PA heavy metal scene is largely shaped by white, heterosexual, middle- and upper-middle-class complicit masculinity. It examines how this masculinity seeks to revive former models of male dominance through violent regressive hypermasculine traits and to benefit from the hypermasculinity promoted during the Bolsonaro administration. The article also discusses how these practices relate to Brazilian far-right neoconservatism and how they are performed in opposition to other masculinities and femininities within the scene.