Having the newspaper Jornal da Baixada as source, published in the years 1979 and 1980, this article discusses the emergence of the struggle for better living conditions on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro, in the context of reappearance on the political scene of social movements that demands the right to citizenship in its various forms. At the same time, taking as its prime source a journalistic organ of the "alternative press", politically compromised with the struggles for rights in the final years of military government, this paper propose an analysis about the construction of a narrative that intentionally took the political goal of creation of another perception about the identity of the region socially defined like “Baixada Fluminense”, one region traditionally associated by the great press for its violence, the lack of public services and arcaic political practices.