The Special Commission on Political Deaths and Disappearances sent a letter to TV criticizing the “White Room” test from the Big Brother Brasil program, comparing it to the torture methods of the exceptional regime experienced in Brazil.
According to the organization, the event, which confines participants with the aim of testing their psychological resistance, “has gone beyond the boundaries of gaming and entertainment to enter dangerous terrain that flirts with physical violence and psychological scourge.”
For the commission, the similarities with dictatorship practices are undeniable. “It is impossible to ignore that such methods bear a terrifying similarity to the torture practices systematically employed by the Brazilian civil-military dictatorship, a period of pain that still leaves scars in the memory of our nation,” says the letter.
The commission is a State body, responsible for memory and reparation measures for victims of the dictatorship.
The document is signed by the president of the body, Eugênia Gonzaga, and four other members: Diva Santana, representative of the families of the dead and missing, federal deputy Natália Bonavides (PT-RN), appointed by the Chamber’s Human Rights Commission, and Vera Paiva and Maria Cecília Adão, both from civil society.
They mention some evidence from the room, in particular one that forces people to remain standing on a kind of pedestal, “a practice used as torture during Latin American dictatorships.”
The signatories add that the argument that the participants in the reality show agreed to submit to the dynamics does not exempt the broadcaster from responsibility. “Our Federal Constitution, in its article 5, is clear: the prohibition of torture and degrading treatment is an absolute value”, they say.
The commission asks that Globo review practices equivalent to torture and that civil society reflect on the topic and this form of entertainment.
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