Proverbial

Once again, in the name of protecting us from the horrors of racism, apology to crime or the incitement of violence, Brazil’s diligent judges censored perfectly valid discourse. As much as this sort of thing pisses me off, though, I applaud that these ridiculous laws keep being enforced.

A couple of weeks ago, PROCON (the country’s national consumer protection agency) started to enforce a ruling from October last year, banning any form of commerce involving the games Counter-Strike and EverQuest (which is not even sold in Brazil). Which means that you can’t sell the games, nor make money off them by renting computers to play them at a lan house and such.

Last friday, a journalist from the country’s largest newspaper tipped off the federal government about a planned CS competition, to take place during this year’s Campus Party. Being this a sponsored event, the organization was warned not to promote the game in any way (people may still play it, if they have it on their computers), otherwise undercover government officials camped at the site would shut the whole thing off.

About the same time, a Carnival float depicting the Holocaust was banned from this year’s parade in Rio, after a lawsuit from that state’s Jewish Federation claiming it was a celebration of racism. Viradouro - the group responsible for the float - tried to argue it was a respectful reminder of the horrors of Nazism, and that everything was done with the approval of rabbis and the Jewish community, to no avail.

Apparently, though, they were already expecting something like this, as they quickly transformed the float into one defending freedom of expression, decrying the court’s decision. Even better, they used a slogan from the banner of Minas Gerais state (Freedom, even if late) and also remembered the famous case where a float depicting a hobo Jesus Christ was banned from 1989’s parade, only to be covered in garbage bags and sent to the sambódromo, with a ribbon reading “Even forbidden, look over us”.

While watching parts of the parade with friends, last night, someone mentioned that if it were something considered a work of art, people would have understood and turned a blind eye to the religious and political implications.

Which is precisely why I hope these laws keep being heavily enforced, on every possible occasion. Until people realize the problem is not in judges’ eventual double standards, but in the ridiculous legislation which allow for this sort of nonsense in the first place, this sort of thing must keep happening.