Chairman Eugenio “Toto” Villareal of The Movie and Television Review and Classification Board is not happy with what ABS-CBN in their Pinoy Big Brother reality show did to the two female housemates.
He will meet with “PBB:All In” executives today about its June 4 and 5 episodes wherein Big Brother or “Kuya “ challenged housemate Jamey Jalandoni to pose for a nude painting as part of her weekly tasks.
Big Brother sternly told her: “Marami ang nakasalalay rito; ang inyong weekly task, ang tulong na maibibigay sa pintor at sa kaniyang adbokasiya… Bibigyan kita ng oras para makapag-isip (There is a lot riding on your decision; your weekly task, the help you can extend the painter and his advocacy… I will give you time to think).”
Apparently feeling the pressure, Jalandoni wavered and agreed. She was told to choose three other housemates to join her as nude models and she chose s Michelle Gumabao, Daniel Matsunaga and Ranty Fortento , who initially agreed but later changed their mind.
Jalandoni changedher mind after she was allowed to discuss the task with her father in the confession room. She told her housemates,“Sabi ko na mag-no-no ako, kasi gusto ko respetuhin ‘yung daddy ko (I said ‘no’ because I wanted to respect my dad).”
Villareal said, “The pressure exerted upon said housemates arguably constitutes moral and psychological violence upon them and may violate their dignity as human persons. “
In summoning ABS-CBN executives, Villareal said the MTRCB invokes its 2012 Memorandum of Understanding with the station and other networks for the positive and non-derogatory portrayal of women in television in support of The Magna Carta of Women of 2009. “More the conflict with religion and the incursion into otherwise harmonious family relations can also border into insensitivity toward the Filipino values of faith and family.”
Gross insensitivity indeed for the sake of ratings.
The Philippine Commission on Women (PCW) is alarmed by what PBB, a franchise from a Dutch-based Endemol, did to Jalandoni and the other housemates. In its statement, the government agency said it saw nothing wrong with women posing nude for art, but it should be her free choice to do so.
Big Brother, it said, violated Jalandoni’s right to freedom of thought, conscience, religion, and belief.
It reminded ABS-CBN executives the provision in The Magna Carta of Women that states: “No individual, television show, or entity has the right to cause discrimination, insecurity, discomfort, offense, or humiliation to any woman.”
The public can do their bit not to encourage shows that promote questionable values and dysfunctionalism: Turn off your TV. Don’t watch.
Sadly, that’s the selling point of Endemol’s Big Brother franchise anywhere in the world – Catering to the baser instincts of bored contestants. And bored audiences.
Nudity, even sex, seems to be encouraged. There are many Big Brother casts in the US, UK, Brazil, Germany, etc that have become very popular because of actual sex scenes, nip slips, tiny swimsuits and other forms and degrees of nudity titillating the voyeurist audiences. Go to YouTube and see for yourselves. It is only in the Philippines, I think, that a more conservative format is the norm and I’m not saying it is wrong.