“Censorship is still alive today, it left a legacy”

José Pacheco Pereira argued in Covilhã that the censorship perpetrated by the Estado Novo left a legacy and remains alive to this day.

The auditorium of the Teatro das Beiras was filled to hear the researcher of contemporary Portuguese history, journalist, chronicler and politician, last night, in the gathering “Censorship in the Theater during the Estado Novo – Censorship Materials in the Ephemera Archive”, promoted by the Teatro das Beiras within the scope of the “and now April” initiative.

In the end, in statements to journalists, he argued that of all the instruments of repression used, “censorship is the one that is still alive today”.

“Censorship messed with people’s heads, the police messed with their bodies. Messing with people’s heads over such a long period of time has results. It creates a lot of behaviors that people inherit from censorship but don’t think come from censorship,” she said.

He gives as an example “the demonization of politics, the idea that politics inferiorizes”, arguing that this comes from 48 years of censorship.

“The demonization of politics and the obsession with a world where everyone understands each other comes from censorship”, he said, pointing out that “a world where everyone understands each other is not a democratic world”, he stressed.

He points out that censorship “left a burden to this day”, resulting in a lack of ideological debate. “A Minister takes an ideological position. What is the problem? It is supposed to have ideology, we can contest that position, but through another ideological position”, she said, regretting that this is not what happens, but rather “seeing that position as an insult and that is what is unacceptable”

He stressed that censorship was used to “protect the power relationship” and on a cultural level “it was very effective”, although on a political level “it was possible to deceive”.

He warns that nowadays there are other forms of censorship, “it is not state censorship”, there is censorship that comes from “fear of others” and “political correctness”.

He states that “literary creation and political discourse and narrative cannot accept these types of limitations”, he concluded.

This colloquium closed the exhibition “Censorship in Theatre” which was on display at Teatro das Beiras, with documentation by José Pacheco Pereira and Rita Maltez, with scenography and installation by José Manuel Castanheira and research and texts by Guilherme Filipe.