When Big Brother Brasil started in January, Carla Diaz was everyone’s darling, making her very successful on Twitter for all her care for the other participants and for her support of her opponent Juliette, who was being excluded by all the other participants. These attitudes made her gain a million followers on Instagram overnight. A few weeks after the beginning of the confinement, Carla started to get involved with Arthur Piccoli, which at first was seen in a very funny way by everyone, because Arthur is the typical straight man who doesn’t know how to get to anyone, but his advances went right in the end and she engaged in a romance with him.
In the first few weeks, Carla fought with Karol Conká, hated by the viewers for all her attitudes that made it clear that the human being is terrible, who again placed her as the protégé of the public. But what ended her positive image, incredible as it may seem, was her relationship with Arthur, because in many moments the sister came out in defense of her boyfriend and his allies.
Besides, Arthur gradually revealed himself to be a very toxic guy, starring in numerous extremely abusive moments with the sister. At first, he constantly placed Projota as his highest priority in the game and made sure to make it very clear to her. Along with this, small, almost imperceptible violence began: Arthur never defended Carla when other participants spoke ill of her, he never had a couple’s attitudes, like kissing and hugging and when the blonde left an extensive resistance test, the brother didn’t even bother to look her in the face.
The public was revolted with Arthur’s attitudes, his image was extremely deteriorated out here, and getting him out of the house became a new goal. But the one who went to the elimination (“Paredão”, literally translated to “big wall”) before him was Carla, who, in this case, came out on a fake elimination. In other words, Brazil allowed the sister to see this facet of her “boyfriend” and to have her eyes opened. When she returned home, her first attitude was to kneel and ask Arthur to be her partner in love and the game, to which he replied with a dry “partiu” (something like “alright, let’s go”) and she, like every woman in an abusive relationship, remained blind and hopelessly in love. From that point on, Carla, who until now was the victim, became the villain, the idiot, the person who wasted the perfect opportunity. The other week, she went to the elimination again and was eliminated, instead of Rodolffo, who had already given homophobic statements for several weeks.
Carla Diaz was blamed by the public for getting involved with Arthur and was withdrawn from reality for that. However, what happened in that secret room was very significant for women in abusive relationships and was not considered by fans. Carla understood nothing, saw nothing, and went back to her abuser, saying that she saw everything and was always right about this love. However, the pay-per-view was limited, and ended up focusing on the bad parts she saw and heard from the other participants, and not from Arthur. This is one of the mechanisms that perpetuate abusive relationships. Especially because, at first, she didn’t even want to be with him, she was fine alone. But she gave in to the pressure of being part of a couple and making it work.
Arthur Piccoli is still in the game. Even though he’s placed on almost every elimination, the public always believes that there is someone more wrong than him to take out of the game before him. Arthur represents the perfect stereotype of toxic masculinity: he is a coward and he’s violent, always biting and blowing with Carla, he is mocking and cold, using this as a tool of psychological pressure. Of course, Arthur is a man wounded by this structural system that leads men to be irresponsible monsters, but his attitudes cannot be justified by this and he needs to be penalized.
Carla and Arthur’s relationship was never seen as abusive. Since at no time was he explicitly physically violent towards her. Arthur didn’t scream, he didn’t punch. But abuse is a form of exploitation, someone benefits over another, it’s a parasitic relationship. And we, as a society, have a habit of always blaming women for men’s mistakes. Carla paid for this prejudice, like so many others. Her trajectory on BBB has a lot to teach us. A woman who got into the reality show with everything she had, who had a great chance of reaching the final, in a few weeks fell down, due to a relationship with a toxic man and a structurally sexist society.
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This article was edited by Anna Bastos.
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