Big Brother

Not again! Why is this being inflicted upon us yet again?

Yes, I know, I don't have to watch it if I don't want to but ... Big Brother is like a plague that infects the country every summer. It's very difficult to avoid even if you want to.

I gave it a couple of cursory looks to see if it is as unbearably stupid as usual and I have to report that if anything it may be worse. About the only good thing about this year's is that the contestants seem to possess some books. Was it true that books were prohibited articles on a previous series?

The 2003 crop look like being extremely boring. Hardly any of them stood out. Oh, why I am even bothering to write about it? Enough!!

Last fall I got a job outside of London and all I ever heard people talking about was the newest episode of "Big Brother." I was already familiar with the US series, but in America they broadcast an hour time slot, edited, and don't print what's going on in the newspapers.

I couldn't believe it when the last season's series managed to break front headlines news. I know the Daily Mail is tabloid, but even then, you'd think maybe real stuff going on would be featured - not the lives of people living in a house being exposed to television.

The show is a pain, mainly because everyone in England loves it, even older people, and you can't really go anywhere without hearing about it. Countless films I wanted to see were canceled only to display this message: "Big Brother is running over schedule, our film tonight will be rescheduled." The show broadcasts from about 12 at night to 6 in the morning sometimes, which is insane. I once stumbled across it while flipping channels late at night, only to see people sitting on chairs talking nonsense, the audio occasionally shutting off by error.

I just don't get it. WHAT'S THE POINT?! I'm one of those people who enjoys watching people when I'm out and about - just seeing how people interact, go about their lives, etc. (I get it from my mother's side) - but this is plain voyeurism, and BORING voyeurism. Who cares what some loser thinks about some guy living in a house? GET A LIFE! And I thought my social life wasn't the best! At least I don't revolve my conversations around the conversations of random people occupying a house together! Good grief! A few years ago I didn't like "The Truman Show" because it was too far fetched. I watched it again a few nights ago and it's not looking so far away anymore.

Each summer in the UK a group of people (6 men & 6 women) are removed from normal society and placed in a house, cut off from outside communication. They are given a shopping budget to buy food and complete weekly challenges to win more money or other treats. On a weekly basis the housemates (as they are called) must pick tow of their number to nominate to be removed from the house. When the nominations are tallied up, those with the most nominations face a public vote to remove them. Each Friday one is removed until only one is left to claim the cash prize.

Too many people are very snobbish about this programme and simply dismiss it as rubbish and attack those who watch it as simple minded, fools and idiots.

That is snobbery in my mind and it is unfair to assume that the millions who make this programme successful are just muppets – you know what? maybe they just find it entertaining? I have watched Big Brother each series it has been on in the UK – however I will dip into it occasionally over it's weeks rather than watch religiously, I reckon I watch about a quarter at most. I don't read the tabloids (Times man I'm afraid) and I don't gossip at work about 'did you see what such and such did' etc but I do easily get addicted to this show – and that's its power. It may be inane but it is real people and you keep watching because everybody loves to judge and gossip and this show gives us all the power to judge and to have people to shake our heads about and gossip about. It is easy to watch because the 30 minutes shows will be eventful (after all, they summarise 24 hours of 'action') and, of course, it is very easy television to watch – it is simple and allows viewers to veg. I have no problem with this because not all TV or films should be high art or make you think – sometimes we all need to just chill out and not think!

Of course it is trash and the fact that it is often just a bunch of students getting drunk for a few months means that it can easily become dull (as series 3 in the UK showed). Thus we have come to see the reason why BB was a worrying trend at the start; it has started to become more and more of a worry and has made me wonder what the makers are willing to do in the name of entertainment. Of course they pick people who will rub each other the wrong way but generally people are polite and channel 4 has been forced to continually spice it up to try and make it more eventful than last year. And that's the problem for me is that it is no longer 'real', it is full of people looking for tabloid deals, who have been selected because they are extremes of personalities. The most recent series in the UK shows this – it doesn't have gay people it has flaming queens; it doesn't have lesbian characters it has angry, left wing feminist lesbians; it doesn't have strippers it has bi-sexual strippers; it doesn't have black characters it has angry alpha-male black men and so forth – this series is the worst for it (they all are extreme stereotypes) but generally they are. At times it is funny (look at Kitten thinking she's some sort of individual when really she's a walking cliché) but generally it is just to try and manufacture fights and tension the best they can.

Now that we (the viewers) have gotten used to that it has been forced to continually up the ante. In the US they put people in with their ex's but in the UK the current series was billed as being 'evil'. They made the house smaller, put them all in one bedroom, make the tasks harder etc. In one regard it has made it more interesting and made these people work for their 15 minutes but in another it is very worrying and quite off putting. One task was funny – BB threw the housemates a kids party and fed them all cake and jelly, then hours later made them all sit on a roundabout until a task was completed – needless to say they all went green and some puked! However recently we had a situation where tow people were placed in another part of the house and allowed to spy on the others, who thought they had been evicted for good. After a week of these two seeing the others backstab them, BB reintroduced them back into the house and gave everyone lots and lots of booze. Needless to say they all got drunk and a fight ensued which security staff had to come and stop because men were about to start hitting the women (not good – even if the girls in question were inviting it something rotten). This is my problem with this show now – it is no longer just veg and gossip TV: it needs to shock and create talking points to keep it's audience and the tabloid headlines. With the UK's problems of binge drinking and after hours, drunken violence, is it right to basically stage a fight – which by the setup and the alcohol, the makers of BB essentially did. They are pushing people as far as they can all in the name of winning ratings.

I watched Battle Royale once and thought it was exaggerated, but now I have a point of reference to see what it is spoofing. How much more violent and cruel will TV get in order to win ratings? This series is not even a third gone and already the makers have been very cruel all in the name of breaking people and creating things for us to gossip about – as the contestants become more savvy and eager for fame, it is all they can do to keep it interesting. I didn't watch this series but I tuned in to see it all 'kick off' a few weeks ago, only to be disturbed by what I saw. I saw people put in a situation where tension would be high and then I saw them fed large amounts of alcohol. Can it be morally right to do this to people simply to 'entertain' others? I know many of us will say these people deserve what they get but it is a worrying thing to have on TV and will only serve to further erode our national morals – ie we don't see others as 'people' on the same level as us.

I am not snobby and I know how easy it is to watch this show: calling it rubbish and insulting those that enjoy it is childish and smacks of superiority that is not there. However even fans will acknowledge that it is rubbish – but it can be entertaining rubbish if all you want to do is have something to gossip about and distract you without taxing your brain – something we all want in some way (nobody watches arty foreign films all the time!). However the format of this (and other reality shows) is becoming increasingly cruel to win ratings – and how far are they willing to go. Things like Fear Factor and eating bugs in 'I'm a Celebrity…' are bad and so is the most recent BB. I accept people will watch these things and I understand why they do but for me I have tuning out as I cannot allow myself to be part of it anymore. BB is the only reality show I have ever bothered with but now it has gone where we feared it would – into the usual ratings-chasing spectacle where it is all very forced, manufactured and cruel. I will not watch people be made to fight and suffer for my enjoyment and I can only hold my head in fear about what we will be watching in 5 years time once our sense have become further hardened to drunken fights and flirting.

Overall this is an awful show but one that I can watch easily as it doesn't require me to think and it can be quite enjoyable and addictive. However the road it (and others) have led us down is a worrying one and even BB supporters are beginning to wonder what on earth is going on. Everything is manufactured to create talking points and the contestants are very aware of what they are doing (playing for the camera, thinking of the newspaper deals etc) – it is no longer 'real' and the novelty has worn off. There are much better things on TV and I think I shall watch them as few of them turn my stomach in quite the same way as this show has started to do.

Never, until the day I die, will I understand the appeal of watching some sad and lonely freaks raping their dignity for the sake of "entertainment". What is so amazing about people sitting around and talking? People sleeping? Who watches this filth?? It distresses me greatly how my generation will grow up thinking that "Big Brother" is a sleazy reality TV show and did not start out as one of the central themes created by Orwell for his book, "1984". When we live in a society where people waste their lives watching this crap, you realize that class is dead. As I am part of the "MTV Generation", BB's biggest audience, I worry if people will automatically assume that I am a fan, so I would like to assure you that I am NOT. It also annoys me how ex BB contestants like Jade Goodey and Brian Dowling (luckly there are few) have managed to turn themselves into household names, despite a complete lack of talent. It is morphing into a cheap and easy way to get famous, whilst those who have actually had to WORK for their fame are pushed aside!!! This programme is a DIRECT representation of the dumbing down of society. Annoyingly, it is still proving extremely popular, but I am praying for the day when the public will come to their senses and stop watching this garbage.

" Have you been watching BIG BROTHER " my sister asked me in a telephone conversation . I replied that I hadn`t . I knew what the show was because every single tabloid newspaper had hyped up the show from the very first day it started way back in the year 2000 . While the series is being broadcast it`s impossible to open a British popular newspaper without being greeted by page after page of the housemates life stories , but just out of curiosity I decided to give the show a chance and I must say I was totally underwhelmed by it .

It might surprising to know that I managed to avoid this show untill series four , but if this is as good as it gets I`ve missed nothing . A bunch of people sitting around drinking is not great TV unless the people involved are Oliver Reed , George Best , Alex Higgins etc . We have a big strapping Scotsman Cameron Stout and he never makes Anglophobic statements , never gets drunk and never pays flattering compliments to the female housemates ! Not a typical Scot I`m sure you`ll agree . Well Cameron won in a popularity contest that resembled vote for the least boring person because someone will win . I guess I would have voted for Cameron myself but that`s only because we`re both Jocks and the opposition were so bland

That said , if Channel 4 are thinking of doing a fifth series I wouldn`t mind having a go myself . After all the drink`s free and when`s the last time a Jock`s turned down free booze