You can’t talk about Big Brother without talking about class, it seems. Over at Troppo, Ken Parish, who should be familiar with the BB concept of the grenade lob, lobs one in comments:
Far from being careful, I’ll throw petrol on the fire. I think the phenomenon of people who should have more taste and intelligence professing to like BB is just a pretentious affectation, like ending a post with “just sayin’”. Then again, all these shows (including Ladettes to Ladies and the assorted Gordon Ramsey shows) have a certain macabre fascination, sort of like not being able to resist looking at a particularly gruesome car smash as you drive past.
The really vexing thing is that these shows are also a calculated cost-saving gambit by the free-to-air channels. It doesn’t cost all that much to make them because they don’t have to pay the actors. A truly principled lefty would boycott them (although, as Jen pointed out last night, you can make a similar point about the employment effects of blogging on professional journalists).
I don’t know about the logic of boycotting tv shows for political reasons – I suspect it’s only ever invoked in this sort of context, and one could counter with the fact that a lot of writers and other “creatives” get employed by these mega shows (which are actually far more expensive to produce, but also more lucrative, than a lot of the cut-price free to air drama that’s around). And Corey Delaney is Worth(ington) 10 grand a show apparently. Though there’d be an interesting angle in thinking about how “creatives”, anyway, are self-exploiting – freed of career paths, permanent employment, and all those other things that go with not being a contract for hire and an entrepreneurial micro-business. And the lack of reflexivity that comes with seeing one’s endeavours as a big quest for that one big break has uncanny parallels with the show’s refusal of any solidarity to its Housemates. But, whatever, Ken probably thinks I’m displaying an “affectation” – while I think that the BB hatin’ *and actually I don’t enjoy this season, I just find it interesting* is a classic “that’s for the Bogans” Distinction. Proper people, of course, go to the theatre, dahling.
In a way, though, it was ironic that John Howard was a BB hater, because the Inmates couldn’t be more aspirational and individualistic. Some might even drive utes, and you can bet they’re big alcopop drinkers. I’m sure Brendan probably feels their pain. (And I’m sure that he’d probably jump at the chance to be an intruder. Might be useful training for all those frontbench wars.) But class is at issue within the House too, as another excellent post from Eye on Big Brother shows.
Tonight, Terri got to sit – proudly, harshly – at the table, before the Little Princess™ who had conquered the dysfunctional residue of having led a short, sheltered, privileged life, and declared; “We have to remember that Brigitte is from a privileged background… but see? She’s learned.” She gave the Little Princess™ what was almost a smile – almost – and nodded; “I’m proud that you came round, Brigitte.” Can you just imagine the King & Queen who gave the world this Little Princess™, sitting at home, watching their 60 inch, to see a dowdy, hard, battling Aussie Hanson supporter, give the firm nod to their daugher for having risen above how they fucked their daughter up?! Sometimes, I think the most interesting parts of Big Brother are the things we don’t see, and can only ever grasp by paying attention to the bigger picture that this is actually not a piece of television fantasy, but – for these people, and the people around them – an actual reality. There’s something very real behind the silly fantasy we tune in to watch.
And who, of course, didn’t want to hear a bar of how privilege was an excuse for Brigette’s behaviour? The other rich kid. What a coincidence! Because what the group failed to realise was that even though it may appear that it’s quite mature, quite compassionate, of the group to endeavour to understand and excuse Brigitte, if you’re someone else who also fits into the idea put forward – about young over-privileged kids – it’s going to come across, potentially, as rather insulting. We’ve even seen a bit of that, here, over the last day or so. Haven’t we?
Go read the rest – it’s really interesting.
As I said in my last BB post on Brigitte the Little Princess and her Unicorn, this show is a mirror to our society, but not in the way we think (or in the way it thinks).
Dear Kim;
You read too much into BB.
Sincerely &c &c
OK. You watch the first series of Survival and then Big Brother… but what then?
Its like that old song goes…say something once – why say it again?
Dearest darling Kim – if yr life is that empty then please IM me asap.
Ok, people commenting on blogs after midnight telling me to get a life!
Wouldn’t have the faintest as regards BB. I’m a man. And men want archaeology with Baldrick and tip tinkering with Robert and Lisa, not gossip telly. Telly about THINGS, not telly about people. If Jerry Bruckheimer had seven handsome middle-aged male actors on call he’d punch out five more CSIs; but he only has two.
Gender imbalance? Television leaves China in the dust.
Einstein, Spicks, Collectors, Australia Wide aka Recompiled Stateline/7:30 Stuff, etc. There’s really only one rule and it’s Cheap to Produce. Transcends all public/commercial exigencies.
The Einstein Factor is so cheap it pays me to watch it.
Also you get to watch Peter Berner die a thousand deaths in twenty five minutes.
Rubbish! The problem I have with BB is that its not cheap enough!
Im awaiting “Big Crowd” myself. Live from the surveillance cam in Queen St mall.
All your faves, including bloke in hat, pissed sheila, lost Japanese tourist, and remonstrating copper.
i have advocated not only boycotting ‘Border Security’ but also the products of companies that advertise during the show.
Trackback (bait is live and has hit the water).
A very Nelsonian effort there – first certainty, then qualification.
Kim, aren’t you getting the hint yet that it’s kind of unedifying listening to your attempted self justification every year at setting up the folding chair near the train line to watch the coming wreck.
You know people have excellent reason for disliking BB and everything it stands for regardless of issues of class, the number of psychologists or writers it employs, or the sociologists or academics who think that cruelty and artifice is a legitimate way to get a feeling for the national zeitgeist.
If you truly dislike the show, do the right thing and stop watching it. Otherwise, you’re part of the problem.
while I think that the BB hatin’ *and actually I don’t enjoy this season, I just find it interesting* is a classic “that’s for the Bogans” Distinction. Proper people, of course, go to the theatre, dahling.
Such an embarrassing line that I can’t even make myself argue with it.
Also on troppo, James Farrell said …
… which nails it for me. At school I certainly didn’t observe those people with fascination or study them to improve my understanding of my world. I just ignored them for the dull, insipid nebishes that they were. Just like I’m now doing with BB. Or at least trying to. It’s a bit difficult to ignore BB when there’s so much coffee-room and message-board chat about the show’s fabricated bogans, almost as if they were real people.
There is no such distinction, though. I go to the theatre and I watch some reality TV (Australian Princess was fun and the best reality show EVER). Don’t most people embrace low and medium and high culture?
It is weird, however, how in BB everyone is reduced to being the Little Princess or the Bogan Gran or something.
It’s interesting that some folks get upset at some slights against groups, but it’s still okay to kick the boot into the “Bogans”. I say bogans of the world unite, you have nothing to lose but your flannelette shirts.
Just sayin’.
“I think the phenomenon of people who should have more taste and intelligence professing to like BB is just a pretentious affectation, like ending a post with “just sayin’””
Well, I think Ken’s wrong. I like watching it, it’s that simple. To paraphrase Adrian Martin: I am a viewer of Big Brother 2008. I accept that this may imply to certain people that I don’t have taste or intelligence, but I’m not going to lose any friends over it, of that I’m certain. The way in which I consume the show – through discussion, analysis etc – may or may not be the same as the fifteen year old girl in the apartment upstairs, I can’t say for sure, but I suspect it’s not that different (although my reference points probably are).
Contra skepticlawyer, I don’t think it’s possible to offer a simple account of the objective worth of the show, and I haven’t been convinced by any of the arguments so far that there is sufficient reason for me to not watch it. I am happy to accept that there are lots of good reasons other than ’snobbery’ for not liking it. I draw the line at critiques that rest on an implied, maligned audience, or on the other hand critiques that imply that me watching the show, and that the way I consume it, are in some way ‘not genuine’. Just sayin’.
Hi Kim. I’ve really enjoyed the LP posts on Big Brother. I promise I’m not troll-baiting when I say that a lot of what you folks have been saying is consistent with, and maybe extends with some new observations, a really interesting strand of media and cultural studies work on reality TV (Try Jane Roscoe’s “Big Brother Australia: Performing the Real Twenty Four Seven”, International Journal of Cultural Studies, Vol. 4, No. 4, 473-488 (2001) for a good start if you’re interested (Most Uni Libraries in Brisbane will carry the journal, and I’m pretty sure the Statey as well).
Ken’s comments lack some nuance, to put it mildly. It’s true that reality shows don’t cost as much to produce as drama, but nothing much else does either, and reducing it to that binary doesn’t register much understanding of how the economics of TV work. A glance at the schedules would tell you that there is a whole ecology of programming there, much of which can be had more cheaply than Big Brother.
Declining free-to-air advertising revenues put as many question marks over the future of “quality drama” as the future of “quality journalism”, a point forcefully made by Mark Scott in an address to the Future of Journalism conference a couple of weeks back. (State support or subsidies might make a difference, but that’s obviously a vexed question) The market is there for reality programming, but it’s not a simple either/or proposition between drama and reality programming (Underbelly’s success shows this pretty clearly). Meanwhile, are all those millions of BB viewers indulging in affectation or are they just stupid? Are markets good or bad? I get so confused sometimes.
Ultimately, the underlying logic of one side of the discussion here is about policing other people’s cultural preferences. There’s also some pretty cliched stuff in there about the inauthentic chatter/preferences of lefty luvvies, which I guess you LPers get all the time, but let’s put that to one side.
How about this – Kim watches Big Brother because she enjoys it. She gets different things out of it than other viewers, and some of what she sees leads her to reflect more broadly on the culture that Big Brother is a prominent part of. She writes some of this down on LP. What about any of this makes people so uncomfortable? Is it just their own concern to display their own distinctive tastes? (CF Bourdieu)
Disclosure: I’m not a BB watcher for now, mostly because I’m too busy, but I’m happy to get updates on LP.
Just sayin
Darlene:
I have no problem with bogans. I just don’t want them in my living room and I’m perplexed that there are LPers that do.
I think it is the show itself that sticks the boot into “bogans”, Darlene. The whole premise seems to be to hold a group of people up to the derision (for any number of reasons, not just class) of an audience who then get to pick them off one by one. This is why, after seeing a couple of episodes of one series, I don’t watch it.
I am going to have to come out of the closet and admit that I’ve probably watched about 45 minutes of BB in the last two years. It’s about as entertaining as watching grass grow. However, as I said, other reality shows have entertained (e.g. Australian Princess).
Is that the way the people participating feel, though Su? It’s obvious some of them think it will lead to their big break.
I’ve got no time for BB or any others of that raft of shows like Border Security, Villa in Tuscany, Jerry Springer. Usual tawdry and tedious list (and last couple of weeks I’ve been housesitting for people with cable and believe me there’s heaps more tawdry shit on Foxtel so much of my time here the TV has been turned off). Of course BB is a reflection of our society – thre’s nothing on TV or radio or in cinema or bookshelves or DVD stores or art galleries or advertising billboards that isn’t
More pertinent is to point out the irony of Howard’s own attitude. Lets face it most of these shows pander Howardista type values and BB is no exception. I’m currently reading some Girard and it strikes me that BB even more tends to suit the Howard era because of it victimisation dynamics. The while process enables a collaborative victimisation. It’s no surprise that this year with all the talk of being tough and nasty that they have assembled a cast based on “freak” value. Freaks make great scapegoats. And so it was also no surprise to hear that they got Corey on. It continues the ethos of ACA and TT, very much Howard’s ethos of Tampa, and breaching and all the other viciousness of the last dozen years.
So I hope BB withers away. When it’s finally put to rest it’ll be a sign to me that the Howard days are finally finished
There was an interesting german film that predates Big Brother called “Burkhard Driest’s Private Life Show”. It was deliberately transmitted without any indication that it was scripted and that the show’s participants were actors. I wonder whether BB was partly inspired by that film.
Hey Jason,
Citing an ‘interesting’ essay in an academic journal and saying ‘CF Bourdieu’ doesn’t carry any weight at all with me, in fact, it predisposes me toward expecting the lightweight. (Even though I am an academic myself – I know this can’t be deduced from my blog) These are mention citations not use ones. They don’t convey anything except that you want to bring scholarly dignity to bear on the topic.
I read the tone of this and the previous BB post in exactly the opposite way to you. I think it is Kim who wants to patrol and police other people’s tastes. She wants to talk about why people who say they dislike the show *really* say this, instead of simply taking their professed opinions on face value.
It’s interesting that Jane Roscoe, who Jason cites, is now the Head of Programming at SBS. If you can come up with a BB type show for them, they’d lap it up.
I don’t watch the show but i read the Eye cuase it IS interesting.
Anyone dare to comment on Eye on Big Brothers commentary on Queer Eye/How to look good naked Carson’s moment on the show?
“And who was his favourite? Well, the hot little Princess was, of course! He’s gay! Gay men, like, adore ditzy little handbags, didn’t you know?! And I could go into a whole other article that could keep you here, all night, with that one – but I won’t. But the problem with the recent arrival of The Gay Man™ in the world of pop-culture is that what was sold – and bought, might I add – is the gay man as a symbol of hedonism and – the part I loathe – sexism (because they revere these kind of women, and that’s partly their “thing”). Gay men can be just as sexist and misogynistic as straight men – just because you don’t want to have sex with a woman, doesn’t mean you automatically get a go card, when it comes to how you value women. And gay men, I’m very sorry to say, are notoriously awful at putting really vile images of women on sequenced pedestals. It’s different to the straight men, and, in so many ways, it’s “better” (if you really want to split hairs), but the irony is that it’s actually still a part of the over all problems with the patriarchal culture, because what this is partly about (and I’m putting it into a nutshell, here, to spare you the indepth article!) is that gay men – in their frequent desire to sexually dominate (translation: avenge) those who have oppressed them and denied them (straight men) actually fantasise about being what they unfortunately see as being the ultimate kind of individual who is most worthy and “accepted” (if that’s the word) by straight male culture (but there’s also the element of “relating” to, and being “raised” by, female culture – but we’ll leave that out of here).
And that “worthy” figure is the hot little harlot. That’s why they love Kylie and (I mean, really) Paris Hilton. That’s why Carson put it forward that he is, most of all, “like” Brigette. That wouldn’t be something you’d imagine many people so casually admitting to, but he was more than happy to cast himself as… yes… the ditzy little sex siren that all the boys wanted a piece of. “We share the same brain,” he smiled. No, Carson, it’s something else you’d like to share with Brigette, let’s face it. You’d like to share her “power”.
Before you rush to condemn, Aaron Darc, the author, is gay.
“I think it is Kim who wants to patrol and police other people’s tastes. She wants to talk about why people who say they dislike the show *really* say this, instead of simply taking their professed opinions on face value.”
I don’t think that’s clear from this post at all, Laura, although it may be the case elsewhere.
I’m wearing my flanalette shirt right now. And I love Ladettes to Ladies.Its one of the funniest shows on TV. But what I’ve seen of BB this year has been pretty boring.
If other people like BB it doesn’t bother me, just don’t expect me to watch it with you. I watched a bit of the first Australian season because one of the housemates used to be a fellow-student of mine (although I didn’t know him well), and have occasionally caught moments over the subsequent years, but I don’t even stick if I happen across it while channel-clicking now.
I was far more interested in the first few seasons of Survivor (largely because as someone who grew up bushwalking the ineptness of some folks in the wild was gobsmacking), although I don’t watch that or any other reality TV shows any more. The “casting” machinations to find freaks/outcasts and people who will obviously annoy the shit out of each other just to get some “drama” have sucked any interest out of them for me.
David has spoken about his life in the Exclusive Brethren Cult. He took a while to do so. Glad he has had his say and the house mates listened intently too. David has lost a lot in life, meaning his family. When there is a death he won’t be told, as the EB bury their dead now within 24 hours, so this young man is someone to watch in future, and hope he has a lot to say in the future about the cult. Good on him.
I’d just like to say, I have no problem with taking the piss out of bogans.
And yes, the position is hold position is elitist.
Michael, I think you are mistaken to align Big Brother with strictly ‘Howardista’ values, mainly because it implies that ‘quality’ programming doesn’t pander to those values. I don’t think scapegoating etc is confined to the trashier end of the spectrum. I was watching a repeat of a BBC mini-series the other night – well scripted, high production values, some good acting – and the whole thing was resolved – ie the central ‘family’ was united through the scapegoating of a lesbian teenager.
Damn, got distracted by the phone at a critical moment in that last comment. Now it makes no sense.
Lefty, just change the name on your post to mine and no one will notice.
In all seriousness though – I just find that show unwatchable. I dont really have a wide-ranging critique, other than that its boring. I do watch some other reality tv.
I flicked over it once by accident, and some bogan scrubber was faux-fellating a stubbie. Puhlease… surely things haven’t got so bad I need endure that.
I don’t think it’s particularly productive to take potshots at Jason for citing an academic paper and Bourdieu. It might almost be read as anti-intellectualism, although no doubt that’s not your intention, Laura. But there is value and worth in what Bourdieu has to say, and there is no doubt that one of the things people do by referencing their own cultural tastes and comparing them to others is to establish a distinction between themselves and those others. That’s particularly obvious when it’s done so blatantly as in Ken’s case, but all of us do it all the time. Don’t we make some assumptions about people on the basis of what they read, what they watch, what they consume? And don’t we assume others will make those assumptions about us?
It’s one way of explaining why Australia’s biggest internet dating site allows people so much space to talk about what films, tv shows and books they like. Obviously their market research tells them those things are variables which are relevant to judging those they don’t know.
I think I know the series, Klaus. I saw which way the wind was blowing and didn’t watch the last episode. I have had my fill of “crazy bitch” crime dramas. But there the audience is not an active participant in the scapegoating.
I should have expanded a little on the Burkhard Driest film; it included mock phone in segments and the participants, supposedly a married couple, were awarded money for the frankness of their confessions. The host and the mock studio audience provoked them to escalate their ‘honesty’ until one of them snapped. Because the home audience assumed it was all real, many phoned the police and there was quite an outcry afterwards. It was intended as a satire of TV producers.
Can I just say that I hate Big Brother for no other reason than I find it mind-numbingly boring. That said, I have no set against it, I’d rather not watch it is all, and probably resent a little bit who tell me that my opinion is rooted in ‘elitism’ rather than taste. I’m not talking about this post though, more my peers who seem to struggle to understand why I can’t watch it as much as I struggle to see why anyone would watch it.
Big Brother and its generic siblings are part of a whole culture in which people are willing to exchange their dignity for fame. They believe that life is only worth living if you have a shitload of photgraphers follwing you around.
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ironically its all a gyp to removie the super-rich celebrity from the entertainment business. In The Player a development exec is decrying the large fees paid to screenwriters and his rival responds: “Gee if only we could get rid of these actors and directors we might be on to something”.
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Exactly.
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So these dopes who line up to get into Big Brother are involved in a show which to date will make you, at best, an underpaid filler somewhere in the endless bandwidth of bollocks. You might score a job staying up all night talking to the lens between ad breaks or gossiping with another bucnh of gormless twits on Friday night. Mostly you’ll be forgotten after your few weeks of being ogled at, gossipped about and generally humiliated.
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You create nothing. But that’s the point. It’s a super-rationalisation of entertainment. If you can get rid of talent then you’ve really got the perfect enterprise.
The people who “create”, though, Adrien, are the writers who construct the narrative out of the raw material and maximise the indignity!
As to whether I’m “policing” tastes, nothing could be further from my thoughts. I’m much more interested in why class always rears its head in discussions of BB audiences (and we might question as well why “Bogans” are figured as “stupid” – as Eye was saying, that’s very interesting with regard to Renee herself as she transitions from one “bubble” to “being watched by Australia”). I’m interested in questioning why people feel the need to announce their distaste for BB, and why that’s constructed in terms of a certain disdain (or in Ken’s case, a claim that “intelligence” and “taste” are incompatible with BB watching – which must then be an “affectation”).
Ken would be best placed to speak about his own motives, but I find a certain level of irony in the fact that he lobs a grenade into the blogosphere, knowing that he will provoke response and conflict. By dissing a show that lobs grenades in knowing they will provoke response and conflict.
In a way, if Ken looked into the mirror, he’d find Big Brother looking back at him.
Laura:
I didn’t intend the comment as a grant application, but thanks for the peer review. (Note to self: must try to be less lightweight).
The first citation was really directed at Kim in case she was interested, which I thought was clear from the context – sorry if that was off-putting. I still reckon it’s worth a read in the context of this discussion. The second was an allusion to what I thought was a pretty familiar set of ideas. I certainly didn’t put it in there so it could radiate unearned dignity. I’m sorry if seemed like that was the intention.
Anyway, I’d reiterate the main points minus the citations, namely:
Also, I still think Ken’s account of the economy of television production above is simplistic.
I’d like to turn this around for a second, and this isn’t specially directed at you Laura, so please don’t read it that way. Let’s forget about evil relativism or luvvie affectations or whatever and think in terms of more traditional forms of critical practice. If people want to talk about notions of quality, and BB’s failure to measure up to them, why don’t they start making some critical arguments, or finding some germane comparisons to illuminate their judgements? Even Dr Leavis felt that responsibility.
“X is crap because bogans/luvvies like it” doesn’t cut it as aesthetics or criticism, and wouldn’t even if it weren’t a caricature of the audience. “X is crap because it’s popular culture” is very shaky, because it’s an historically specific category, which many canonical cultural works have fitted into at one time or another. If you’re not articulating your judgements by reference to the artefact you’re discussing, they’re just assertions. You’re always vulnerable to charges of snobbery if you’re justifying your judgements by gesturing at the audience or the medium.
If I have some sympathy with Kim, it’s precisely because she has been articulating her reasons for liking BB (or at least finding it interesting). She’s also showing that it’s pretty complex and revealing in a number of ways, and I’ve enjoyed reading her musings. And after all this, I’m still not sure why other folks have such a problem with it.
Nor am I, Jason. It can’t be “this is serious blog” because no such problems occur when posts appear here about Good News Week or Carson Pressley’s Naked show (perhaps a better comparator – because it’s linked in with BB for a start). What is it about BB specifically? I don’t think it’s reality tv per se. Survivor – for instance – or Australian Idol and all the similar shows – don’t seem to generate a similar level of angst.
And if I can cross reference Laura’s comment on Troppo, I don’t think anyone’s saying that you have to agree that Big Brother is sociologically interesting. But I’m not sure what’s wrong with people who find it sociologically interesting discussing why that is.
Thanks Jason. I appreciate that, and I appreciate your comments.
I think there is an interesting question about why people seem het up about someone choosing to write about BB. Obviously there’s the JG level of objection – you know, damn that John Hartley and cultural studies – they should be writing about Shakespeare! So perhaps there’s some agonising about dignifying something by taking what it does and what it reveals seriously – which is a weird sort of distortion of the whole project of literary or cultural canonisation. I’ve been trying, for what it’s worth, to avoid judgments of “quality” or “value”.
Now, I’m not seeking to ask people to account for why they don’t watch BB. But I think Jason does have a good point – those who don’t watch it perhaps should account for how they are able to dismiss it, if they feel it necessary to point out that they don’t. I’m seriously interested in why. What’s the need to say so? And to judge those who do? It seems to me there’s much more invested in these dismissals than in a comment like “I don’t like Midsomer Murders”.
And those who have watched it and dismiss it as “crap” are surely under some sort of obligation to provide an aesthetic or comparative critique.
The fact that this is rarely done leads me to suspect that the dismissal is in fact social, which is what I’m trying to understand.
To stay with the analogy above, why would a post on crime tv or Sunday night costume drama presumably not attract people or inspire people concerned to argue (or just assert) that such a post itself can have no value because of its object? Clearly something more is going on here than a mere expression of preference or choice.
What is it about what I’m writing that leads people to ignore the issues being discussed (and it should be clear that I’m more interested in talking about the cultural and social dynamics at work in the show and the mechanics and stakes of how it constructs a narrative than talking about the show itself), and feel compelled to express a personal distinction demonstrating that they are not the sorts of people who watch BB or who can imagine that serious issues can be discussed through the prism of what BB reveals?
Oh, and thanks for the Roscoe reference, Jason!
I rarely watch BB, because the dynamics of the drama don’t engage me much. I lose interest in it quite quickly and I find that I can see the dramatic moves coming pretty easily. I enjoyed the first series because it was fascinating to see how it all worked. Now there isn’t enough there to keep me watching.
But, I actually find it more entertaining than ‘Midsomer Murders’ for instance and my critique is a purely personal one. I agree with Jason. If you enjoy it, watch it. No big deal.
“In a way, if Ken looked into the mirror, he’d find Big Brother looking back at him.”
Line of the day
It’s an interesting question about why BB (out of all the reality shows) gets up people’s goat the most. The partial answer to the question is why Kim’s discussion of class is important. Of course, another part of the answer is that it’s duller than the most dull thing ever in the history of the world.
Bring back Australian Princess….NOW.
Paul, flannie shirts are so comfortable and they can look quite attractive
. A bloke in a flannie has got that rugged macho thing going on.
Ps – I’m not trying to diss anyone or conduct an inquisition into why people like or don’t like BB. I’m more interested in what people think about why they don’t like reading writing about it! I’m just asking people to reflect a little on why they might be reacting as they are, is all. If you find it interesting to do that and want to do that, that is.
Kim, I actually find the discussion around BB far more interesting than BB.
They hurt you at home and they hit you at school,
They hate you if you’re clever and they despise a fool,
Till you’re so fucking crazy you can’t follow their rules,
A working class hero is something to be,
A working class hero is something to be.
Keep you doped with religion and sex and TV,
And you think you’re so clever and classless and free,
But you’re still fucking peasants as far as I can see,
A working class hero is something to be,
A working class hero is something to be.
There’s room at the top they are telling you still,
But first you must learn how to smile as you kill,
If you want to be like the folks on the hill,
A working class hero is something to be.
A working class hero is something to be.
a recent marianne faithfull version
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3N_rNz2oAGA&feature=related
It’s hard to have complete disdain for the people who you share Xmas lunch with.
OK, why I feel inspired to assert my opposition to Big Brother:
1. I like my TV to use the best talents of directors, writers, actors. Reality TV in general is a cancer that is steadily eroding the opportunities for genuinely talented people. And the less opportunity now, the less talent we’ll have in the future.
2. BB is ubiquitous. It get’s discussed by my family, my colleagues my friends. And all as if the goings on actually matter. And anybody that doesn’t watch the muck is of course out of the conversational loop.
3. We live in a world that increasingly values the easily attainable and superficial over genuine and hard-won excellence. And BB is the epitomy of that. Don’t worry about tertiary study, training your voice, learning an instrument or building up a business. Real achievement is to appear on reality TV and get vast swags of money for carrying on like a bogan.
Kim – No worries! Keep up the good work! Really enjoying it!
Glad to hear it, Jason!
Well I assume you’re using the word ‘writers’ in its broadest possible sense. But I guess in a sense they are ‘writers’. Still the industrial background to reality TV is interesting. Big Brother as I recall was taken up big in the States due to grumbling amongst writers for more money. If you compare the salaries of stars in successful shows to the relatively paltry amount of prize money that BB contestants may win if victorious it makes sense from a business point of view.
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As for its value culturally there is no institutional body that dictates the judgment of taste anymore. Academics are more likely to ’study’ BB than John Milton so go figure. However there is one centre for the judgement of taste and that’s the individual – I think Big Brother is Crap.
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But that’s just me –
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RE: Stereotypes about ‘class’ and taste and quality: that’s a tenuous subject. Shakespeare was still dismissed by many a hundred years posthumously for being a ‘populist’. Now he’s the world’s greatest writer. Likewise Raymond Chandler who wrote pulp is, I think anyway, one of the 20th century’s great American novelists. For me he goes up there with Fitzgerald and Hemingway.
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There are plenty of Posh Scribblers from the same era who’re now deservedly forgotten. I don’t think the size of one’s market bears on the quality of one’s work one way or the other. Emily Dickinson and the Velvet Underground had very limited audiences but their influence was massive. Why? Because they were BRILLIANT.
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Best sellers like Dan Brown? Crap.
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What’s the objective criteria for this declaration? There isn’t one. But I can say I turfed my telly three years ago and since then my thoughts and expression are the clearest they’ve been in decades.
Watching the treatment of Brigitte around the dinner table last night (“Is Brigitte a ’sooky-la-la’?”) made me realize what the main theme running through this year’s Big Brother was – arbitrary punishment.
In the first week it was Nobbi who was punished, by being sent to the Combi van, which acted as a de facto Punishment Room(TM). What was Nobbi being punished for? Nothing in particular, only that he had upset Granny Terri, and that BB had given Granny Terri the power to take revenge on him. It’s better to say that the punishment of Nobbi was arbitrary. It looks better than to say that Nobbi was being punished for being Asian – that would be racist, and BB could never be accused of that, God forbid. Nobbi incessantly whined about not being able to get access to the house, but was he accused of being a ’sooky-la-la’? No, of course not. His whining was justified, though BB paid no heed to it, because it was fun to watch.
The second victim of BB’s arbitrary punishment was Dixie, the fat Aboriginal chick (pardon the sexist language). BB deliberately set out to make her crack, by depriving her of food. Take that, fat Aboriginal chick! No one could dare call BB racist, because BB was not punishing her for her race. God forbid, no – that would be racist! BB was punishing her for being fat. Dixie whined about the food, but was she called a ’sooky-la-la’? No, no one dared call her that, because that might be construed as racist. In any case, BB came to Dixie’s salvation by giving her, and the rest of the house, a kitchen. Problem solved! Not that all her whining made good televison. It didn’t. That was a failed experiment on BB’s part. Oh well. Onto the next victim, and that would be Brigitte.
It had to be Brigitte, because the other intended victim, Rima, has been taken out by a bit of bad planning by the Friday Night Games, which sent her to the hospital. That was lucky for Rima, because she was probably being targeted by BB to be punished for being a midget anyway. At least she didn’t whine about the broken leg. Only a sooky-la-la would do that.
And so we come to Brigitte – slutty, pretentious, and fake, just like a plastic doll. The punishment of Brigitte had been planned weeks in advance, and it was only to last 24 hours, after which she would be given her salvation through Celebrity Carson Kressley(TM). Let’s not pretend that it was that neo-Nazi Saxon who lobbed that hand grenade into the house. It was BB who handed the grenade for Saxon to lob. And let’s not pretend that it was Saxon who singled Brigitte out for punishment. Brigitte’s punishment was planned in advance by BB, just as BB had Carson waiting in the wings to offer her salvation.
And what was Brigitte being punished for exactly? Wasn’t she being being punished for who she was – a spoilt, sheltered pretty girl, in other words, a sooky-la-la? Being a sooky-la-la was exactly why BB chose to put her into the house in the first place. She was set up to be punished, unjustly, and made to complain, just like any sooky-la-la would when a direct assault is made on who they are.
This all came to a head on Wednesady night when each housemate was given a turn to insult Brigitte. In the end, Brigitte proved to be no sooky-la-la after all. She sat there meekly soaking up all the insults. What a spineless pathetic sight. I was especially shocked at Granny Terri’s performance. Not only did Granny Terri lay into Brigitte in front of her, but when Brigitte finally drew the nerve to defend herself, Granny Terri had the nerve to tell Brigitte to shut up because Brigitte was interrupting Terri insulting her!
But it’s all passe now. BB caved in, and rewarded Brigitte with a celebrity makeover, so now Brigitte can strut around the house looking like a slut to her heart’s content.
The only question I have now is – who will BB punish arbitrarily next week?
Jo, that song is extraordinary. Hits one right in the gut.
Of course, Marianne was hardly a working class hero but her version is terrific.
“They hurt you at home and they hit you at school,
They hate you if you’re clever and they despise a fool,
Till you’re so fucking crazy you can’t follow their rules”
That rings so true. One wonders, in the context of this post, about the line about “keeping you doped with religion and sex and TV”.
You guys are tragic. Tragic.
I saw the greatest minds of my generation destroyed by Ughs.
It’s true, Adrian, Judy Garland but without the talent. I am going to break into Somewhere over the Rainbow.
Lefty E, nothing beats a pair of Ughs after they have been worn out in public (including in rainy weather and stinking hot weather) for more than 5 years. Ahhh, bogan comfort.
Lefty E, would you be willing to do the following this weekend for a prize of absolutely nothing other than the pride of knowing that you’ve discovered some Bogan Pride (I fear you might be a closeted bogan):
1. Listen to Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap.
2. Wear a pair of Ughs (new ones will do for this exercise).
3. Drink a slab of any unimported beer.
4. Buy Post magazine (does it still exist?).
5. Watch………………………..Big Brother.
1. Sure. Love the Easybeats, and successor groups.
2. No. Urgh boots r not us.
3. If I suddenly discover a drinkable Australian beer for the first time in 39 years, yes.
4. Is that the nude girly mag? Cos there used to be one called Australasian Post too. It had “weird” stories from the globe etc. I could handle that.
5. You must be kidding. I’d rather excise a bunion with a rusty spoon.
su, looked up Burkhard Driest on Internet Movie Database. Two things:
(1) Burkhard Driest apparently wrote the Fassbinder movie Querelle. Cool.
(2) The movie seems to be from 2007 – that is, not only NOT predating Big Brother (in any of its incarnations) but it seems is an obvious parody/satire/critique of BB and the reality show genre.
Klaus K on 29
“Michael, I think you are mistaken to align Big Brother with strictly ‘Howardista’ values, mainly because it implies that ‘quality’ programming doesn’t pander to those values. I don’t think scapegoating etc is confined to the trashier end of the spectrum. I was watching a repeat of a BBC mini-series the other night – well scripted, high production values, some good acting – and the whole thing was resolved – ie the central ‘family’ was united through the scapegoating of a lesbian teenager.”
I wasn’t talking about quality programmes vs trash ones and I agree that scapegoating is part and parcel of ‘quality’ programmes. Indeed, I believe Girard’s own theories arose from his studies of ancient Greek dramas. As I remember things too British drama seemed to take a distinct turn for nastiness during the Thatcher era. Some of that nastiness was satirised by shows such as new Statesman and Young Ones but Thatcher’s visiousness was played out in a number of ‘high quality’ dramas
But every time I’ve had the misfortune of seeing BB over the years there seems to be some sort of victimisation going on. So far I’ve not seen this current series but silkworm on 51 simply confirms that victimisation is pretty much the order of the day as the show promised in its lead up PR campaign. No doubt that’s why Corey’s there – I’m sure lots of people, in the tradition of ACA or TT would love to see him ‘dealt with’
BB pretty much signature of Howard – aspirational and victimising all at once
Fair enough, Michael. For what it’s worth, I think Girard has some obvious applications in popular culture. I guess I’m just wary of the association with Howard in particular, not because it isn’t the case – and both you and Kim have pointed out the irony of Howard objecting to the show – but because there are certain ‘civilisational’ themes – including victimisation, scapegoating, constructing ‘legitimate targets’ – that aren’t particular to conservative governments, even if they are often put to good use in those contexts.
The presence of Corey isn’t really a continuation of the ‘victimisation’ thing: the narrative that the show is going with is that he’s ‘an ordinary boy’ who needs some guidance. It’s being framed as ‘getting to see the real Corey’. There is a bit of oppositional stuff being mobilised then, although it’s kind of an ambivalent mix at times.
Hi Rod C. “Private Life Show” won an award in 1996. I couldn’t find it on IMDB at all. Here is a link to Burkhard Driest which talks about the film and here is another about the film. I couldn’t find anything in english though.
Wow! FWIW, I don’t watch BB because it’s unmitigated rubbish.
Gah. If you google “Fernsehlexikon Private Life Show” you should get to the second link.
Querelle is such a whacked movie! And everyone should read Genet’s novel.
I’ll come back to this thread tomorrow – having glass of wine and off to watch BB Friday night games!
Touche Kim – the word ‘class’ sets off my bullshit detector I’m afraid.
Certainly there is a serious critique here – take the Truman Show for example – about ubiquitous surveillance, obscene top-down commands and the virtual micro-management of this fucking ‘Brinworld’ we are all a part of these days. ( Anyone here remember ‘Mandycam’?)
Sheesh.
It pains me to say that whassiname was right – privacy is dead…get over it.
The real trick now is to get all the cops , bureaucrats and politicians under OUR close net surveillance. We retain our privacy – but if they want to be true-blue public servants then they submit to our Big Brother. That is the future of any class struggle worthy of the Spanish Main.
Well, it’s not just about the privacy, Prof! It’s also about the individualisation and the consequential failure to see any basis for reflexivity and solidarity.
Incidentally, I’m puzzling (again!) a bit about two things:
(1) Why watching “Bogans” on the teev is so distasteful. Don’t “Bogans” deserve a bit of representation? I don’t see anyone complaining about too many middle class scenarios on the telly! If anything, I think Australian tv has become more middle classed over the last couple of decades. And it’s more complex than that anyway – as Eye, my and silkworm’s comments about the privileged backgrounds of Brigitte should indicate. Paul Whatsie the surfie dude (reprised on the first Big Mouth) and Saxon and Renee actually come from a demographic that’s huge – but rarely shown on tv outside sport. Maybe there’s an index of the lack of representations of working class culture and also the increasing individualisation of working class “aspirations” that leads to their wanting to go on BB?
(2) On a related note, given the huge tradition of “working class writing” in Ozlit, and Helen/Skepticlawyer’s own indication in what she wrote about the themes in her forthcoming novel about Logan City (which I assume is on hold because of her Oxford studies), I’m a tad surprised at her apparent distaste for “Bogans”. Or maybe it’s just that back in the day, the Logan kidz were “Bevans” in Brissy-speak
Kim:
Maybe you’d also like bogans better represented in operating theatres, Art Galleries, orchestras, Booker Prize shortlists and university faculties. Why let lack of talent get in the way of equity?
Kim:
Don’t “Bogans” deserve a bit of representation?
hmm, maybe in situations which operated according to self-reflexive valorisations of their own cultural practices and not a pure simulation produced for the purspose of capturing the attention of bored middle class audiences.
There is a profound lack of dignity for constestants on big brother that I think should be likened to pornography in that there is a similar power relation – one is gendered and the other is class and culture based. The argument that petite celebrity is part of contemporary ‘bogan’ culture is problematic as I think it is part of the power of the media apparatus.
Rather than arguing about what big brother is, what about what it does. Do regular watchers of big brother discuss anything else? is everything framed in terms of big brother? does it really produce narratves through which the cultural poor understand their existance? is this not something of a tragedy?
Klaus @ 60
Oh Howard doesn’t have a monopoly on such civilisational themes but I think he worked them to a high degree. Indeed that capitalist aspirationalism that Howard and his followers so often invoked and exploited really drives what Girard would refer to as mimetic violence
Yes. It’s called People magazine now. Yet still as classy.
Ah bevans that takes me back. When then was a reason to NOT go near McDonald’s on a Thursday night. Is there actually a class link with Big Brother? In my experience lack of taste, abysmal behaviour and intense and chauvanistic stupidity (we’re dumb and we’re proud) are not something any ‘class’ have a monopoly on. I’ve known plenty of working class ‘elitists’ and plenty of middle-class bogans to boot.
Yes Neighbours, Home and Away, The Footy Show and Big Brother Up Late for those more sophisticated and Renaissance bogans – “Oooh Shazza you are so grouse. I will luv you forevevuh (’til tomorrow morning).” [Que three hours of the same shot of a doona moving a bit.]
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Not to mention ring tones, how best to wear one’s jeans around the underside of one’s buttocks and the deep inner meaning of facile R’n B.
Yes. What else is there?
Wot? Speek ‘Strine whycancha? BB is real grouse I get to see some ace norks.
No quite the contrary. Is comedy. A comedy of (absolutely no) manners.
I don’t mean this to come across as snarky, but much of the “class” analysis above is pretty pedestrian. There is too much conflation of taste and class. But I wonder if “class” really has much explanatory agency in the postmodern west.
Well, what is a “bogan”, Jenny? Haven’t we got here again the association between not being middle class and stupidity? I’m sure you’re not arguing that kids from Inala or Logan couldn’t become doctors, or conductors, or novelists, or academics? So – what are you saying precisely?
(Though their chances of becoming any of those things are much lower than those of GPS school alumni…)
Well, yes, glen, of course, I agree wholeheartedly. But what I’m arguing against is the comments made by people on this thread that it’s a thing of horror to “have” to watch bogans on their televisions.
Isn’t one of the justifications for requiring Australian content on tv that it’s supposed to represent us to ourselves as Australians? Well, which Australians?
“Maybe you’d also like bogans better represented in operating theatres, Art Galleries, orchestras, Booker Prize shortlists and university faculties. Why let lack of talent get in the way of equity?”
That is exactly what Kim is arguing Jenny, that BB contestants be allowed to operate at our public hospitals, y’know with the doctor shortage and all.
I also had a bit of giggle about one of your earlier posts:
“1. I like my TV to use the best talents of directors, writers, actors. Reality TV in general is a cancer that is steadily eroding the opportunities for genuinely talented people. And the less opportunity now, the less talent we’ll have in the future”
Bring back Darryl and Ozzie – the glory days of Australian TV!! Saturday nights haven’t been the same without Dicky Knee or Mahatma Coat.
Since when has commercial TV ever been free of talentless freeloaders or risible crap?
Channel 10 btw. have always programmed on the edge of social acceptability –some of the same talking points were heard 30-35 years ago when Number 96 and the Box scandalised the nation, not to mention Benny Hill.
Adrien, you’d know the strike rate of Oz prime time sitcoms & dramas; a sad litany of three episode wonders yanked and replaced by superior US imports or repeats of the Simpsons’ in the case of Channel 10. I would have thought high rating locally produced reality TV programs are supporting quality local productions, like Idol single sales in the recording market, rather than displacing production. Isn’t there a shortage of productions, not the other way around?
“Big Brother and its generic siblings are part of a whole culture in which people are willing to exchange their dignity for fame.”
And having learnt how to exchange dignity for fame from the meedja, and from actors, directors, TV hosts, politicians, comedians, etc– those pesky dumbarse bogans are trying to muscle in on that turf.
Away damn bogans!
I agree that coarse, uncouth behaviour isn’t confined to the underclass or working classes, many BB contestants are from middle class backgrounds whatever that means in Australia today.
Glen – “There is a profound lack of dignity for contestants on big brother”
While working in an abattoir is empowering and prestigious?
Big Brother for ultra bogansTM’s is like Cate Blanchett getting the nod to play Elizabeth I. Omigod!
But I agree with some your post Glen, but mainly in respect of the young ages of more recent season’s contestants. Too many young contestants calls into question issues of consent in terms of how much these young contestants, who are being cast to fill particular stereotypes (straight man, nerd, bully, racist/nutter, dolly-bird, joker, girl-next-door, exhibitionist, minority group interest) and to play against that type or not, don’t simply understand that ie. with limited their self-awareness and as much as they think they understand how the BB program works etc., they actually don’t know or understand how they themselves work.
Much like the people who turn up at Idol auditions believing they can sing like Whitney Houston and are absolutely shattered when the judges cringe & laugh behind hands, which is then broadcast to the nation for our gratuitous viewing pleasure.
My criticisms of BB producers are many, mainly in respect of the shallow gene poll casting overall, the too-young median age of the contestants. The constant insertions of twists, punishments and nasty games – which interfere with the natural course of events (and are just plain nasty) and take away from any inherent value the show may have. In earlier seasons, they just left a slab and some alchopops on a bench and filmed the result. Which is where LIVE SEX ON TV came about.
And never missing an opportunity, the producers then cast the very next season exclusively from Gold Coast night clubs, which turned around and bit them on their 19 year old breast implants.
Big Brother is ultimately about the ‘group’ via the audience, weeding out the bullies, the narcissists, the liars, the racists/misogynists/homophobes, the whingers, the lazy, the feckless, the neurotics and schemers – one by one and finally crowning the nice, the reliable, hard-working, kind, decent and worthy. Or someone who vaguely approximates such.
And if along the way those not-so-attractive personality types get their comeuppance, then it’s viewed as deserved, and if they break down and come to some epiphany about their ‘selfish’ ways, then redemption via another week in the house etc is their reward.
The winners and runners-up of BB in Australia have always been either the nice straight guy or the worthy/helpful or minority interest types. And this is the admittedly meagre pay-off for me, to KNOW that the community still has it’s overall moral compass pointed in the right direction, with a little help from the producers.
I was actually devastated at the end of a particular Survivor series wherein this young dude, an ex-street-kid direct from struggle street who proceeded to build the team’s structures & would get up before everyone else spear fish with a surplus catch each day, would have the fire ready, food cooked, & cleaned the camp-site, would also climb trees and get the coco-nuts etc etc. He also won just about all the challenges (although his wasn’t physically huge) was humble, never gossiped, never lied, was polite and thoughtful etc. He was however beaten for the ultimate prize in the finale by the technocrat scheming power player.
This is when you know a country has lost it’s moral compass, albeit, it was only the ousted contestants who voted, they gave the prize to guy who back-stabbed everyone single one of them, rather than the guy who kept them alive, and then justified why they had made this decision – arguing that back-stabbing & game-playing was what Survivor was actually about.
Douglas Adams couldn’t have written it better.
BB is pretty far down my list of reality TV programs – Wife Swap UK and Wife Swap USA are at the top– nothing like swapping the mothers from gun-toting, home schooled Christian fundamentalist families with the mothers of hippy, liberal, laissez faire-child raising families or working mother corporate families with no down-time etc. Never an hour wasted with Wife Swap.
Glen @ #68, yes to all of that. Comment of the Week. Possibly of the Month.
Yes Glen at #68. Well said.
Jo –
In what way do actors, directors, TV hosts, politicians, comedians exchange dignity for fame? Certainly Papparazo tries his best to westle it from them and some have been willing to give it away but in general I don’t see this happening. I can’t think of a single director that’s done it.
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Your point about the strike rate of locally produced stuff is pertinent. Australians are enculturaterd (is that a word?) to accept US stuff as their own. And the US can dump their stuff here elatively cheaply. On the other hand we ourselves do not produce with overseas markets in mind (by and large) this is suicide in a country of 21 million. Some stuff such as Neighbours sells quite well OS. But overall our stuff is, well, shite.
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“On the other hand we ourselves do not produce with overseas markets in mind (by and large) this is suicide in a country of 21 million.”
Wht a larf! Tell this to all the produces who go off to MIP every year to raise money from os broadcasters. And guess what? They often succeed. I suggest you look at the credits of Australian children’s drama for instance. All of them have investment from overseas broadcasters.
Jason, I beg your pardon for my pompous slap at you post. Rereading your post I see it is phrased as a comment to Kim and not mainly as a comment for the world at large, which can’t & needn’t be expected to know what your allusions mean.
Kim, I think it’s fine for you to write about tv shows and anything else you’re interested in, but I don’t like it when you do it via criticising other people’s lack of interest in same – even worse, when you put words into other people’s mouths about why they don’t care in the way you think they should.
Mark you said my comment might appear anti-intellectual if I don’t watch out. Well then, your idea of intellectualism is what I would call scholasticism. Intellectualism to me is the rational and dispassionate interest in the play of ideas over one’s subject matter – it’s not the same as showing an exagerrated respect towards scholarly authority.
Jo further -
I’m not sure where this linkage between Big Brother and class comes from. It’s been three years since I’ve had a TV and the last year I had one I did watch the show out of morbid curiosity (probably why I got rid of the screen). I didn’t notice that the BB contestants where particularly ‘working class’. It’s actually quite difficult to tell peoples’ class background in this country.
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Glen’s (much lauded) comment that among other things says:
Is I think to a certain extent unsubstantiated, or maybe just problematic. BB is rooted in a soap opera conflict of peronality types from a general persona pool of exhibitionist tendencies. Is there a ‘class’ differential? And there’s an inference that BB constestants (and porn stars) are opressed victims somehow. But they enter this voluntarily they want it. Indeed they fight for it.
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I don’t know whether there something particularly fame hungry about ‘bogans’ I think there’s a general trend in global culture (that part of the globe hooked up to a telly anyway) that has us believing that life is worth living unless someone’s taking a picture of it. Hence this ritual where people are willing to submit to being objects of derision and voyeurism simply because a hundred thousand strangers will know your face and your name for three months.
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I don’t see any meaningful egalitarianism in this. Warhol said we’d be famous for 15 minutes. That’s becoming more true every day. And, in accordance with the principles of classical economics, the truer it becomes the less valuable it actually is.
http://www.afc.gov.au/gtp/wftvtopprog06.html
Here’s the top rating 20 television programs for 2006. The last available year. It’s clear what people want to watch; sport, light entertainment and reality programs. No drama at all from anywhere. But interestingly, BB doesn’t figure in the top 20 programs. The issue for television drama all over the world is that it’s expensive and can’t compete in terms of ratings. Reality prograsm do well, but it seems they have to keep re-inventing themselves to keep on rating. Hence, increased nastiness and senstionalism.
That is free-to-air tho’ innit? The big bucks (ie well-heeled demographics) are tuned to Pay TV these days. So I hear.
Jason said: ““X is crap because bogans/luvvies like it” doesn’t cut it as aesthetics or criticism, and wouldn’t even if it weren’t a caricature of the audience. “X is crap because it’s popular culture” is very shaky, because it’s an historically specific category, which many canonical cultural works have fitted into at one time or another. If you’re not articulating your judgements by reference to the artefact you’re discussing, they’re just assertions. You’re always vulnerable to charges of snobbery if you’re justifying your judgements by gesturing at the audience or the medium.”
I agree with all of this, but I think some of it is red herring material – in particular the point about popular culture. This isn’t the place to go into why but I will write a post about it on my own blog if I get time this evening.
The proximate trouble is that I am unconvinced that other the debatable example of Ken Parish’s comment on his own blog, anyone here has seriously proposed that BB is unworthy of his or attention because of their opinion of the worth of the medium or the constitution of the audience. I haven’t seen anyone try to justify their judgements in these ways, and frankly, it’s a bit tiresome to be constantly subjected to the suspicion or the assumption that one’s judgements are based on such views because they are, as you say, ignorant about how cultural productions work at best, and bigoted at worst.
My only thoughts about the audience are a) that I have no information about who watches it and I’m suspicious of those who claim to know not only who watches it but also why, and b) that whoever the audience is, I think the makers of this type of television are the ones who are insulting their intelligence and making LCD type-assumptions about their tastes etc, not BB’s critics.
You are right though that there hasn’t been much attempt to give illustrations of how and where BB falls short (Glen’s point excepted).
Speaking for myself I haven’t bothered because, rightly or wrongly, I didn’t think the actual artistic merits of BB was really the topic under discussion here.
You could be right Adrien. There’s no actual ratings available for pay tv. All the demographic info I can find is vague and very out of date.
I wasn’t aware I was doing that, Laura – it certainly wasn’t my intention to do so.
Pay TV does not have anywhere near as big an audience. As it is, within the pay tv audience, there’s so much content that ratings are dispersed amongst a larger variety (resulting in smaller ratings). Commercial free-to-air television – for now, and for a while yet, I would imagine – is still the most powerful concentration of people glued in to a single advertising portal. That’s what ratings really “are” – it’s the maximum sized demographic that companies can pitch to consumers to, during the show.
The only other component in favour for Pay TV is that it is, of course, a demographic with a much higher disposable income, so products targeting high-income earners will always find a value in pay TV, because it assures an audience that have potential response capabilities (that is, realistically can afford to act in response to the ad by… well… paying for the product!). So, it does have a select niche with a particular advantage for many products – and this is actually why advertising on pay TV is quite expensive. This is also why you won’t find ads for toilet paper on Pay TV. The pay off doesn’t work – they’re better paying a better value amount on free TV and reaching a massive audience that are all going to be persuaded to buy toilet paper.
Keep in mind, however, that what differs in Pay TV (and another reason as to why it’s better that many people doing the whole “It’s better because it’s aimed at higher class…. educated, etc… people” thing tend to forget) is that Pay TV is ultimately an industry that thrives on subscription. Free to air is all about advertising (that’s where the profit comes from), so its content is driven by advertising dynamics much more. In advertising, most is nearly always best, so these shows try to cater to the largest group of people it can. “Smarter” content alienates too big a portion of the public, and so shows like Big Brother succeed, because they appeal to the masses by talking to them directly. As higher income viewers switch to pay TV, it leaves a ratio within the free-to-air audience, where the “bogan” mentality is an even higher percentage than it was before Pay TV.
Having said that, Big Brother does want to win the smarter viewers – HOWEVER, it needs to do that in ratio. It will allocate a very small portion to winning these people over, because they wont risk their bogan audience trying to win over a much smaller smarter crowd. That doesn’t make economic sense. But this dualism has defined the “problems” for the shows, in recent years, because pleasing two antithetical audiences is a difficult tight-rope to balance, and one they’ve ultimately not been overly successful at doing. But, in the end, they’d rather be left with the bogans, than be left with the smaller smarter crowd.
Now, people have been talking for years about Big Brother being axed, and the reason why it has not been, and can afford to perform slightly lower than other shows, is that no other show is the kind of marketing platform that BB is. Other shows are just about the advertisement break slots. That’s where they generate money. If the ratings drop, less companies advertise, and the show becomes unprofitable and reaches a point where it is eventually axed. But Big Brother makes money from so many avenues within the show, because the actual show “IS” an advertisement slot. They offer the show to businesses, and if you pay, you can have a task based around your product, an intruder, a competition named after you, and so on, and so on. That’s extremely profitable! I think the people who only see the “well, it’s cheaper, because they don’t use high-paid talent” are not seeing the whole picture as to how far it extends. It’s not that it’s just cheap – it actually generates money, from every angle.
So, even though (hypothetically, here) The OC rates higher, the only money The OC can make is commercial break slots. So if it drops to, say, 1.1 million, it may have a total advertising revenue of $500,000. Now, let’s say Big Brother rates 1 million. It’s a million less, and the slots will become cheaper than OC slots. It may bring in only $350,000. BUT, it then has all the internal advertising space – KFC pay a small fortune to call a certain facet after themselves, 3 Mobile have paid to have a task where Nobbi must answer a call, every episode on his – what a coincidence – 3 Mobile, etc, etc. So they pull in a whole bunch of dollars, and it ends up bringing in a total of $700,000. So, even though The OC has rated higher, it’s actually worth LESS than the lower rating Big Brother. The OC would be axed first.
So, there are a whole lot of things to consider, in regards to comparing ratings, etc, between free to air and Pay TV, and even between the shows, themselves. It’s not just about what is ‘cheaper’ to make, it’s about what is more ‘profitable’ in the end outcome (like any business).
I’ll say one thing for Boring Bogan: they go the PR right this time with the apposite I don’t think so pitch.
Interesting post, Eye. The ways of tv are wondrous.
I believe there’s also a profit sharing arrangement with respect to the voting call lines, yes? The producers and the station get a substantial cut of all those pay-by-the-minute calls?
RE: # 86
This is THE Eye from Eye on Big Brother Kim ‘n I have been linking too!
Welcome Aaron
Seriously.
Yep, hi Eye! Nice to see you round here!
Thankyou very much
And yes, the phonecalls are another source of revenue. There’s plenty. That’s what really happened to Big Brother. When people talk of that “innocent” period, it’s not really that it was innocent, morally, or whatever. It was that, at a certain point, they realised to what extent Big Brother could become the ultimate cross-marketing platform, and that’s what really killed this show. In the beginning, it even had a charity aspect – the most noticed cross-promoting was for a range of great organisations that each housemate chose to represent! A world away from today.
As far as the “bogans” go, their role is that they were tempted by sadism, because the show also realised that offering quite unsavory vicarious pleasure through mob mentality was a greater pull for that audience – particularly the young people (though not exclusive to). So you had something that now the main initiative was to market, having absolutely no moral compass as to what they used to lure those consumers in. Sex and sadism soon ruled the day. That’s why they make sure the women they put in there are particularly “good” for the fall. The public particularly enjoy the crucifixion of women (you can take that on a whole range of other discussions, of course!), and so they deliberately place a range of really screwed up young women in there, every year, many of whom have severe sexual issues (because they always provide “adults only” content, and succumb to the men rather easily).
I think someone earlier said something about looking not at the show, but what it “does”. And the problem with what it does is that it provides the thrill of the kill, without any context for introspection – it’s the opposite to introspection or observation… it’s impulsive, reactionary. Because those impulses translate well in terms of consumer psychology (they motivate people to pick up a telephone, in the case of the calls). Advertising isn’t about THINKING, it’s about impulsive ACTION. And the problem then, socially, is that it deliberately draws on darker elements of human and social nature, and – the argument goes – in the process, effectively legitimises them and reveres them. It encourages it; all the editing and design (of the “game”) is tailored to set up those crucifixions – whether it’s the Fat Lazy Aboriginal Girl (obsessed with food), The Little Princess (who suffers for being a slutty rich bitch) – whatever that bullying of the week is. In the beginning, the slogan and concept was that it would be a kind of “celebration of everyday people and diversity”, but instead it turned into plain old capitalising on social ignorances and counter-productive collectivist mechanics.
“In the beginning, the slogan and concept was that it would be a kind of “celebration of everyday people and diversity”, but instead it turned into plain old capitalising on social ignorances and counter-productive collectivist mechanics’.’
Hmmm …much like political party we once knew.
That’s really interesting Aaron. And well said. I actually didn’t know that about Pay TV and its quite useful information. This:
Is kinda obvious tho’
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But on the topic of ‘bogans’ and class I’d like to know how the marketers of BB conceive of ‘bogans’. Is it a class thing, a smarts thing, a taste regime? Taste regimes? It seems to me that the cross-marketing angles share a lot in common with, say, breakfast shows and the like where, as you say, the whole thing is one big ad. In those shows the market seems to me to not so much be some target demographic but a generality. An aspect of the Great Mass. Sunrise is orientated around the family aspect of Suburbia. BB, like most reality shows, appeals to its schadenfreude.
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I’m wondering whether the future of advertising will split ever more into these two tiers based on the ’smarts’ of the market. The smart set being catered to with specific promotions targeted to their presumably higher incomes and possibly more selective and active way of receiving advertising. And then a general sphere in which advertising is hard wired into everything; where shows like The OC will be awash with product placement. This already happens with news and current affairs.
It’s class to the extent that marketing sees demographics in terms of disposable incomes, but ultimately I would define it more as a “Taste regime”. Within that, there are various facets that are seen, and then used to tailor marketing. For example, political affiliations and repulsions. One of the “clever” ways this year’s BB thought it had found the perfect bridge between the bogans and the smarter set is the use of Howard. Now, the bogans and lefties loathe Howard for different reasons. The BB bogan audience are not right winged – but neither are they left. Howard is seen as the ultimate “wowser”, and the show was very quick to portray him as a symbol of the conservative view against the show that effectively stops them from getting their tits and ass. It has nothing to do with their social conscience, or any of the reasons why people like “us” (I say, tentatively!) dislike Howard. So they wouldn’t use an endorsement by Rudd to advertise BB, no; but by using Howard, they were appealing to the two different demos that BB wants to juggle, if it can.
The intelligence of the non-bogan demo, the “smart” factor, comes into play, based on a perceived resistance and savvy to marketing psychomechanics. The problem with smarter demos is that they are harder to con! They require substance – whereas less savvy demos are easily fooled by branding. Marketing is all about using branding to create an impression of a reality that doesn’t really exist (that works right down the line – Lynx won’t really get you more girls, etc). I spent last year working for companies who wanted me to make them look “green” (a quick panic trend within marketing, last year, that has now subsided because – whaddya know – people aren’t really that motivated to be green), but they weren’t really very green, at all. They were just creating an impression through branding. Now, everyday people would presume that’s right – a picture of the globe, a green leaf here and there, the word “GREEN” in big letters, and surely the product is saving the world.! A smarter, green-savvy consumer would want more info, they know how to assess whether a company really is green, so branding isn’t enough. So, these smart consumers are problematic for marketing because they demand a greater level of reality from a world all about fantasy. The greatest tool against the world of advertising is education, for this reason – bogans are conned by marketing because they really don’t understand the propaganda of it. They think it’s real. They think Big Brother is real – but there’s been a growing rebellion amidst it, and that’s partly why I blog it (it gives them a way in which they can understand the marketing, by joining the dots in something they follow religiously).
I think the marketing-savvy factor is a huge factor in Big Brother, now. So, yes, I think your two-tier observation will increase. It’s not even just that a portion of society are getting smarter to marketing – it’s that the marketing is being pushed and pushed to a point (the propaganda thresh-hold, in a way!) where it’s just too obvious for smarter crowds. It’s certainly a problem for BB. The bogans are still very easy to please (I usually end up with 100,000 of them on my blog, but that leaves 900,000 I can’t reach, unfortunately!) – and they’ve maintained that audience, at the end of the day – but the smarter audiences turned off (as did the press turn on the show – another important factor they are now trying to fix by offering the Big Mouth format, where journalists will be so desperate to be invited onto TV, they will start being nicer about the show).
So the different aspects – class, tastes and concerns, politics, intelligence, etc – all come into play, really. But demos are defined by the chemistry between them and the marketing – “what works for these people?”. So it’s really just, “This is my audience – my target demo – how do these people be successfully persuaded – by what?” All else follows – whether that demo can be categorised by the music they like, or the social class they come from. That’s how the cruelty increased in the show – their demo loves it. They realised the greatest ratings and marketing responses were coming during periods of cruelty. We sit here and call it “bullying”, etc (and it is), but to them, it’s entertainment. Whereas the smarter demos don’t like this element.
So with BB, you’ve got the smarter audience’s ability to see through marketing, and that annoying morality where they don’t like watching people be victimised. Then, you have the “bogans” who are very responsive to marketing and love sex and victimisation (they don’t even mind the sex and victimisation being combined). And this is really the battle of Big Brother, eight years down the track. Two tribes go to war.
And I don’t want to hijack this thread anymore, anyway!! Lol
But thanks, Kim and Sublime and everyone. I am ultimately left to walk the same tightrope between the two-tier demos that the show is, and it’s always nice to have a “smarter” crowd catching on, too. So cheers for that!
Really? No! Damn. You mean I’ve spent all this money on this foul smelling shit and still no woman. I’ll do anything for love (except shower, colour co-ordinate, refrain from belching in restaurants, listening and developing an interest in something other than rugby).
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I don’t think you’ve derailed the thread at all. It’s very interesting. I reckon the two-tiered marketing thing will become more prominent and advertisers who can find a way to access the ’smart set’ will prosper. Given that they’re both propaganda resistant and probably have a tendency to evade profiling and any other info access the marketing industry’ll throw at them it’s not easy. I have a few ideas on the subject but I’m torn between the money-go-round and the prospect of furthering the cause of putting a dollar sign on everything.
There are sections of the Right who like to do away with the concept of an educated public. Ann Coulter for instance, I’d argue, does not believe in Creationism really I think she’s just using it in furtherance of the ‘public schools are Commie indoctrination camps’ schtick. Hence she gets the very people who’d benefit most from quality public schooling to eschew it of their own accord.
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But that’s off topic.
A tad!
But I’m happy to go with the Eye segue into marketing, which is very much on topic.
Ps – for someone who doesn’t watch Big Brother, Ken Parish seems to know a lot about how it works:
http://clubtroppo.com.au/2008/05/18/cane-toads-and-shockjocks/#comment-272818
“But I’m happy to go with the Eye segue into marketing, which is very much on topic.”
Cool.
Now just imagine if the complex ideas about society we explore here on LP so resonated across the ‘class’* spectrum, that we realised that we were no longer speaking to the converted, but actually stimulating a whole new audience of people into the nuances of critical thinking.
And imagine if, rather than embedded advertising on this site, it was actually possible that broadcast media would pay to see us GeekFreaks on LPTV.
Imagine a blog that spun off its own show, not the other way round.
What an interesting cultural phenomenon.
*albeit an awkward term.
But what would the rules of *our* game be, sc? That’s the question!
Ask Eye
x
Hehe!
Tonight’s eviction show was the most boring ever. They had a segment showing the highlights of Corey’s stay in the house – his handstands, flour on his face, wrestling with the boys, armpit farts, and a Mr Bean impersonation. BB said, “You don’t know Corey.” Right, and we still don’t know him. What exactly did he do in the house?
Rebecca voted herself out of the house. It was the highlight of the show, which is not saying much.
This show is headed for a quick demise. They’d better do something soon, or I’m tuning out.
I taped it and watched it later so skipped all the Corey bits!
Not being familiar with his previous incarnations, I’m wondering how the Kyle ever gets any work. Deadpan or dead dull?
The extended daily show had a lot more (confected) drama than the eviction bit – I’m wondering if they’ve actually gone down the wrong track – dramatically – with this year’s vote to save setup. (Obviously, as Eye says, it makes them a ton of bucks).
Another interesting question is that Bec (and presumably other housemates) still refer to the “experience in the House” and a few of the HMs doing eviction votes referred to the dynamics. That seems outdated now and a residue of previous series – since no attempt at all really is made to represent those dynamics. The storylines and their construction are now far too forgrounded.
Glen’s question about how BB’s users experience it is a really interesting one here.
On Big Brother being Shit:
Nobody is arguing the point about Big Brother being crap, but most of us like to know what comes out the other end as well as what’s going in.
Why, but, why, do we want it soo ?
Is it that we love comparing ourselves to other folk and want to watch other folk making turds of themselves so that we can feel that we are less shitful?
Or are we just lonely at home, or curious about why everybody else watches it, or really needing the insight into what comprises the immediate daily popular culture?
I reckon that when popular culture is widely recognised as poo . . .
. . . well apparently the untouchables in India who work in domestic tasks of shitkicking, shitstirring, and shit carrying, and recycling in general, are well paid.
Do we sit there watching a stream of recyclable personalities so as we know how everyone rates certain reactions, only so we will not put a foot wrong in the bar with the boss we might be hoping for a promotion from?
Maybe one day a guest appearance on BB, or putting in a week or a month with the housemates, will be obligatory in certain professions outside of the popular television personality industry.
I can just see it now, we’ll all have affordable internet streaming in our houses, and there’ll be a whole range of BB type houses, where folk have to go for retreat so as not to be demoted at work; with all of us watching.
That’s the basic idea of calling it Big Brother in the first place isn’t it?
Scary stuff, shit!
Perhaps Corey Worthless would’ve made a deeper impression had he been permitted to trash the BB house the way he did his parents’.