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| "The Hopefuls" |
Public parades
Public participation programmes have taken off in recent years. Channel 4 have been in the forefront in providing a new type of entertainment whereby programme content is at least in part controlled by members of the public other than professional media types or politicians. Comment and Right To Reply stand out as among particularly good examples of programmes where individual members of the working class are able to take the opportunity to put across their views on a topic of their concern to them.
In the United States, things have gone much further still. There, the public can actually create their own shows in some instances at minimal expense, so long as they have the time and energy to do so. Public Access Television, as it is called, started as a big hit in New York and has since spread to other American cities. Programmes cost next-to-nothing to make and any profit for the network comes mainly through advertising. Clips from some of the more eccentric and bizarre Public Access shows have been aired in Britain on C4's Manhattan Cable and the currently-showing United States of Television (Saturdays, 11.05pm).
It would seem that the "anything goes" atmosphere of Public Access Television is unlikely to find a home in Britain for a while though, which is a pity. The state authorities control television output in this country tightly, as is evidenced by the fact that Britain still has only four terrestrial channels. This is a shame indeed, for while Public Access TV is a showcase for the bizarre and ridiculous at times, it represents a democratization of the airwaves which the more serious, including socialists, could benefit from.
Give us a twirl
Instead, British TV is currently dominated by public participation programmes of a rather different sort. These are shows where the main aim is to make the public look foolish for entertainment purposes. Some of these programmes are innocuous enough like Bruce Forsythe’s Generation Game where contestants compete to make bad wobbly pots. But others have a more sinister undertone. These programmes can be spotted easily as they are invariably based on a mass-hysteria on the part of the audience who are required to leave all their critical faculties at home. This is presumably because only those in such a mental state, fortified by a sip of alcohol, are likely to consent to taking part in a show whose object is to humiliate them and their class.
These shows were developed in the United States but are certainly a less welcome import from genuine Public Access TV. Blind Date on ITV was one of the first and it still remains compulsive viewing for millions. Far from attempting to find everlasting love, most of the contestants seem to be part-time disc-jockeys or budding actresses desperate for publicity, fame and fortune. Few if any actually attain this, and their fragile egos are invariably dented before the show is over, to the delight of the studio audience and the satisfied curiosity of the watching millions.
Hear the word
Currently the worst example of public humiliation TV is a spot on Channel 4's The Word (Fridays, 11.05pm), entitled "The Hopefuls". This is a feature where a member of the viewing public is allowed ten seconds of fame on the condition that they will do anything to receive it. It is public humiliation taken to its zenith. Typical tasks allocated to the hopefuls have been to wallow in a bath of horse shit, to drink their own urine and to eat a plate of pig’s eyes.
Channel 4 also seems to have introduced a similar, occasional spot on its new Saturday night show hosted by Chris Evans, Don’t Forget Your Toothbrush (10.05pm). On one show a contestant had to French kiss a stranger for thirty seconds if she was to be eligible to win a prize.
Just where, we might ask, will all this end? Have sex with your grandmother for a tenner? Lose an eye and win a holiday? For sure, this is capitalist "entertainment" which has sunk to its lowest ebb. Dangle the carrot, don't spare the stick and dress it all up as "fun" in front of audiences who would have presumably laughed and "whooped" at the Nuremberg Rallies. Precisely what sort of society is it that glorifies in demeaning its inhabitants and in draining them of every last ounce of self-respect they have left in this way?
Socialists have the answer. It is a society rotting on its feet, hooked on hysteria and seemingly addicted to mindless competition and glory-seeking in all its forms. The collective hysteria of the television studio acts as a substitute for real social solidarity and the public humiliation spectacle it feeds on is little more than the sickest of jokes at the expense of the often desperate. If society is judged by the way in which it treats its own inhabitants, then this one is surely ripe for drastic change.
To this end socialists have a sound piece of advice for the millions of viewers of public humiliation TV. Let’s overthrow this muckheap before it engulfs us all.
Dave Perrin
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