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DIY Ethic vs. Big Brother - Why Don't You...?
by Deborah Taylor
Summer's brainwashed everyone into zombies who worship Big Brother and the football's World Cup. Is there any way to keep what brain cells you have left?
So, here we all are then. Stuck in the middle of the World Cup on most channels and Big Brother on the remaining ones. Summer has arrived as hard and fast as it ever does and, as usual, I'm a fish out of water. A very hot fish at that.
It's not like I'm trying to be a misfit... that would be too much effort. It's just that popular culture is just not very good at the moment is it? Really, it's all a bit pants. Big smelly pants with various nefarious stains on them.
From a country that produced Shakespeare, Dickens, Bronte(s), Bowie and Roald Dahl, the best we can come up with nowadays is getting annoyed by annoying people trapped in a room annoying each other. Quite frankly, it's annoying. I've a television the size of a house and more channels on it than there are countries and still there's nothing worth watching on them.
On top of that, nothing else is going on if you want to escape Big Brother except the World Cup. You can't even go and have a quiet drink to escape from it all. Everywhere is devoted to this silly little game as though it's something important.
What can you do about this? Apart from hiding in your house, shouting that it's too hot and drinking fair-trade rum?
You'd be surprised because there's quite a lot. Irritating people in pubs by asking inane questions about the footballgame they're watching is always fun. (Like, why do they keep falling over? Who should I be supporting? Isn't there something better on the other side? [Invariably not...])
But there's other things we can do. We can refuse to accept this mindless drivel that people seem to think entertains us. We can, honestly. We can spurn this stuff, stop watching, stop participating, stop buying into the hype. Stop caring about which vacuous nonentity is swearing in a small room making an exhibition of themselves, stop worrying about whether some people win a pointless contest. Stop watching.
And make our own entertainment. Not in the Edwardian we made our own entertainment sense. But in a CREATIVE FORCE that no one will be able to stop. Write, paint, sing, dance, ride a unicycle. Anything that will make other people stop and think and create something of their own.
Anything other than World Cup Big Fucking Brother.
About the author
Deborah Taylor is a band manager, events organiser and the uber-glorious Features Editor of Mookychick.co.uk. She also writes short stories that will twist your head and a regular mooky opinion column. You may send her roses, top hats and fair-trade rum.
