Arseholes?

I had toyed with posting about voting in the European Parliamentary election (the invisible election?) - about my experience of looking over the list of parties and candidates (the vote-splitters; the known and the no-face politicians), and the rationale (if I could raise the status of any one party in the UK, who would that be?) that led to me voting for a party (Green) that I'd never before voted for... but I won't. Instead:

Shane: Politics, eh.

Emma: Mm.

Shane: So what have we got?

Emma: Quite of few young, big-boobed beauties. There are the gays, a few internationals, one or two normals, a geordie - gay... you know, the usual. Oh! And a really nice young Brazilian lad.

Shane: Worth watching?

Emma: It will be, in bits. Eventually. First few weeks are usually too noisy - wait 'til they settle in and settle down.

Shane: Ok.

Emma: I think you should go on Big Brother.

Shane: You say that every year.

Emma: You should!

Shane: That would be hideous! How would I get on with ANY of the people you'd typically get on that programme?

Emma: I think you would. I think you'd be rubbish at the getting excited and all of the shrieking, but that's why you'd be good. You'd just be... y' know, not bothered.

Shane: It would be hideous. I'd end up in a conflict - on national television, with either a massive muscley male - hideous, or some totally ditsy blonde thing - equally hideous.

Emma: You wouldn't. You'd rise above it. You'd float about and you'd talk to everyone. Then they'd all vote you out and you'd be back here in less than a fortnight.

Shane: (a bit offended) D' y' reckon?

Emma: What?

Shane: D' y' think I'd be got rid of... quickly?

Emma: I don't know. There'd only be one way to find out...

Shane: Pathetic, absolutely pathetic. The humiliation! Just applying... before getting anywhere near to being on the tele'. Not a chance.

In the way that Huw doesn't concur with lofty disinterest in football, I hold the same view regarding Big Brother. As people discuss the programme - a massive and shifting cultural phenomenon since it first aired, the real value of the show becomes evident. In person, in-the-flesh, as part of life here on Earth, I have learned much about relative strangers, as I've listened to their views on the empty, the vacuous and the banal. Because, of course, them there - their - views, can be far from empty, vacuous or banal. Racism, sexism, politics, the value of time and energy, sexuality, relationship-formation, conflict - how and how not to resolve it, and much more besides. Big Brother has it all. And so, Big Brother is as sharp as the minds that watch and listen to it. So yes it will be tremendously dull, but it'll also be as sharp as... well, you and I...???

(Whispers) The thing is, I don't really care that much - you know, enough to actually vote, but there is something that can be pro-social about it all. I think that's what I hold onto.

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And for anyone who got this far down the post: a treat! A shot of the performance artist, Ron Athey - a very nice man. We once chatted about an atmospheric violin soloist. As I typed the title to this post, Ron came to mind.