The End for Big Brother?

Looks like things have started getting serious:

John and Ashley have been escorted from the Big Brother house.

The official site says…

Big Brother Housemates Ashley and John were escorted from the House on Saturday afternoon following a breach of the rules. The producers Endemol Southern Star and Network Ten deemed their actions were grounds for their removal from the show. The producers will not be commenting any further on this serious matter.

“What the hell happened?” you’re no doubt asking yourself.

According to the Behind Big Brother forums, at around 4am this morning John held Camilla down so Ashley could slap her in the face with his penis.

Last year they had a similar problem, although not quite as extreme as this. If it’s true, then I imagine there would be grounds for legal action (and unlike many similar cases, evidence will presumably be in abundance).

I wrote last year about the nasty strain of misogyny which seemed to be in evidence on BB. This year has had its share, but I until now I thought it was a tad milder than last year’s. It’s something that goes beyond common garden chauvinism and gets into real fear and hatred. It’s an attitude which seems to have been taken to an extreme in the Dianne Brimble case. I haven’t been exposed to these attitudes much in my day-to-day life, which might say more about my day-to-day life than it does about either BB or Australian society in general, but I do think it’s a matter of great concern if John-and-Ashley-like behaviour is seen by young men as an acceptable (or even funny) way to act toward women. I think it would be tremendous if the police were to prosecute these two guys.

For the record, I have no problem at all with sex or nudity or anything else that happens on BB, as long as it’s consensual and as long as any broadcast properly informs its viewers beforehand about what they’re going to see. I’m not any kind of wowser - my issue is with the degrading nature of what happened.

Also note that I’m assuming for the moment that the story on Jess’s site is correct - I haven’t seen any stories in other news sources, and the producers (I gather) are being tight-lipped about it for the moment. I stand to be corrected if the story is wrong, but at the moment I find it quite believable.

UPDATE: Been fishing around for more information. The BB forums are down, with this message:

In light of the events of the last 24 hours the Big Brother forums will be unavailable until further notice.

The justification being what, I wonder? Are the producers imagining that they can keep a lid on it? Are they hoping that images won’t get out? There are a couple of photographs on Ausculture, which are grainy nightvision, but clear enough to think that the full video would be pretty incriminating. I won’t copy them here unless I see any reason to.

UPDATE 2 10:55pm

Nothing on The Age website so far. The SMH is repeating the producers’ lines.

UPDATE 3 12:18am

Fwiw, here’s a rumour:

According to a source inside Network Ten, senior management have met with Southern Star Endemol producers tonight regarding the future of the program, Big Brother on the network.

Just under a fortnight ago, Ten management finally axed the show Big Brother Adults Only, citing continued government pressure in relation to censors.

While the controvesy of the weekends events involving Ashley and John, who were evicted earlier tonight, was certaintly the main reason for the talks, others suggest a sudden collapse of funding from the major sponsors also prompted the talks.

At 9.30pm tonight, the Official Site shut down it’s forums, unable to keep up with removing posts regarding why John and Ashley were evicted, even after pleading with forum users to steer clear of talking about the subject.

The source has also claimed that just under an hour ago plans were being finalised from the meeting, and that the decision reached was to axe Big Brother immediately, with the remaining prizemoney split 8 ways between the contestants still in the house.

The source has also claimed that tomorrow’s eviction will no longer go ahead, instead being replaced by The Simpsons and a special Futurama documentary.

The consensus about the place seems to be that this is unlikely to be true, but we’ll see.

July 1, 2006. Uncategorized. 17 Comments.

17 Comments

  1. Mark Bahnisch replied:

    Trackback.

    July 2nd, 2006 at 10:46 pm. Permalink.

  2. Blogger on the Cast Iron Balcony » Blog Archive » Ohhhhh moi gourd!! replied:

    […] It’s my opinion that Big Brother is staged, semi-scripted, like WFF wrestling, and the recent fracas between Camilla and two of the men was probably a setup to increase ratings which was taken further than the stage managers meant. Which worked, because we watched tonight’s episode to see how the cro-magnons still in the house would deal with it all. While I counted about 500 “Ohhhhh moi gourd!!!”s during the episode, I have to say I’m bothered, bewildered and bemused, BB. Because what I saw was a woman who’d been sexually assaulted on national television, being made to recount her episode of sexual harassment (again on national television), crying, and apologising… to the perpetrators. […]

    July 3rd, 2006 at 6:28 am. Permalink.

  3. Bianca replied:

    Have you seen the footage? I downloaded it and watched it and I reccomend everyone does the same BEFORE they start commenting. The events I saw were: Ash and John in a bed called Camilla over She asked if they had farted and wanted her over there because of that. She went over and sat on the end of their bed. She asked if they were going to “turkey slap” her (i assume that is the term for what happened) They said no and she said they were liars and THEN asked to be let into the bed. John said to lie down and he put an arm over her when SHE lay down. She asked again if they were going to turkey slap her and they didnt reply but ash dropped trews and swung his penis into her cheek. she made yuk noises and sat up. John did not restrain her. She then said They turkey slapped me!! and she was laughing. It was immature and stupid but she didnt say no that i heard.

    July 3rd, 2006 at 6:58 pm. Permalink.

  4. Katy replied:

    I to wonder about our society when a woman can be held down by somebody she “has known for awhile” and have another slap her in the face with his penis and think “it’s not the right behaviour” before reaching the conclusion that it was a laugh and the boys didn’t mean any harm. While it wasn’t “good” it wasn’t considered bad, anti-social, wrong, feral and illegal. Big Brother may have washed there hands of the situation as “serious” and refusing to discuss it any further the message is out there, and when it is a message that should be condemened but has been taken out of discussion it makes it a very grey action.

    July 3rd, 2006 at 7:16 pm. Permalink.

  5. Dan replied:

    Bianca - yes, I’ve seen the footage. It’s wrong to say that John wasn’t holding her down - he clearly was.

    As for whether or not she said no, that’s not the point. Unless you want to claim that she consented somehow (and that certainly doesn’t appear on any of the footage), then it’s safe to assume that she didn’t consent.

    The fact that she was laughing doesn’t mean anything either. In the group context, Camilla would have been eager not to stand out or embarrass herself any more than she was already. It’s totally understandable that she would want to play the incident down, and that doesn’t make the guys any less responsible for what they did.

    July 3rd, 2006 at 7:27 pm. Permalink.

  6. tubagooba.com » Blog Archive » More BB replied:

    […] In a comment on my last post, Bianca alludes to the fact that the video footage seems significantly less harrowing than one might expect from the description of events (or even from the still photos). Unlike Bianca, though, I didn’t see anything on the video (which was available on YouTube – sees to have disappeared now) to suggest that this was anything other than a serious assault. I don’t think that anyone really knows how Camilla felt about it, but there was certainly no indication that she consented – that’s the only relevant issue. […]

    July 3rd, 2006 at 8:04 pm. Permalink.

  7. Chloe replied:

    Before I have my say, where can i download the footage from?

    July 3rd, 2006 at 10:38 pm. Permalink.

  8. Bianca replied:

    Well I think she consented because she said “are you going to turkey slap me?” and when they said no she called them liars and after that got into the bed with them. She knew what they were planning and of her own free will she got into the bed. I am not trying to trivialise sexual assault, i just dont think this particular incident falls into that catagory. I might even go so far as to say that you are trivilising sexual assalts by comparing this to one. Also Camilla has not been the type to hold back on what she thinks in the house, if she had felt they were out of line I think she would have said something quite strong. I object to people not knowing the facts and relying on the description of the incident as john and ashley getting into her bed, holding her down and making genital contact with her face. this wasnt an accurate summation.

    July 3rd, 2006 at 11:13 pm. Permalink.

  9. Dan replied:

    Bianca: You left out the part where she said “I’ll hurt you if you do” (turkey slap me). Also the bit where Ash shouts “Hold her down, hold her down” as she struggles, and the scream as it actually happens.

    Consent? Hardly.

    July 3rd, 2006 at 11:36 pm. Permalink.

  10. Hillery replied:

    BB is insightful of what different age and culture behavior is current of our society which is made up of other cultures interblended. BB it’s a physiologists dream. Unfortunately this incident boils down to that J and A did a pack dog act on C. To say they never intended to hurt her in any way is sad to hear for anyone is a caring parent. My fifteen year old son said ‘that is disgusting what they did.’ In heinside J and A really need stop thinking how your going to tone this down and apologize to C and to viewers who may think this is suitable behavior for a practical joke. You are way out of line boys. BB did the right thing to boot you both out. Let’s hope you got a whole lot of growth out of this if not anything else and for the viewers let’s hope that BB isn’t axed because of this.

    July 4th, 2006 at 8:43 am. Permalink.

  11. Rebbecca replied:

    that dan, what a gentleman. before you pass comment bianca, why don’t you experience the same thing? do you think your opinion will change?

    July 6th, 2006 at 9:39 pm. Permalink.

  12. David replied:

    Ok. I think it has all gone to far, I mean really she let it happen she knew they were going to do it and still its not assault she didnt even press charges.Think about it this wouldnt even be a big deal if it wasnt on national television. -.-

    July 7th, 2006 at 1:26 am. Permalink.

  13. David replied:

    OMG get over it please!

    July 7th, 2006 at 1:27 am. Permalink.

  14. David replied:

    I think that its a big set up the whole of “BB” is!

    July 7th, 2006 at 1:28 am. Permalink.

  15. David replied:

    Why would they do it on national television they look smarter than that?

    July 7th, 2006 at 1:29 am. Permalink.

  16. preppy replied:

    i no how it feels to be turkied it is bad as but john and ash smell like legends so let them off

    July 7th, 2006 at 9:55 pm. Permalink.

  17. j replied:

    “Friday afternoon at approx. 1.30pm Camilla said to a group of housemates she wanted to be turkey slapped, and it went to air on the internet stream.”

    July 9th, 2006 at 3:59 pm. Permalink.