Britain's Got Pomposity

Another series has gone by with a Dog act finally winning, resulting in a slight smile from Simon Cowell and Twitter being swarmed with the same joke regarding the £500,000 prize money and Pedigree Chum. Ha ha ha! Think of all dog food it'll get to eat! Ha ha ha, you're all so funny and original!

Just like every year, it was apparently 'the hardest to call' with all the acts being 'brilliant' and 'worthy of winning the competition'. In fact, a number of acts this year were 'dark horses of the competition'.  Taking all of that into consideration, you wonder why they waste time showing the painfully crap acts, and why there are some people who sit on their high horse, refusing to watch it.

There is a real pomposity against Britain's Got Talent; something which comes with all talent shows. For example, when X Factor is on, it is easy to see the social divide between those who love it, and those who think of the whole affair as something only enjoyed by the dirty, thick lower class, and that it lowers the morality of the whole country. Those latter people think that by not watching the show, they are better than everyone else in every single way.

That divide appears smack-bang betwixt the middle classes, with some enjoying it, and others detesting it. Then a majority of the higher classes don't watch the show. However, politicians will occasionally appear to be the same as the public by pretending to enjoy and care about it; I think we all remember the news of Gordon Brown being concerned for Susan Boyle's welfare in 2009, and phoning Simon Cowell to check how she was doing - you know, like everyone does…

Anyway, those people think they are morally superior to the human race, just by saying they watched a documentary on 'Yesterday' about the Nazi's, or claiming they read a book and filled their brain with cultural intellect instead of letting it stew in the output of baby-faced singers, back flips and dancing dogs. These people will proudly share this fact when anyone in earshot mentions the words 'Britain's' 'Got' and 'Talent', and then share one of the facts they learnt. Then, the other people sneer before continuing to discuss what their favourite moment was, before agreeing that the Dalek guy was 'pretty cool'.

So where do I stand amongst all this snobbery? Am I one of those who watches and enjoys the shows, or am I one of those people who watches a documentary about the railways on BBC 4? Well, I'm in the former category, and to me it doesn't share the same moral issues as shows such as Big Brother and I'm A Celebrity… Of course, there are many issues with the show, from both a moral and direction viewpoint, but I don't see why people hate it so much, and think they're any better than everyone else because they don't watch it. Fine, don't watch, that's a personal preference, but don't write off everyone who enjoys something you hate.

This pomposity has spread to almost every culture aspect in Britain, with music being a very good example. More specifically, there is often a war of words between the Belieber's and the Non-Belieber's (I hate myself for even knowing that word, let alone for writing it…). We live in a time where if someone even knows the title of a Justin Bieber, their entire being is dismissed and they are considered to be the worst thing Hitler. On Twitter and YouTube, people who love Justin are told they should die, and the people who hate Justin, are swarmed by the Justin lovers until they eventually suffocate under the heap of children on top of them, or are stabbed in the eye with a hair clip with the picture of Justin's face on it… I avoid all that gory mess.

Anyway, what advice do I give Cowell to improve his show? Well, not a great deal. Everyone who dislikes the show, will never like the show, so there's no point trying to appease them. However, he could appease me by just pointing one camera at the act for two minutes instead of cutting to different camera shot every 4 seconds. It's hard to see a dog dancing when they cut to a long-shot of the entire studio, rather than just what is happening on stage. Unfortunately, directors these days think that the audience get bored and switch off if the camera doesn’t keep cutting, quick enough to give an epileptic a fit… You see, even the people who work on the show are pompous and think the people who watch it are gormless morons...