The latest series of Celebrity Big Brother is being heralded as, the most exciting yet! Having not watched any kind of BB for years, even I have been dragged into watching every episode. Not only this I am enjoying/ have become slightly addicted to it. As I waited last night to catch up on the latest slanging match between Perez Hilton and nearly everyone else it struck me why this is. It is a quick and easy direction to focus any sadistic and masochistic tendencies I have.
In general we are not a society that enjoy kicking people when they are down in person. But as soon as you film a house full of those that mainly spend their time flaunting themselves in front of our eyes and are clearly financially lacking, the public love it. If you strip CBB down to its basic format, it becomes quite depressing. The housemates are for the majority a product of the world we live in, in which any old Tom, Dick or Cami can have a camera pointed at them and be led to believe they are famous. Then as they consider this to be their job they need to keep financing their lives in this way. So what other explanation can there be for the increased viewing figures compared to the last series apart from a rising mass of sadism towards the 'celebrities'. We are now used to and have almost accepted that 'reality star' is a job title, but watching them stuck in a house, being more ground down as the days go on, it is feeding anyone's sadistic side in feeling that they are almost working for their money.
The masochistic tendency for me comes into play particularly when I realise I am actually voluntarily spending my time listening to anything Katie Hopkins says. As a rule I try to avoid this as I have not yet found one point I agree with her on. Within the house of such a varied bunch of self-publicists, every viewer (well those that express their opinions on Twitter) have their own Katie Hopkins, a housemate who fundamentally puts their teeth on edge. Deriving any sort of pleasure from watching people that you had previously viewed negatively, is a definite form of masochism. However Hopkins appears in the house, no matter how many times she cries because compliments are the 'most hated woman' in Britain's kryptonite or how much she stands up to Perez's attention seeking ways, my opinion of her will not change. She has made her money from being nasty and negative and so to change her whole public persona when she comes out of the Big Brother prison would be ridiculous. So why do I and thousands of other viewers continue to put ourselves through this?
Of course with all my scepticism the obvious answer would be to stop watching, but the fact is I know that I am now hooked until the end. Now I will just be wiser in the knowledge of why we, the viewers of CBB do this to ourselves. As the hype around 50 Shades of Grey has died down and the surge of people buying whips and handcuffs has subsided, CBB has stepped in to a public S&M void. The bonus is, it's S&M you can enjoy in pjs and a huge dressing gown with a cup of tea.