I’m inclined to think that what we’re seeing is a mixture of racism, stupidity, xenophobia and class conflict, rather than simple deliberate, conscious, outright racism. It’s worth noting that we haven’t heard a racist peep from the racist contingent directed at Jermaine Jackson—he’s not perceived as ‘foreign’ because his accent is American, and the three women have felt no discomfort about the class gulf between them, because, unlike Shilpa, he doesn’t treat them like uppity servants.

Germaine Greer nails it, I think, in today’s Guardian:

The problem is that most of the housemates are too dim to convey what a pain in the ass Shilpa is without appearing to persecute her.

Not that I’m defending Jade Goody, Jo S Club and the Scouse one—the latter two in particular have made some pretty grisly comments—I just think that the issue is perhaps a little more complex than ‘OMG! They’re total racists!’.

Interesting, too, to compare this scandal to the first time Big Brother contestants, and the viewing public, faced accusations of racism. Back then, it was over Jade Goody, who is mixed race, and her ‘piggy’ nose.

Update, the next day:

Last night’s episode made great viewing.

Channel Four and Endemol covered their backs by including a segment in which Danielle Whatsit was confronted in the diary room about her opinion that Shilpa should ‘go back home’. Bizarrely, she seemed unaware that she’d been caught making a stock racist statement, instead dwelling on the unconscionable awfulness of suggesting that someone should leave the Big Brother house.

Jade’s spat with Shilpa was pretty ugly, but in the aftermath, it was clear that Jade couldn’t give a toss that her nemesis is Indian, homing in on the fact that Shilpa had said she needed elocution lessons, and that she looks down on her for being working class, and accidentally rather than deservedly famous. Jade also, with unusual eloquence, suggested that Shilpa should consider the position of her fanbase before she turns on people for being poor (formerly, in Jade’s case) and uneducated. Jo S Club’s ‘[Shilpa] can’t even speak English herself’ remark did rather make me wonder, though.

So, where does that leave us? Danielle Whatsit is a dim bulb, and a nasty little playground bitch, but unaware of how her comments will be perceived; Jade Goody is not nearly as thick as she appears, realises that a prolonged bout of bellowing will net her screentime, and has, understandably, a hefty chip on her shoulder about mockery from snooty, educated, middle-class people for her lack of education and, to quote Shilpa, ‘gutter’ ways. When it comes to the last, and least, member of the coven, I’m inclined to think that Jo S Club is just a racist little gobshite.

Photo by STML

You’ll have to watch Eastenders in the coming months to find out, but, believe you me, the answer is a hairpin culturebend.

Consider the alternatives: a not wholly unpleasant, well-dressed and handsome young man, a not wholly unpleasant, vaguely pretty young woman with learning difficulties, a sad, alarmingly unfunny old man, some lad from a novelty hip-hop act and a woman who appears to have had her personality surgically removed in exchange for a grisly pair of tits.

Then, consider Pete Burns: a post-human vision of beauty and terror, a living sculpture, inarguably the greatest living Englishman.

Update: A sad day indeed, but I suppose that Pete Burns was doomed to fail, too beautiful to be accepted by a jealous public. And it is at least some consolation that that public found it in their hearts to award the prize to a poor, brave retarded child.

Four jobs I’ve had:

1. Freelance music journalist.
2. Freelance art journalist.
3. Freelance technology journalist.
4. Freelance whatever-else-they’ll-pay-me-to-write-about journalist.

Four films I can watch repeatedly:

1. The Red Shoes
2. Grey Gardens
3. Orlando
4. Uncle Buck (Can as in ‘am capable of’. Long story.)

Four places I’ve lived:

1. Noctorum Lane
2. Croft Drive
3. Park Circus
4. University Avenue

Four television programmes I like to watch:

1. Deal Or No Deal
2. Curb Your Enthusiasm
3. Channel 4 News
4. Coronation Street (Though my heart belongs to Brookside.)

Four places I’ve been to on holiday:

1. Budapest
2. Zagreb
3. Stockholm
4. St. Jean D’Angely

Four of my favourite dishes:

1. Confit du canard with potatoes fried in duck fat.
2. A full Scottish breakfast. (Not English, I need potato scone and white pudding in the mix.)
3. Eggy bread.
4. Bone marrow on toast.

Four websites I visit daily:

1. Metafilter
2. Wikipedia
3. Flickr
4. A wonderful site I am not allowed to name, let alone link to.

Four places I would rather be right now:

1. Zagreb
2. A city in Eastern Europe, Central Europe or Scandinavia that I haven’t been to before.
3. At a Prince gig. (Before 1989.)
4. The future.

Four bloggers I am tagging (sorry chaps!):

1. General Ape
2. Sister Phonetica
3. Donny Hide
4. Rob Annable

Thanks, Matt, for tagging me.

At last, something to fill the gaping void in the comedy schedules left by Little Britain: I Am Not An Animal. Written and directed by Peter Baynham (who has has a hand in almost everything funny on the television since 1995) and voiced by Simon Pegg, Julia Davis and Steve Coogan, it tells the story of a troupe of talking animals.

Bio-engineered in a sinister vivisection lab, the poor loves are doomed to live a life of loft-apartment luxury, with Heat magazine as their cultural barometer and an endless supply of Chianti fuelling dreams of visiting London. By the close of the opening episode, the gang have been freed by bungling animal rights vigilantes, left to find their way in the world.

As you might expect from a long-standing Chris Morris collaborator, the humour veers between sledgehammer bum-gags - two ‘My poo smells of sugar puffs’ scenes in one episode - and tickly little feather-duster subtleties, as in the titular nod to The Elephant Man.

The characters are wonderful, too. There’s Philip, a pompous intellectual horse, with endless gadgets allowing him to live the humanoid life. And Mark - my fave - the closet case sparrow with designs on the pop charts and an obsession with shoe trees. And a slutty self-styled femme fatale bulldog bitch, Winona, who has a crush on ‘the actor Tim Robbins.’

God, it’s just fabulous. View a short clip, right here.