I watch too much Channel 4

It's true, I rarely deviate from Channel 4. Although this evening I caught part two of John Prescott's documentary about class on BBC2 (probably the only other channel I bother with on terrestrial). He, in his jaguar (one of two as the Tabloids love to point out) travels around talking to people and asking them what class they think they're in. I missed the first part because I was on my way home from a lecture (because there is more to life than television). However, I probably didn't miss out on all that much.

This time he hung out with Jodie Marsh in an attempt to seek out and learn about the so-called 'Celebrity Class' - I'm not sure what, if anything, Prescott or us as an audience could have possibly learnt from that or any of the programme. As a result, I thought it was pretty bloody awful as a whole.

Class is obviously a highly complex issue, just last week in one of my seminars we ended up in a discussion questioning the determinants of class - the transition of classes and the idea of social mobility; that and the mobility of the very classification of class itself. It is no longer a labourer against a business owner. We are not a nation of distinct employment classifications, we suffer from a huge underclass, we suffer from a mid-range, of people who work the jobs of the so-called 'working class' yet might too be students, or recent graduates, who might have been brought up entirely middle class and yet might graduate into the benefits underclass.

The question of class first requires a distinction of how it is to be approached. Do we distinguish class person-to-person on a completely individual level. Where does family or 'class background' come in? Does it only apply when you are still living with or being supported by your family? Can you only have your individual class identity once you have cut the family cord. If a child grows and works its way out of a social class how will their class background affect them? Will they continue to impose that background and mere ghost of social class on their family?

I didn't read about the programme, or see any reviews for last week but my opinion on this second part is none more than a shrug. I didn't gain anything and frankly I found that in parts Prescott and the narrator's interpretation of what some of the children he spoke to were saying and thinking was completely off the mark. I, of course, might have misinterpreted, but the way I saw it when he was speaking to a group of school children who attended a fairly standard comprehensive school, who might consider themselves working class, either didn't see themselves that way or didn't apply class to themselves or others at all. Yet, Prescott's conclusion was that class was still, in part, holding them back from what they wanted. When did they say this?

It really didn't seem like they were of that opinion. I think it was merely to lead Prescott to a point he wanted to make about the way children get more opportunity going to private, paid-for schools. Of course the statistics are difficult to argue with and I won't doubt the programmes research that yes, a high percentage of individuals in top positions in this country were educated in private schools. Those schools and social connections are an undeniable element of the employment structure in this country. However, this does not prove or disprove individual ideas (or ideals) of class and the class system. Many of those people may too be men, but that's another debate entirely and one that is unlikely to be lead by John Prescott.

I am pretty unimpressed by a lack of interest in what could be an entirely separate class of immigrants. If class identity has an historical position in terms of family or even an extended family class identification then what are early generation immigrants? Are they a sub-underclass? Are they below those who are considered underclass merely because they are not strictly 'working'? Yet immigrants do work more often than not, unless their asylum-seeker status forces them otherwise, but they don't have the class history. If John Prescott is desperate to cling to his working class roots then a migrant worker must cling to their own. Perhaps they were part of a middle class in their original country can they not remain so? In spite of what work they may or may not undergo here?

I know that you can only raise so much in a couple of hour-long prime time documentaries. I can see that Prescott is a bit of a class puppet and has little more to say than Punch or Judy on the matter, not truly and comprehensively. You can't desperately struggle to maintain an archaic system of categorising that does not meet with the consciousness of the nation. There are classes, of course there are, there is no ignoring a clear and present segregation of people in many ways, and the programme went on and on about the transition from black/white to grey, but it is more, much more than this. One woman's opinion went quite ignored and I was astounded that she said, before making her point, something along the lines of: "This is a man's discussion" and that the others seemed to agree and thus ignore her. She said that class was a subjective and individual question and I'd be inclined to agree. The programme didn't even try to posit a new set of recognisable determinants. How could they if they ignored numerous factors.

The celebrity class as well was a completely pointless an unnecessary insert. Neither a class nor particularly relevant their social status is more interesting in their position as class idols. Perhaps their elevation in society is due to an existing cultural lower class? Would class be better defined culturally rather than economically? Of course economics do come into it and indeed appear to help create that cultural class; geography and the physical placement of people is again economic yet again, helps to create for an individual a set of cultural guidelines and norms through the surroundings.

My flatmate this evening asked, though wary of sounding snobby, why the chavs all look the same. One's identity, physical, outward or otherwise, is of course negotiated and formed by numerous factors. Surely class, as Prescott sees it as rather an important element of one's identity, has to be the same?

Politics on TV

Jamie Oliver doesn't really do it for me and it has been a while since I've watched one of his bothersome programmes. I cook for myself a lot of the time, try to eat well, yet he still manages to make me feel shit, in some way. There's never any sense of pride when watching Jamie, he just goads and goads. So, last night I watched Griff Rhys Jones getting angry on BBC2. I missed the first episode and I wonder perhaps, if I missed him getting really really enraged? Last night he was reflective, trying to hone his anger with boxing and the like (a little bit like the kids and that ex-con on The Wire).

On a personal level, it was great. It taught me that I'm not as angry as I think I am. I mean, I don't proper lash out at anyone (even though I think about it). I don't have the physical onslaught of anger, the 'seeing red', the boiling up inside. I think, actually, I only ever get angry at myself. I certainly have the insecurity problem of anger. However, I don't direct it at anyone. I'm acutely aware of my low self-esteem, the way I can change it, the things I should be doing, I just don't do it. I get frustrated at myself, I often vent and complain and whine but I'm pretty sure I don't actually get aggressive towards anyone else. Good one me.

Griff however, isn't like that. He gets pissed off, but then, I found it rather amusing and ridiculous when he talked about the way he got angry; the things he got angry about. So petty, for example - the problem with getting to GMTV (or whatever) for 7am only for Ben Fogle to be on the earlier slot and for him to be waiting around until after the news. His story at the group therapy session in LA about some director in a theatre production annoying him because he knew what he was doing, he'd done it before. It all seemed so pathetic. What is there to be annoyed about? He doesn't have to work, sure he probably wants to, and no doubt he works incredibly hard, but as he complained about not having the time for this and that I think: surely Griff, surely you can just quit something? I mean, there are people out there stressed out, on low wage who can barely keep up with daily expenses and children and problems and they are very much entitled to lash out. It's probably those exact people pictured on CCTV lashed and really aggressive. Where do they hone their anger? Except on the streets, on strangers, in booze.

Anger, I think, is culturally dependent. Depending as well, of course, on you as a person and your individual behaviour; whether you're passive aggressive or indeed simply aggressive. Those who are aggressive, I believe in this country are more likely to direct that aggression, as they've got the freedom to be, in some ways. I think, there are a lot of things that happen more in countries like ours because of the freedom and wealth that we have. Even if we're not all that wealthy. It's the notion that we expect so much yet do so little about it, I think, that makes us angry. We expect it all to happen and when it doesn't, when it's a bit hard, we get frustrated. I always go for this theory, with just about everything that is a bit wrong in this country but I do believe it plays a part.

I'd like to compare and contrast anger in different countries, different worlds. Has capitalism helped to make us angry? I wonder.

Jamie got angry, I saw that, because I did watch it in the end, albeit after reading G2 today. The article on class and food was really not a surprise and if anyone read it and was surprised then they obviously live in Jamie's bubble. It has clearly been an issue in all his crusades, in all these health freakouts and not to mention environmental ones. Organic this and that; why do you think all these guys are on Channel 4? People like me watch it; people with money (or parents with money) who have been taught to cook and know good recipes and delicious food and are willing to spend their money on it. Channel 4 is not there for those benefit folk from Rotherham, young mothers with no time or money. Those people that deserve to get angry but probably don't because they've got too many other things to worry about.

It's interesting how G2 referred to the programme as being an important comment on our culture because I'm pretty sure all the other programmes have alluded to the same issue; You Are What You Eat for one. Didn't that constantly demonstrate the type of people facing this food/class struggle?

It's funny, thinking we live in a classless society when clearly it's there in red, been there all along, it's on Wife Swap and all those other Channel 4 reality/documentary crossover shows. This is not new, this is simply giving the issue its worth.

Yet, I don't think it is enough. Aside from the part where the woman was crying about her debts Jamie did nothing to try and comprehend the real financial strain these people are under. Not just that, but time constraint. It's a real life problem and what the programme needs to do is focus on money, focus on the price of the food they are using and keep going for simpler, disgustingly simple ways to cook decent hearty food. I don't know the answer, if it was up to me I'd give them a slab of mackerel (ready to eat), a few fillets are less than £2 in Tesco but then that's not something kids would enjoy and goodness knows is probably still too expensive. How Jamie got them to buy salmon I don't know. He really should have been giving them something cheaper like Rainbow Trout to cook with. Even I don't buy salmon and I'm a big fan.

It's still brushing over it really, this is not the social food revolution, this is not the working class struggle. They were showing the good a little more than the bad, and no doubt they'll continue to show the good but then when the show is over it will all go back to normal. I just don't think it has the depth it ought to have.

I also think it could do a lot to show the rest of the working class - the immigrant class. The great majority of Jamie's pupils were white, partially because it was in Rotherham but partially, I think because there is a very different culture in many of our immigrant communities in this country. Whether working or middle class the relational culture is hugely related to food, having dinner together, cooking decent meals and passing that recipe on. Why is it such a white British issue? Why is the family so prevalent in other cultures but not the white British culture? Or at least not anymore.

I've been learning about individualist capitalist societies in the West in relation to relational Eastern ones; they are the growing success, they are emerging out of the economic crisis. Is that individualism part of every aspect of this culture? Including food and meal times? That's a scary thought, that even family has lost out to capitalism and its greed.

Pop Politics

When you watch Eastenders have you noticed that if they're watching televsion it is almost always a nature documentary? This was certainly true a few years ago and as far as I can tell it continues this way. The characters of the soap have no interest in anything that is genuinely occuring in the real world, yet, on Monday's episode there was a political undercurrent throughout the episode.

This Monday the Queen Vic re-opened after a (so-called) refurbishment and with it was required to remove it's ashtrays and disallow indoor smoking. Obviously, it makes sense to make a point of it, as though it were reality, as though the Queen Vic had to suffer as all pubs in England have. But bizarrely, it seemed to take up the entire episode and episodes which followed, Dot's frustration, the lack of customers, and Pat's little private book club cum illegal bar where smoking is permitted.

I, unfortunately, have not watched any other English soap opera to notice a difference, I caught a few episodes of Hollyoaks this week but not attentively and usually I sat down in the middle of it feeling pretty knackered after work. However, considering all the goings on I wonder if it was something merely mentioned in passing. I can't say I've really noticed any smokers in Hollyoaks, it seems as though they're all too beautiful and care far too much for their health, I'm sure avoiding the fags keeps their skin clear and glowing.

Another thing Eastenders slipped in, also on Monday was an extremely fleeting comment on Gordon Brown's replacing of Blair. A brief mid-conversation moment along the lines of: 'we all thought it would improve with Brown'. I found it utterly bizarre, oddly placed and somewhat uncalled for. I need to rfresh myself on any rules the BBC may have on political comment in their programming. I'm not sure what that statement was intended to say or how it was supposed to be recived by the audience. It may have been specifically to demonstrate the programme is occurring in absolute real time, that episode, of that day, is very much that episode of that day. Thus, commenting on an affair as important and as date-specific as that demonstrates the attempted realism of the soap without necessarily making any genuine political comment.

Yet, really, I don't understand why it was necessary and whether subtly it may have been a comment, a quick dig at Blair slipped in, or simply the BBC speaking on behalf of the everyday people, the average individual within the nation that we're happy with Brown, we didn't need an election and we don't care that he was the only person who had been seriously considered for the post. I think it would be absolutely apalling if it was acting as this spokesperson but it's interesting that it was mentioned.

Eastenders has been attacking some slightly diffifcult debates which are very much in tune with current affairs yet I've found their attacks less attacking and much more of a stroke, a flippant and unconsidered gesture which comes to no conclusion and does little to open up any kind of discourse on a subject. Look at their poor attempt at involving an Eastern Europen immigrant recently, a co-worker to Dot, a baby, a difficult situation. She, the caring individual, playing it comfortably on the left. Jim, bowled from the right, angered and apalled and ready to get her deported, back to where she belonged regardless of her suffering, regardless of what broght her to the country. I felt that in the end the story didn't last long enough, it got thrown away and i din't really understand what was done with the woman or her baby, not enough people were involved.

Now, we've got the Polish builders, disliked by many, though a form of amusement for others, I can't figure out what exactly the intention of the writers is. Am I suffering a cynicism that emerges from some sort of insitutionalised racism? Does it make sense to have Polish builders? Maybe we should mix it up a bit, you get all sorts of builders, from all sorts of places, I know, I've been working in an environment with builders for the past week.

It's funny because on the on ehand Eastenders can tackle the issues or simply try and present an accurate reality but equally, such as with the Polish people, it can feel oddly uncomfortable. But maybe it's because in actual fact it's a utopia of majority white, mixed class people living in East London. This is hardly the case, city bankers and market traders do not live on the same square, there is not only a token Asian or Black family, there are many more and they play a bigger role in the community, their culture, if thre is a dominant community, will be hugely influential on the types of shops and trading which exists in the area and I just don't believe Eastenders has any kind of true check on reality. So, I figure that's why I find myself unsure and uncomfortable when they try to pop a few pieces of our lives in, either pretend with your little white fantasy or stir it up as far as your imagination/observations will take you. I really thing the decision ought to be made because these bizarre political infusions are removing us from the real juice, like the family love affair between Stacey and the father/son pair Max and Bradley, oooh...