I Blame Jeremy Kyle

I Blame Jeremy Kyle

Did you see “Pramface Babies” on Channel 4 last night? I was forced to miss Ashes To Ashes for this wonderful piece of ….well, it was hardly the epitome of investigative journalism or of drama-documentary; it was hardly the new “Cathy Come Home”. 

“Pramface” is a derogatory term used to refer to underage or young mothers on council estates. See the Urban Dictionary for some more “colourful” explanations. I have seen many a Pramface mom in my time in the Civic Centre of Shameless (see earlier postings). They are hardly inspiring role models for their children. Body-pierced, bleached, tattooed, blue veined, teenage girls pushing and dragging multi-coloured and multi-parented (“parented” is a bit of a misnomer of course – I mean that the children have different sires). They are uneducated, out of work, and foul mouthed. The fathers are, well, elsewhere. 

I read one article about the programme referring to the girls as being from a “working class” background. No they are not! “Working class” refers to a class that works. As my wise and wonderful better half, C, informed me, you are working class if your parent (for it could be either or both of mom and dad) came home from work dirty. Labourers, miners, factory workers and the like. But, there was little evidence of jobs amongst this little gaggle or their “partners”. Although, I notice that they were all able to afford state-of-the-art mobile phones. 

At least we seem to have lost the “Jason and Kylie” generation. Instead, we seem to have developed a fashion for two-syllable names, spelt phonetically. The girls in question were named “Laura”, “Linzi”, “Kerrie” and “Krista” and their “partners” included “Andy” and “Terry”. 

We never actually saw Terry. He was AWOL. Probably wetting the baby’s head with a two-litre bottle of cider and a spliff or a line or two somewhere. Or, maybe getting the baby’s name tattooed on his forehead. We did, however, get a brief insight into the caring nature of Terry with the introduction of the Christmas present that he had given to Laura – an American bulldog (nice) called “Gucci”  (aspirational at least) who was happily nesting in the baby’s carry cot. Charming. 

We did meet Linzi’s other half, Andy, who was described as being a “terrific dad”. Andy lives with his mom. Terrific. In fact, this was to be Linzi’s second child by Andy. Like the first it was “unexpected”. Unexpected? Well at least they didn’t use the term “accident” or “unplanned” but how on earth could it have been unexpected. Did they miss the pretty obvious lesson in biology of the first baby that they made! Indeed, I thought that it was not without a little irony that this programme was immediately followed by “Big Bang Theory”…..on so many levels. 

What is our society coming to? I blame Jeremy Kyle. Judge Alan Berg once described The Jeremy Kyle Show as trash which existed to “titillate bored members of the public with nothing better to do”. He went on to say “It seems to me that the purpose of this show is to effect a morbid and depressing display of dysfunctional people whose lives are in turmoil.” and added that it was “human bear-baiting”. 

These kids seem to have nothing better to do than stay at home (provided for by the state); spend their benefit on drink, smokes, and drugs; and, shag. They aspire only to have their problems resolved in full public glare on Jeremy Kyle or Trisha; the deluded aspire to become famous on X Factor or Big Brother Uncut. Maybe we should consider shutting down daytime TV, limiting the payment of child benefit to the first two kids, and making parenting classes compulsory. 

Rant over…..for now.