Page 5 | To think reality shows of the early 2000s have not aged well! Doing a rewatch

Imcomingovertoyourplace · 2025-05-30T07:35:13+00:00

So far I’ve watched Playing it Straight (the homophobia is rife!) Fat Families (just horrific, ‘lard busting’ and shaming overweight kids) Big Fat Gypsy Weddings (did the producers never want to intervene with what is essentially child abuse?)

MyUmberSeal · 30/05/2025 15:03

AnAlpacaForChristmasPleaseSanta · 30/05/2025 15:01

I think Kinga and the wine bottle signalled the end of BBs innocent days.

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🤣😂, forgot about that, along with Makosi and Anthony shagging in the pool 🤦‍♀️🤣.

Disturbia81 · 30/05/2025 15:02

ThatCyanCat · 30/05/2025 14:37

I wish that dress over trousers thing would come back. It was great for my short fat legs. I always thought it looked like a Western version of the shalwar kameez, which I think is beautiful.

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Wear it! We only live once

AnAlpacaForChristmasPleaseSanta · 30/05/2025 15:01

AlecTrevelyan006 · 30/05/2025 13:57

The first series of Big Brother was fascinating and brilliant tv. Series was 2 was also quite good, then it started to go rapidly downhill once people saw it as an 'easy' route to fame.

I think Kinga and the wine bottle signalled the end of BBs innocent days.

AnAlpacaForChristmasPleaseSanta · 30/05/2025 14:58

One guilty pleasure reality TV show that I did like back in the day was Brat Camp, where a bunch of spoilt teenagers were sent to a cattle ranch in Utah and removed of all privileges, mobile phones and the like and had to learn new skills and discipline.

Mostly underneath the attitude they were good kids who'd been thoroughly overindulged by their parents but I do remember one girls horror at being rostered to wash up after dinner because at home they employed someone to do that for them 🤣.

AnAlpacaForChristmasPleaseSanta · 30/05/2025 14:52

@Daybrake Yes that's the one. He gave an incredible speech to his year group just before they left school forever that had me in pieces. I didn't know that he'd gone onto become a teacher himself, that's lovely.

wwyd2021medicine · 30/05/2025 14:40

Was 'The Biggest Loser' around that time?
I can't imagine that being made nowadays.
I used to cry sometimes at their stories.

ThatCyanCat · 30/05/2025 14:37

DaxieTaxi · 30/05/2025 14:08

Yes! And do you remember that weird ‘wrap dress over wide leg trousers’ style they also forced on just about everyone? It was hard to watch at times, women in floods of tears because they were just so forceful.

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I wish that dress over trousers thing would come back. It was great for my short fat legs. I always thought it looked like a Western version of the shalwar kameez, which I think is beautiful.

WitchHag · 30/05/2025 14:37

ladyamy · 30/05/2025 12:22

Do you not mean bearded lady?

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Yep, I did!

Get snooty, and immediately make a tit of yourself…..this is the way of things :)

Disturbia81 · 30/05/2025 14:26

blacksantanapkin · 30/05/2025 13:35

haha I was too young to watch Big Brother was that series but somehow knew of ‘nasty nick’ and that he was evil and did terrible things. I heard him mentioned years and years later and it occurred to me that I didn’t actually know what the evil things were, looked him up and was like ‘is that it 🫤’

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Yeah it was made into a huge deal, it was fascinating to see how small things become huge when your world is reduced to that, how people can form a mob against an ‘enemy’ etc

DaxieTaxi · 30/05/2025 14:08

dayslikethese1 · 30/05/2025 09:23

Trinny and Susana always dressed everyone exactly the same, it was always a long tan coat and bootcut trousers, oh and a heel of course because the participants/victims had to look 'feminine'😁

Yes! And do you remember that weird ‘wrap dress over wide leg trousers’ style they also forced on just about everyone? It was hard to watch at times, women in floods of tears because they were just so forceful.

AlecTrevelyan006 · 30/05/2025 13:57

The first series of Big Brother was fascinating and brilliant tv. Series was 2 was also quite good, then it started to go rapidly downhill once people saw it as an 'easy' route to fame.

legsekeven · 30/05/2025 13:53

BemusedBrenda · 30/05/2025 13:38

I remember one episode of Secret Eaters where a man was eating double cream on his cereal every day. He genuinely didn't realise it had more calories than milk and thought it was a healthy choice. He was pretty devastated by the revelation - probably one of the only really useful interventions on the show!

And the woman who ate salad for every meal but added half a jar of mayonnaise to each one. They told her she was having more calories then if she had eaten a full curry. She absolutely would not accept it

Original poster

Imcomingovertoyourplace · 30/05/2025 13:50

@MyUmberSealand the plus size models who were about a size 10

OP posts:

MyUmberSeal · 30/05/2025 13:46

AliceDownTheRabbitHole · 30/05/2025 13:39

America's Next Top Model is wild! Tyra is kind of a bitch 😂

I absolutely loved that show. Tyra was a brute with the contestants, but that’s what made it so bloody good 🤣.

whynotwhatknot · 30/05/2025 13:41

Slatterndisgrace · 30/05/2025 12:43

Death of a Reality Star. Just found it. It can be watched on Channel 4 online.

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yep very sad

AliceDownTheRabbitHole · 30/05/2025 13:39

America's Next Top Model is wild! Tyra is kind of a bitch 😂

BemusedBrenda · 30/05/2025 13:38

I remember one episode of Secret Eaters where a man was eating double cream on his cereal every day. He genuinely didn't realise it had more calories than milk and thought it was a healthy choice. He was pretty devastated by the revelation - probably one of the only really useful interventions on the show!

blacksantanapkin · 30/05/2025 13:35

AnAlpacaForChristmasPleaseSanta · 30/05/2025 10:07

The first one was brilliant. All the controversy over Nasty Nick, which essentially boiled down to the fact a man had smuggled a pencil in 🤣.

I found one and two genuinely fascinating viewing. But the fourth or fifth series the contestants were openly admitting they were going in to get a showmance and a magazine deal and I stopped watching as it was no longer interesting to me.

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haha I was too young to watch Big Brother was that series but somehow knew of ‘nasty nick’ and that he was evil and did terrible things. I heard him mentioned years and years later and it occurred to me that I didn’t actually know what the evil things were, looked him up and was like ‘is that it 🫤’

KrisAkabusi · 30/05/2025 13:26

BoredZelda · 30/05/2025 10:45

She was a “nutritionist” whatever that means!

She pretended she was a doctor by saying she had a PHD from some bogus US “College of Nutrition” which has no accreditation and didn’t actually check the credentials of people applying. Ben Goldacre, who wrote “Bad Science” (fabulous book) managed to register his cat with the same qualifications.

Unsurprisingly, she went on to peddle covid and vaccine misinformation. She is a hideous woman!

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I was going to mention that. One of the great article beginnings ever:

"Gillian McKeith, or to give her full medical title, Gillian McKeith, . . . "

BoudiccaRuled · 30/05/2025 13:16

MyHeartyCoralSnail · 30/05/2025 12:36

Tbh nothing “ages well” if we look at it through the lens of today. Views, morals, language, humour, beliefs change over time. Humans have this tendency to believe that their current way of the world is the correct one. But in the future people will look back on today with the same kind of horror. People in the past would probably laugh at us tapping into our phones, talking to friends via social media media, getting preoccupied with happenings half way round the world that’s got nothing to do with us. They’d laugh at us injecting poisons into our face. Getting on tin cans to get from a to b. The about of time we stare at boxes with flashing lights.

Separately reality tv is shit, always has been shit and watched by the brainless.

Many people watching it today would have the exact same reactions, it's just the official, broadcastable opinions that have changed. Travellers, professional benefits claimants, very camp gays - still being judged by many, just not out loud in public.
Love Island cones across as even more morally dubious, but I'm probably just a prude.

StellaAndCrow · 30/05/2025 13:09

StellaAndCrow · 30/05/2025 13:07

I thought they'd removed all trace of it, but turns out it's on YouTube!

1

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- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music that you love, upload original content and share it all with friends, family and the world on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9i3O33KeG5g

Allaboutmememe · 30/05/2025 13:08

Most shows were just fake with paid actors or just randoms that would take part for a bit of cash.
Scam city / gypsy weddings / freaky eaters/ you are what you eat was some and many many more.

StellaAndCrow · 30/05/2025 13:07

Disturbia81 · 30/05/2025 12:26

I need to watch this 😂

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I thought they'd removed all trace of it, but turns out it's on YouTube!

1

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music that you love, upload original content and share it all with friends, family and the world on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?index=1&list=PLAgjUkCrumNJCMFB0VGizdfF6Iq9Ki-kL&v=9i3O33KeG5g

StepawayfromtheLindors · 30/05/2025 13:05

JudgeJ · 30/05/2025 09:37

Maybe those places don't have problem schools or families and are so perfect???

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I think it’s because the production execs themselves live in these counties. The premise of this series is that Yorkshire or Essex or Liverpool or wherever need “educating”. By omission from the series, other counties don’t.

Dated, regressive, negative stereotyping of different parts of the UK.

Puzzledandpissedoff · 30/05/2025 12:57

sashh · 30/05/2025 12:34

Was that 'Faking it'.

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It was, yes sashh - we identified it upthread and I added one of my favourites