Crufts coverage, why so patronising?

[Laptoplapdoglaptray]

Don’t get me wrong, as a huge dog lover, I’m very grateful that I can watch coverage of Crufts on terrestrial tv! I’ve really enjoyed the showing rounds and observing the huge variety of breeds in one place.

And I understand the technical challenges of covering such a vast noisy event as this featuring live animals.

However, why does Channel 4 insist on speaking down to viewers as if we are all idiots? Honestly it’s like watching children’s tv but worse! It totally ruins the programme and makes it so tiresome.

Clare Balding is as professional as ever but Claudia Winkleman, who I like in other things, is playing the role of “ignorant bystander” and honestly it’s painful. I thought she was going to kneel before a male judge at one point she was being so falsely ingratiating!

The veterinary sections, most of the interviews with owners, the links with the former Blue Peter presenter, are so cringingly patronising, it’s embarrassing.

I get it Channel 4, you want to get away from tweedy traditional country folk wearing loden green and emphasise that dog ownership can be all things for all people, and that’s all good, but please don’t throw the baby out with the bath water in the process! You do have quite a knowledgeable audience watching too!

I tend to watch the show results come in on fossedata as I have an interest in a specific breed. I find the coverage tedious too.

why are you posting about something that happened 25 years ago. that even at the time was acknowledged as an isolated incident that had already been dealt with and changed made to ensure it didn't happen again?

We back to never allowing people to learn and grow and move past mistakes made as young people?

Not where cruelty to dogs is concerned.

Hope no one minds me asking; can we be aware please that some people haven’t seen the final judging yet if they are watching on catch up, so would appreciate no spoilers please.

one would suggest they don't read threads on crufts, and avoid all the radio and news channels because it's already all over the news, the internet, and social media.

Watch the LIVE coverage on YouTube. I've been attending Crufts for over 30 years and not watched it on the TV ever since they started a YouTube channel. None of the infantilizing presenters and time filling crap.

This is a thread about the coverage though.

I don’t think it’s an unreasonable request until everyone has had the chance to catch up tomorrow.

This is a great suggestion, thank you very much!

I will know what to do next year!

I’m normally a big fan of Claudia - but actually I didn’t think she was at her strongest here.

also having met Elllie Simmonds professionally, I really did not warm to her at all

Clare is just so Crufts

I SO agree about ‘Who Do You Think You Are’. I really want to understand HOW they make their discoveries!

fed up with her being on everything. Everything is ‘amazing’, phenomenal’ etc, so so false.

I went off her when she and Amanda H were talking about French kissing their dogs. 🤮
Also (this was CB) dogs dont have genders, they have sexes. We wont melt if you say sex.

We actually did watch lots of it last night with the sound off as Claudia was so bloody irritating
I liked Ellie and Claire - they were fine. But did we really need a montage of all the inane Claudia clips? She was great on Strictly but this is not a good fit for her.

I thought if they want a celebrity how about Miranda Hart? Not to be funny but at least she'd be good at chatting with people

I watched the bits I wanted to see on Crufts YouTube channel. Brilliant, no celebs, no irritating waffle, just knowledgeable commentators talking about the events and the dogs. It's all still there if you want to catch up. I gave up when Angela Rippon did it and spent her time gushing and going on about lucky socks. It's as if people who love dogs have had their brains removed and have to be treated like backward children. Grrrr!!!!

I'm not really a dog person but always watch the last evening of Crufts and watched the afternoon session yesterday too. I was cringing at Claudia, she is a superb presenter on some shows but acting like an excitable child in a sweet shop at Crufts. I don't want it to be all totally serious, and it should be accessible viewing for non dog people like me, I like all the background stuff about the breeds etc but it is not a lightweight reality show either.

On another note, it’s interesting to see Claudia pop up on various shows. She has a chat show lined up as well. However, there’s zero sign of Tess.

Very much agree! Claudia seemed to lurch in to the saccharine Davina McCall school of presentation yesterday. Hoping to fake charm people in to submission! 😬

Sorry, that was a bit harsh! There is every chance that they are decent people off screen! I am sure the the job is a lot harder than it appears. And
I admit to being in a very bad mood today.

All of the tedium about wanting to marry dogs and take them home though. OK said once as a joke in passing. Really tedious when it continued.

I sound like a right old grump again but I expect Chelsea Flower show will be the same. Just as with the history programmes PPS have pointed out, the tv coverage will focus on all of the gimmicks and celebrity attendees and people gushing over the receipt of medals while managing to ignore huge tracts of expert horticulture on display.

It’s the arrogance of assuming that the tv audience knows so little that they have to be constantly talked down to and patronised that makes me so cross!

Thank you for seconding You Tube FizzingAda. Specialist streaming is definitely the way to go in future I think.

It’s a shame though! Why cover a major event like this and turn it in to a pantomime? Wimbledon is going the same way.

What I like about Clare Balding is she manages to pack enough serious stuff in there to balance out the rest.

I’m really surprised that people enjoyed Clare’s presenting - I found it really annoying to watch her, she doesn’t seem to have any ability to connect with the people who she is interviewing! The one interview with the guy who pointed out she had interviewed him before was painful!

^ This. Annoyed me no end. We watch it every year but tuned out this year. I generally like Claudia as a presenter but she sounded like a teenage girl all the way through and added nothing.

I came on to start a thread to moan about the same thing. I had to turn off Crufts because I found it so cringeworthy. The whole thing with Claudia and Ellie made my toes curl.

I’m starting to feel all TV (and radio) is like watching kids tv that days

I admit to being biaised because I like CB, but to be fair, some of the dog owners were not the easiest subjects to interview!

Take the winner’s owner for example 😬

I don’t mind Claudia in small doses but she overdoes the faux ingenue stuff. That heelwork section when we were trying to show the dog’s performance was all about cutting to Claudia, that was a really poor decision by the production staff. So it was less about the dogs and more about Claudia in a show that was meant to be about the former. I love dogs, and I can be a bit gushy about them, but not if I was being paid to be a professional tv presenter. I am not a fan of Balding but she is always a consummate professional.

Someone mentioned Tess Daly upthread. She recently woodenly presented The One Show with Vernon Kay. The press say she is in the running to do This Morning, but I think it was a tryout for them to do the One Show permanently. Apparently Alex Jones is the one they want for SCD but if she takes it she will probably not do The One Show. Vernon has also had a charisma bypass like his wife.

Tess doesn’t have a famous mother.

Christ. I have just googled that and had no idea!

This is Claud in her ‘I know nothing, educate me’ mode. She may well calm down when she’s found her feet. And the camera panning to her all the time is someone else’s call.
But she does have fun.