The Drug of a Nation

Think this post is about Cannabis? Nope. My views are my own and will be revealed come independence day... (although any users who know are welcome to post in the comments section...

Nope. This post is about Television. I was going over my television watching habits, since I've recently taken to playing enter sandman on Guitar during the 5:55pm repeat of Big Brother on E4. Then a bit of people are strange... Well... it entertains me at least.

But over the past two weeks, I've watched the entire series 3 of Battlestar Galactica, started Twin Peaks, watched my DVD boxsets of X-files (up to series 4) and the occasional program on Discovery.

Note very little Scottish there? I did as well, then ignored it.

Then I watched "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip". For some reason I caught a bit of river city. The difference between the two is appalling. I know one's a drama and the other is a soap opera, but our Scottish TV show is so amatuer in comparison that it's not just a disgrace, it's an insulting disgrace.

We CLEARLY have a great amount of talent of writers in Scotland. You only need to read Alistair Gray's Lanark, or James Kelman, or Des Dillon to know that.

Why is our television so insulting to our intelligences? Where the fuck did BBC Scotland get the idea that it's viewers gave a rats arse about Roisin or Shellsuit Bob? Where is the intelligence, the irony, the brilliance that we're capable of?

Scottish Television output is shit. Absolute rubbish. It's not even intelligent for Kids. In America you get intelligent entertainment. HERE you get failed actors pretending they're teachers to pre-schools. We get forcefed rubbish and rigged gameshows, inane and pathetic soap operas which (if they were real) we'd all sell up and fuck off somewhere better.

I'm not even going to indulge Nationalist fantasies of a "Scottish" Channel, because brothers and sisters, that's not going to solve the problem. If all you're going to put on it is River City repeats and a film of how the Wasp Factory got on when it was on at the Kings then it's a waste of time, money and creative time.

This is one of those occasions when negativity is a GOOD thing. We need to tell our broadcasters that their output is shit. We need to vote with our feet and find something better to do. Instead of watching River City, support musical artists by going online and buying Trybe or Albannach. Instead of watching Heather Simpson purr all over John Smeaton email them and tell them that either she shags him on television or they start reporting WORLD NEWS from a Scottish context.

Go along to the Edinburgh Festival, and beside all the English on holiday, you'll find lots of Scottish Talent. If you see someone good, why not email BBC Scotland or STV and ask why THEY'RE not on television, and why they insist on boring the rest of us with all this Glasgow Vaudville SHITE.

The tragic thing, the really really horrendus problem we have, is that TV executives aren't showing what talent we have. Iain Banks has a plethora of brilliant novels that could be televised.

Imagine having the talent in a country and not being able to use it. We're living in it. Don't WATCH River City. Learn to HATE River City and all that it represents.