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Did anyone see this pile of shite last night?

The premise it take 6 ordinary Australians and do a "social experiment" by making them boat people, but in reverse.
What it actually turned out to be was a game show styled punishment for a group of racists and a token bleeding heart.

The host of the show took their belongings, ID's and passports as if he was one of these smugglers. They were to be sent to unknown locations for each segment of the program, starting domestic and getting progressively further abroad.

The worst of them was an unemployed girl in her early 20's who lived with her boyfriend and their thirteen pit bull's in the western suburbs of Sydney (well known for it's population of racist bogans). She professed ON NATIONAL TELEVISION that she didn't like Africans, because of the colour of their skin and way they looked. This was revealed in the opening sequence of the program.

They were spit into two groups and went to different towns where Refugees had settled or were being processed.
One group went and stayed with a family from the African continent. Where they learned the woes of their hosts.
The young girl spouted "Yeah this family seem nice, but they're not all like that. I'm still not gonna make friends with Africans" while an older lady said "These are lovely people, they're the true refugees, but them boat people, they're not legit".

The other group was sent to a detention centre and they met some Iraqui refugees, who told their stories.
Even after this experiences, one of the guys remained unconvinced.

After the visits, they were all to board a "junk" to be taken to an undisclosed location. All the while the host was as smug as could be. He was really enjoying torturing these people.

A couple of hours into the journey, tempers flared, and the two worst racists had a spat complete with the C word and a stack of F bombs in the space of 30 seconds. No whit is an indicator of the intelligence of the participants. Swearing and carrying on like a prat with a CAMERA in your face, you think that it's not to be shown on the TV?
This is the sort of stuff that will haunt them for a long time. It's all pretty embarrassing in my opinion.

Part way through the journey, the boat "sprung a leak" while they were sleeping.
This felt staged, right off the bat. The captain couldn't find the source of the leak, but nobody noticed that the boat didn't seem to have sunk much considering that the lower deck was swamped with water. Oh and then there was an engine fire too.
They bailed all night until the coast guard came.

Guess who was on board?
That's right, the host of the show.

He "revealed" to these people that it was a fully seaworthy vessel and that the leak and fire were fake.
A couple of the participants were shocked and indignant.

Come on, it's like signing a release for a show called Bullshit and expecting not to be ridiculed!

The "experiment" is a joke, run by a guy who I suspect wants to punish racist idiots. He certainly seems to be enjoying himself, while they all squirm with the things he's doing to provoke a reaction.

It's poorly made and deliberately inflammatory. Not journalism, but just another reality television show.

Sounds like every other show on American television. I'm sorry we've infected your country. Was there a lesson learned of some kind by the end of it?

Didn't watch it, but I enjoyed your write-up.

Thanks Moloch,

IT's totally not worth watching.
But it does serve as source material for our bogan hunt from last week :D

It's getting rave reviews everywhere you'd expect, but without having seen it, it really seems like an opportunity for people who hate bogans to have their prejudices confirmed, and for bogans to be totally unaware of some show on SBS (that's our 'multicultural network', for those overseas).

Quote from: JuniorSpaceman on June 23, 2011, 04:57:21 AM
It's getting rave reviews everywhere you'd expect, but without having seen it, it really seems like an opportunity for people who hate bogans to have their prejudices confirmed, and for bogans to be totally unaware of some show on SBS (that's our 'multicultural network', for those overseas).

The whole production stinks of a sham.

Not all of the reviews are glowing :)

My objection is not with refugees, but with the horrible biased an manipulative way this production was put together.
Back in the early part of this century, I worked for a company that processed the refugees legal stuff for DIMIA.
They had to be vetted carefully, as in with the innocents, were crooks and people connected with terrorist organisations.

I was also on Xmas Island after the Children Overboard debacle. I visited the detention center. The people at that time were my age (22) or younger. None of them seemed anything other than average human beings. Human beings who have been through a lot of shit. This show does them a great disservice.

Regarding the issue at hand.

I'm buggered if I know what the solution is.
Empathy vs Pragmatism.

http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/you-call-this-evenhanded-refugee-series-is-strictly-for-the-gullible-20110622-1gfav.html

QuoteOne of the most passionate and enduring debates in this country has been built on a falsity, a false choice that is being carefully recrafted, repackaged and re-presented on SBS this week, at taxpayer expense.

A comment that sums up the falsity at the centre of this debate and the three-part series Go Back to where You Came From came from one of the six manipulated participants in the show, Darren Hassan, who complained that the group was being subjected to enforced empathy.

He had seen the loaded dice at the centre of the progressive argument about boat people: that if you believe in stopping the small number of asylum seekers who arrive by boat, you are lacking in empathy, lacking in compassion, and probably anti-Muslim.

Quoten the first part, on Tuesday night, the unseen narrator said the participants had just ''survived a sinking, burning boat''. In fact it was an obvious charade.
We were told that ''at the last minute, the stricken boat is spotted''. Again, only for the gullible. The rescue was as false as the emergency.

QuoteNone of these basic questions were seriously addressed by the producers in their opening salvo. They had carefully sifted through 500 people before selecting the six for the program, and carefully chosen the refugees the participants would visit in Australia. But it would have been possible to randomly select six Australians, take them to a refugee camp, or to a newly arrived refugee's home, and see a ramp-up in empathy in most cases. This series is about something else.

QuoteThis new series has real people in real places, but it remains an exercise in manipulation for everyone involved.