[south12345]

Originally Posted by DanaC

Sam didn't win because he's deaf. He didn't win because it's fixed. he won, imo, because a large percentage of the viewers want to see old style BB: a social experiment in which ordinary people are placed in an extraordinary situation.

Much as I loved Dex and Gina (and i really did) they were manufactured personalities. If anything, the production team was pushing them for the win (who got the air time?).

The 'real' people in there were Sam, Callum, Sophie, the twins, Dan and at a push Wolfy.

Charlie was raised by a showbiz mum, Dex is a self-created mystery, Gina is a fabrication of someone who wants to be famous, Sallie and Hazel both models, and Jemima self confessed gold digger/cougar. All six of these housemates had been in the papers or the entertainment industry before they ever went near the BB process.

This was the first series in a long time that I have watched from start to finish. Mainly because for the first time in a long time there seemed to be people in there who fitted the original criteria.

As much as I enjoy watching 'characters' (and I do!) I'm more interested in seeing how ordinary people cope in the BB house. We have Celebrity Big Brother to see how z-listers and others familiar with the entertainment world cope with the privations of the house. The regular show needs more of the ordinary to distinguish it.

People keep saying that a) Sam did nothing - yet most of the housemates seemed to think he was fun. So he lay in bed for half the morning: that still leaves a bunch of hours of everyday doing and saying things which we didn't see. The production team was more interested in showing the big characters. So all we can really say about Sam's apparent dullness, is that we weren't shown very much of him. And they say that b) his aggressive sexism wasn't shown...yet he displayed nowhere near the misogyny that the people's prince, Dexter displayed. 'Show us your gash for free pie and mash' is coarse, but it's wordplay, which is what most of his jokes consist of. He's clearly fascinated by wordplay humour. I found that far less sexist than Dexter's VT in which he objectified women in the most unpleasant terms. Real or fake, that he thought that was an acceptable image to strive for is very telling. Likewise, Sam's attempts to flirt and his cheesy chat up lines to women in the house were far less sexist than Dexter and his comments about female housemates being 'good wife material' because they were 'domesticated' and his claims to have taught men to pick up women through the technique of 'negging'. That shows real sexism and misogyny, rather than a bit of laddish fun and flirting. The way Sam interacted with the other housemates was interesting on that score: he interacted with the girls and the lads in more or less the same way. Aside from flirting, he treated both the same. He argued the same regardless of the gender of the person he was arguing with, showing no sense of 'special treatment' of women. The way he approached Dex and the way he approached Soph was identical. That is telling to me. That speaks of someone who doesn't actually view the opposite sex as fundamentally different.

The attitudes of some of the fans on here has appalled me, it really has. The idea that because someone they personally didn't find entertaining won the show thismeans it was a fix, or that 'real viewers' can't possibly have voted for Sam is deeply insulting. As is the notion that he won because of 'sympathy votes'. It disparages those who watch and vote, just as it disparages anybody with a disability.

Those who say it's wrong that someone can fly under the radar for weeks and then come into the picture in the final weeks and win...well, either the quieter personalities don't get a look in when the big personalities are dominating, or the quieter people have played a game. It's a game show. And if that game won, then well done that game player.

Personally, I've always found the latter weeks of BB the most entertaining precisely because that's when the quieter, less egotistical and less showbiz characters tend to come to the fore. They get drowned out by the hyped up arguments, bitching and fabricated stories during the early weeks. I don't watch to see a circus show, I watch to see a social experiment. I find that more entertaining. The latter weeks are where you get to see who people really are, big personalities and quieter types included. The bigger personalities have usually settled down and dropped the act, and the quieter types have usually come into their own. That is entertaining.

I'm glad Sam won. I'd also have been just as glad to see Dex or Gina win. Not because of their antics at the start (however entertaining they were) but because we got to see more of who they were and they were more interesting to me because of it.

People need to get a ****ing grip and stop with the blanket insults to fans of any housemate. They also need to accept that Sam was the winner, because that's who people voted to save on the night.

Very well put...