Faux-Intellectuals and How to Pepper Dem. A Smart Woman View of Big Brother Nigeria 2019

Have you ever been judged for indulging in guilty pleasures? I certainly have. My friends have been questioning me lately about my love for Big Brother Nigeria (BBN). Most times, I am at a loss of what and how to reply to them without going into my usual Pentecostal and energetic reply, so instead, I ignore them. But here's the thing: I'm tired of being put on the spot and made to feel like I have to defend myself.

These questions range from “What do you see in BBN” to “How can you waste your time watching this? In reality, what they seem to mean with their words is - “How can someone as intelligent as you waste time on something as trivial as BBN?" It's like they have this delusion of grandeur as if their intellectual pursuits make them better than those who enjoy mainstream entertainment"

Who decided that being intelligent means you can't also enjoy popular culture? Why can't we be both smart and socially engaged?

At the root of questioning my choice of entertainment, is their “delusion of grandeur”. A form of anti-social activism that is seen as antithetical to the front of intellectualism, creating a kind of mutually exclusive event, as if to say that I can be this because I am that. And I wonder, who in God’s name came up with the warped idea that people cannot both be intimidatingly smart and excitingly social? Who came up with a one-directional definition of entertainment? In this way, we restrict and dampen our experience of the world. In this way, we insult the human faculty and discredit the rich and motile nature of human passion.

So why do I like Big Brother Nigeria? it’s simple - It’s interesting. It is the dynamics of having more than 20 diverse, unique beings with their different experiences, idiosyncrasies, and manner, most times clashing, few times, in harmony. It is the love and friendship inadvertently formed, as vibes connect and kindred souls mesh. It’s the political gimmick and manipulation that sometimes blows up in their heads, hurting them, far more than the gains.

It is the financial implication of seeing a country where more than 70% of people live less than 2 dollars a day and yet continuously spend above their means to vote for their favourite housemate(s) and I cannot help but wonder “Are we so down and out that we would nakedly search for even the inherently foolish- to block out the pain and misery ubiquitous in Nigeria, to create a sense of happiness for ourselves? Ironically, we are among the happiest people in the world. Suffering and yet smiling.

It is seeing the impact of marketing and branding, and the power of insufferable followership to the extent of creating “WhatsApp groups”. It is seeing the influence of celebrities and popular figures on pop culture. It is the irony of seeing a country where the BBN voting system works unbelievably better than my country’s electoral system despite the billions of dollars budgeted for. It is the savagery commentaries of the “Twitter people” that sometimes instil in my mind that stupidity and sagaciousness can never be extinct. It is a whole lot, more than meets the eye.

Of course, we can question the morality of the show, but I can also question the gatekeepers of morality on why their unnerving fingers seem to be only pointed at women. The tower of maleness and male morality stands impregnable. They can do no wrong. They are excused as saying “ They are men and men will be men”. This is power, an exclusive preserve of a few to inhabit a world that protects one against the critical awareness of oneself, making them blind to the vulnerable. This instance of inherent male superiority abounds and is enforced by society’s institutions, in private and public spheres, in religious and political symbols, and in the relationship between men and everything and everyone that is not man.

Wake up!! You guys have been living in a bubble. This is 2019, not 1219. I like Mercy Lambo – the winner of Big Brother Nigeria 2019. I like her "surgerized" butt more than the Nigeria electoral system because it works and it is purposed to winning.

It's time to challenge this one-dimensional view of entertainment and celebrate the complexity of human passion. So, the next time someone questions my love for BBN, I won't ignore them or get defensive. Instead, I'll proudly proclaim that I'm a multifaceted human being who refuses to be put in a box.

As with all things in life, there are lessons to be learnt when you have the doors of your mind open- anything can be a teacher. For those who don’t watch Big Brother Nigeria for the sole aim of claiming “Intellectual Nazis", who seem to think that knowledge is their exclusive preserve and meant to be wielded against the outrightly vain and eternally condemned sect reeking of a futureless ambition, who also believe that they are at the centre and everyone else is at the margin, I have one question for you – hope you have made it in life?