BBC’s Bring your Husband to Heel or “Arbeit Macht Frei" (Work makes Freedom (Sign over Auschwitz gates))

After tonight’s “Bring your Husband to Heel” on BBC2 shown 7-730pm tonight (Monday 22nd August 2005) I half expect the next BBC programme on husbands to be called "Arbeit Macht Frei" (“Work makes Freedom” (Sign over Auschwitz gates)). The men will get into trains thinking they’re going to work off their “crimes” but really…

Perhaps you think I exaggerate.  Perhaps, but not as much as you think. After the title cartoon of a woman kicking a man into a doghouse, we quickly find the first rule of training your husband. Lie to him. Tell him it’s a programme about “relationship roles”.  John happily co-operates and allows cameras to be installed in the house. Margaret, his wife, doesn’t tell him the secret. Then we hear about John’s heinous crimes. John makes breakfast but doesn’t clear up.  John makes his own lunch but doesn’t clear up. We see the damming evidence.  A plate, cup and saucer and 3 knives.  Yes, 3 knives!! John comes home, has dinner (this Margaret  makes), doesn’t clear up and falls asleep on the couch. The falling asleep on the couch is not a hard working man tired from work but simply another crime. John even agrees that “99%” of the uncollected plates are his; apparently believing he’s being interviewed about relationships.  None of this is discussed with him outside the fake interview. 

Of course the man must do his fair share around the house.  It seems John’s out working all day. Apparently John’s rich.  John has a house that would be considered small – if it were in Beverley Hills.  It has a huge garden with a pond and if it cost less than 2 million pounds I would be surprised. This looks like it’s all John’s doing.  There’s no evidence of Margaret having any job, but there are grown-up daughters who have children of their own, so it looks like Margaret was the traditional housewife and mother but now has no children in the house. 

Now I’m sure that leaving plates around can be annoying but does it require being treated like an animal?  The programme goes on to show the dog trainer training a dog and talking to Margaret about how to adapt the techniques to John and referring to “training the dog” when she means “training John”. We’re then shown Margaret trying this on John.  She gets it wrong by reverting to her normal style, which is to nag John.  Something she’s been doing for 37 years. This is where the first bit of sense comes in. The dog trainer tells Margaret not to nag, pointing out that it hasn’t worked in 37 years.  Margaret now gets it right and then starts praising John for picking up the odd plate and gradually gets him to tidy up after himself. Finally it’s revealed to John what’s really going on. John apparently takes it good naturedly. The programme ends with a clip from next week where a husband is constantly on the computer at home is told by his wife says “You shouldn’t bring work home”. Of course, it couldn’t be that he’s worried about his job and failing at the job could mean he loses his marriage but it’s probably just that he needs training in how to roll over and have his tummy tickled.

This, of course, is just more sexism from the BBC. We’ve already seen the “social experiment” called “The Week the Women Went” where the women in one village are put up in a hotel to see if the men can cope.  Not only do they cope but they also get on with some extra tasks that they’ve been given. This “social experiment” has been relegated to the less available BBC3 (only on digital) probably because the men coped and it wasn’t a disaster.  There is also a BBC3 programme called “He’s having a baby” where 8 young fathers to be are given tests, such a changing a baby, and awarded points for it. One of their first jobs without any help or guidance was to pick up and quiet down a baby (Not their own as they haven’t been born yet). They managed. The commentator had to make a quip about no babies were harmed in this test.  Nowhere do we see any programme about women’s faults or how young mothers will cope.

John the husband may take it good natured now but perhaps being made a fool could undermine him at work. It can’t help if you are an executive and your wife makes a fool of you on television.  Margaret now says they are starting to have real conversations again.  Perhaps it’s more about stopping nagging and then uncovering a loving husband who’s been in hiding for 37 years. Of course, we haven’t heard John’s take on things.  The BBC doesn’t consider that necessary. Maybe it’s a wake-up call for the relationship or maybe it could put a dent in their relationship that wasn’t there before. The eventual cost could be worst than a few uncollected plates. Let’s hope not.

The BBC has however taught men a lesson that might come back to bite women.  If women want to treat men like dogs, rather than human beings, then maybe men will start treating women like bitches.

Comments

[Peter O'Neill]

Obviously, Michael Buerk was completely wrong when he said the BBC's content is being affected by allowing women to run the show. The fact that the venerable BBC has been reduced to creating shows that are the intellectual equivalent of "Oprah" and "Rikki Lake" clearly can have nothing to do with its new female leadership.

You go, girls. Thanks for elevating the discussion with your "female perspective."

[AbuUbaida]

I thought the program was pretty good. really enjoyed it.

[Paul Reilly]

I thought the programme was a total outrage. I wrote a letter of complaint to the BBC who dismissed the programme as sexist and claimed it was just light entertainment! Well I can't wait for the reaction of women if ever a 'light entertainment' show titled "bring your wife to heel" was ever aired!! I am sure however that due to budget restraints or some other lame excuse this would never happen. I have forwarded a further complaint to OFCOM and urge all other men to do the same. The BBC seems currently to be on a mission to degrade, humiliate and patronise men. This is dangerous ground and I for one will not stand silent and allow it to continue.

[Big Bill]

Gentlemen:

If you are foolish enough to buy your wife a big house, if you are foolish enough to hire servants to take care of it when she is to lazy to keep the house she begged you to get, if you are foolish enough to have several chidren with her, knowing she can extract a chunk of your income for each one, well then you are foolish enough to be trained like a dog.

Prenuptial agreements, gentlemen, from the word go. When you first go out with her and she tells you how liberated she is, she insists on her independence, her own bank account, her own job and her own coming and going, just agree with her, and say that whenever you marry it will be on those terms: each of you keeps their own money, each of you keeps their own bank accounts and each of you keeps their own life.

Tell her that when you get married you will insist on a reciprocal prenuptial agreement that preserves each of your rights so you cannot take all those wonderful things from her.

Once you have laid the foundation and the marriage approaches, remind her of your earliest conversations and go through with it! by that time she will want to take you for all you are worth, but after having played the feminist card for so many months or years, it will be difficult for her to back out, especially since it was she who insisted on the feminist freedoms at every turn.

Be careful out there, men, it's a jungle!

[dave]

I see the BBC are still showing this evil filth .
What shall we do about it ? any ideas ?
I suggest that all men refuse to contribute to any breast cancer charities , until the Beeb agree to stop showing sexist filth like this .

Ofcom have today announced - a decision taken by a woman, I'd wager - that there was nothing wrong with the programme as it was 'not seriously proposing a demeaning view of men'. Oh, well, that's ok then ! As long as they didn't MEAN to be sexist, degrading, patronising, humiliating and insulting then hey, don't worry.

This fascist claptrap must be stopped. The people who made this programme are total scum, nothing less. Is this what feminism was for? Is this why women fought for so long for their emancipation? So they could treat men like dogs? No. It was so they could live on an equal footing, have equal opportunities and not be held back simply because of their gender. Instead some of them seem to think it's ok to spend our licence money on this utter drivel.

Just imagine a programme called 'Bring Your Wife To Heel', with a male dog trainer explaining how your wife can be 'trained' in the same way. There would be a national outrage, and rightly so. Instead all we get is 'stop moaning'.

In the fifties and sixties there were public information films that spoke of women as 'good wives' and 'bad wives', and showed them as virtually the property of their husbands. At the time men said 'it's only a bit of fun'. Sound familiar?

I cannot believe this decision by Ofcom. They and the BBC should hang their heads in shame.

[Floyd]

Ofcom have today announced - a decision taken by a woman, I'd wager - that there was nothing wrong with the programme as it was 'not seriously proposing a demeaning view of men'. Oh, well, that's ok then ! As long as they didn't MEAN to be sexist, degrading, patronising, humiliating and insulting then hey, don't worry.

This fascist claptrap must be stopped. The people who made this programme are total scum, nothing less. Is this what feminism was for? Is this why women fought for so long for their emancipation? So they could treat men like dogs? No. It was so they could live on an equal footing, have equal opportunities and not be held back simply because of their gender. Instead some of them seem to think it's ok to spend our licence money on this utter drivel.

Just imagine a programme called 'Bring Your Wife To Heel', with a male dog trainer explaining how your wife can be 'trained' in the same way. There would be a national outrage, and rightly so. Instead all we get is 'stop moaning'.

In the fifties and sixties there were public information films that spoke of women as 'good wives' and 'bad wives', and showed them as virtually the property of their husbands. At the time men said 'it's only a bit of fun'. Sound familiar?

I cannot believe this decision by Ofcom. They and the BBC should hang their heads in shame.