I only caught the aftermath of Merlin's big silent exit from the Big Brother house, but people really need to fuck off. Christ! What's so wrong with what he did? And why did it make people so angry? I mean, it's not like we missed anything important, being denied the standard post-eviction interview with Gretel, the opportunity to glean such shocking admissions as "Yes. I did enjoy my time in the house. It was fun." And so forth. Get over your howling disappointment already, people! This was way cooler! I think. I mean, I didn't actually see it. I only heard Gretel's explanation of the 'incident', with Merlin walking down to the stage and duct-taping his mouth shut and holding a sign saying "Free the Refugees" and then refusing to speak. Sounded like a pretty canny effort. Threw a spanner in the works, at least. I like that. Hey, it wasn't that canny at all! I mean, why haven't more people, who know in advance that they are going to be on nationally broadcast live television, taken advantage of a rare moment to mess with things, to do something unpredicatble and unstoppable? At least Merlin recognised that he had the power to fuck up the broadcast. That his non-cooperation would leave them scrambling. It beats talking about how opinionated you are and other such crap. Seriously, what's with all the indignation? I mean, boo-ing? Chill out! That's just not sporting, chaps. And what was up with people immediately turning on Merlin and theorising about "Why would he do such a thing? Is he scared? Was he too nervous to talk? Is this his way of making a name for himself?" Like being a fame-whore after coming out of Big Brother is a rationale to dismiss all other agendas. Can't we just marvel at the execution of a simple but effective plan? Cause really, what's wrong or out of place about Merlin holding up a hand-made sign to express his views? I mean, it's so Big Brother. Everyone else in the audience was holding up their own piece of decorated cardboard. They just had different things written on them. Shit Gretel, you don't need to prejudice things right off the bat! I mean, the motivation is pretty simple to fathom. He wasn't talking because to not talk caused disruption. And protest requires disruption. That's it! Jeez! I dunno, but maybe it was all motivated by conscience or something. That's feasible isn't it? And the manner of his protest might have had deliberate associations with the voiceless position refugees find themselves in. Or whatever. Anyway, I wish I'd seen the awkward moment as it happened. No doubt there will be repeats of this "ohmygod controversy". Still, why are people so upset? It was a little bit daring, I guess, but still, pretty tame. I don't get it. It's like you can't even do a minor thing without coming up hard against that 'troublemaker' or 'difficult' tag, you know, which reduces your actions to pure egotism. I endured ten minutes of painful reaction from the crowd, from Gretel, from the housemates. And, listening to it, I started getting really shitty. I mean, people just seemed to be so anti the very concept of a protest [Wesley, you disappoint me]. Mutterings of Merlin "forcing his opinion on other people" and then being too pissweak to back it up with argument blah blah blah. I'm just generally pissed off. Hmmm. I really need to check my own intemperate fury too, I guess. Like, my over-reaction to other people's over-reaction to a minor incident, etc. But, having started off so badly, I'm just dreading how even more painful this discussion is gonna get. Hell, it was just one small personal gesture, and it's being shat on and dismissed like it's totally insupportable. A-holes! Why discredit a decent enough thing, and blight it with negative connotations? Ergh. Fuck off.