How much do you know about Lara Bingle? Did you watch her debut reality TV show, Being Lara Bingle, last night on Channel 10? Unless you’ve been avoiding free to air TV, Twitter, or living under a rock, you have probably heard of it. But the question on everyone’s lips: Did you watch it? What did you think?

Promo still from "Being Lara Bingle".

Here is the (very small) list of things I know about Lara Bingle:

1. She was engaged to some cricket superstar called Michael Clarke;
2. She became famous after appearing in those “where the bloody hell are you?” ads (which FYI , I thought were totally fine and didn’t get the fuss, because I say “bloody hell” all the time); and
3. She is often in the tabloids.

I watched it last night. To be honest, it was a little bit dull. I had no expectations of Lara herself, because I don’t know much about her. She drove her car, got pulled over by the cops, had the expected nude photo drama, went to a few photoshoots and moved in with her brother and her best friend who were as awkward as two teenagers whose braces have gotten locked together pashing behind the bike shed.  I didn’t hate it, because it is pretty hard to hate something so bland – like sticky tape.

It certainly wasn’t Kardashian level drama and everything felt very forced. Maybe it was because her family (and her) weren’t very comfortable around the cameras yet. If the show takes off, maybe that will change.

Of course, you go on reality TV, you open yourself up to criticism. Here are some of the charming tweets from some really kind people I saw on the #BeingLaraBingle hash tag:

Apparently Channel 10 is changing the name of #BeingLaraBingle to Being a Vacuous Bogan.

We all need to get together, find the creators of Being Lara Bingle and high five them! …In the face… with a chair #beinglarabingle

If you hear a screeching sound at around 8:30 tonight, it is the sound of millions of brain cells dying as people watch #beinglarabingle

#beinglarabingle as dim witted and vacuous as I expected. If white bread could talk it would sound like Lara.

I think the 5 minutes I gave #beinglarabingle has irreversibly damaged my IQ

#beinglarabingle more like #beingaxedinthreeweeks

Now, initially, reading over the hashtag, I found most of those tweets were NOT as bad as I was expecting. Some of it was even mildly amusing. I did not see anything sexist, hateful, violent, vitriolic or chauvinistic.  Isn’t the state of social media sad when I have to say that the above tweets were almost a pleasant surprise from the vitriolic abuse I was expecting?

Then, I changed my tweet search from “top” to “all” and disappointingly, my expectations were met, when I saw these disgusting displays of abuse from these rather excellent human beings:

#beinglarabingle your step by step weekly guide to being a #shitc***. F*ck off you useless sl*t.

#beinglarabingle Home wrecking sl*t. How the hell did she get her own TV show?! I’d rather pour acid in my eyes than watch her shit show! 

I felt sick when I read it, and not from the two banana pancakes I had for dessert. That poor woman. The show was not controversial. It was just dull. Awkward, even. Even if it was controversial, no-one deserves that disgusting abuse on the internet. NOTHING WARRANTS THAT KIND OF MISOGYNISTIC ABUSE, EVER. This is the problem with social media and the instant gratification of sharing your thoughts, however harmful, with the world.

Imagine how Lara Bingle or her family felt when reading that hashtag? The initial 5 tweets I posted, meh, they are a little hurtful, rude, even, but you have to expect that when you film a reality TV show. The bottom two tweets? Disgusting. Thinking that publicly making statements like that is acceptable (or even thinking them in the first place) make me fearful for human beings as a species.

What I was relieved to see among the criticism were tweets of support. Lovely tweets from people. Also, I would say that MOST of the criticism on Twitter was because the show was dull. And it was dull. It was a shaky start to a reality TV show, one that makes what seemed like a promising show (for reality TV, anyway), wobble it’s way to the finish of a first season.

Will it last? I don’t know. But just to shut up all the haters, I kind of hope it does. Good luck, Lara.

So, did you watch Being Lara Bingle? Do you love reality TV or do you think it is the biggest waste of television time ever? Were you disgusted by anything on social media? Will you tune in next week?

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