by Roqeebah O.

How do we say it? This show was very divisive. In just 78 days that it was on, BBNaija brought to the fore, many issues that are deep-seated within the fabric of the Nigerian society – from skin colour to class, ethnicity, views on sex and sexuality and what Nigerians find interesting enough to pay attention to.

Through all of the ups and downs and the turns that the show took, one thing that remained clear is that Nigerians (or a very large percentage of Nigerians) were united in their interest in the reality that it presented. What makes this interesting is that it was as unifying as it was divisive.

Who knew how strongly Nigerians felt about the privileges of lighter-skinned females? Who knew that alliances and fandom could develop over such issues as TBoss’ biracial identification and the colour of her skin. Or that some would have been so outrightly and vehemently against her for the same reasons.

Some of the vile tweets will have you wondering if she had some history with Nigerians that no one knows about

One thing i learnt from #BBNaija most especially Tboss is that Beauty without Brain only brings ATTENTION and not VICTORY

— Ewaoluwa (@iAmAlwazhornie) April 10, 2017

It got so bad that she rarely got sympathy from Nigerians when she had the thing where Kemen got disqualified for allegedly sexually harassing her.

#BBNaija Tboss told Debbie she's not a deep sleeper
But then she doesn't know wen Kemen tried to finger her

Her fans are too dull to think

— Baba Lukaku (@Usmanashafe) April 2, 2017

Another toxic issue that this year’s show threw up is that of discrimination based on class. Again, TBoss was on the receiving end of the hate that flows from Nigerians who believe that richer people or those in the upper class look down on the poor. And this is not to say that this a problem that’s only in people’s perceptions but TBos got judged a lot as the girl who looked down on others from her position of “privilege”. On the flip side, it was almost as if Nigerians voted the boy without a silver spoon in defiance.

Of course, we will not forget in a hurry the sexual harassment bit. Although the #MenAreScum conversation has been on the table for so long before the show but that episode with Kemen made the conversation heated and the camps were not even divided along male/female lines.

It’s probably not a good idea to take the show so seriously but all we are saying is maybe if there’s any lasting good that we can make out of #BBNaija, it should be for us to table these issues that obviously deeply affect us as a society and successfully thrash it out.