From: John Robinson Newsgroups: alt.humor.best-of-usenet Subject: [uk.media.tv.sf.babylon5] Re: B5 is Better than Sex? Ha! Date: 29 Feb 2000 15:19:10 GMT Subject: Re: B5 is Better than Sex? Ha! From: "Derek O'Brien" Newsgroups: uk.media.tv.sf.babylon5, uk.media.tv.sf.startrek, uk.people.sf-fans Dawn wrote in message news:387CEAAA.F98CF92C@cwcom.net... > Shaun Gerrans wrote: > > > > On Wed, 12 Jan 2000 08:34:17 -0000, "Alex Peckover" > > wrote: > > > > > > > >Shaun Gerrans wrote in message > > >news:387be0a8.9947431@news.demon.co.uk... > > >> On Tue, 11 Jan 2000 21:01:12 -0000, "Alex Peckover" > > >> wrote: > > >> > > >> > > > >> >Shaun Gerrans wrote in > > >message > > > > >> However the way you phrased it, it sounded as if the awards were > > >>being given by the SFX staff. > > > > > >Okay. I'd say that some of their staff are anti-B5, but some of them > > >are very much pro. > > > > > > > Fair enough. It seems strange to me to cite the readers awards as an > > example of that. > > > > >> Which is true enough, although there was a considerable erosion of > > >the > > >> ratings for a time which did give cause for concern. > > > > > >Maybe slightly, it certainly never came near TNG at it's peak. > > > > > > > DS9's ratings fell from an 8 average at the start of it's run to a 4 > > average during it's 5th season , the ratings recovered through the 6th > > season giving an average of 6 and then falling back to a 5 average for > > the final season with the DS9 finale receiving a 5.4 rating. > > > > >TV Zone in particular has been known, from time to time, to make up > > >information to support it's "Babylon 5 is Better than Sex" campaign. > > > > What utter drivel. > > > > >That bull it published a while ago about "quality indices", for > > >example. It's contention was that B5 was doing tremendously well over > > >here because it was the most "appreciated" program in the time slot. > > >This was during season four when it was being shown at 11pm and there > > >was nothing else on. > > > > > > > The audience appreciation figures as I recall were sourced from BARB. > > > > Shaun > > "I am a Ranger. We live for the One. We die for the One." > > Note to reply via Email remove NOSPAMTODAY > > BABYLON 5 IS BETTER THAN SEX?********************! > Somebody better tell the guy he's doing it wrong...... > In the name of all the little gods of hill and river, let's get a > sense of perspective about things! TV is just TV... Sex is.... > different. > DEREK........ Help! > Dawn..... (I can't believe I have to put metaphorical pen to paper to discuss this. This is worse than fricking debating class... "Evil is Bad: Prove") For those that may believe Babylon 5, or indeed any TV, including Trek, is better than sex: I once awoke in a cold sweat. It would have been a hot sweat if my naked body hadn't been lying on the edge of the mattress, exposed to the vicious Arctic draught of my former digs, a draught reaching under the door and caressing my defenceless flesh with chill claws of steel. I was shocked by this state of affairs, for I had begun my repose under a generous pile of bedclothes, cuddling up to a warm body and floating into a blithe slumber of sexual afterglow, I sat up in search of animal and fabric. It was that time of morning when the sun was blossoming the grey ribboned clouds in the sky into bolts of salmon- and shocking-pink satin, and I could open bleary eyes and gaze at the partner with whom I had, that night before, shared my food, drink, video collection, packet of long-ago-purchased thingies (now finally gainfully employed), and afterwards, a cigarette. The partner who was now curled up contentedly on the other side of the bed, every square inch of her flesh except for one eyelid, closed until further notice, covered comprehensively by a voluminous wealth of bedclothes. It took some effort, inducing wounded, self-righteous murmurs of dissent from her, before the murmurs dissolved into half-conscious mumbles of contrition, and she handed back half the surface area of bedclothes. What does this description of The Morning After have to do with the proposed argument? Simply put: this simple, realistic depiction of human contact, even minus the flowery prose, minus the depiction of heights of ecstasy, the gentle swell of inner music and the crashing of waves, is still *miles* better than sitting watching a fricking TV show. Even those moments when you awake in the night, from the elbow resting on your nose, from the knee pressing into your groin, from the partner getting an itch on his/her foot and scratching yours by mistake, from the bizarre sounds your partner makes that you would *never* make, no sir, from the way your bodies find themselves glued together, backs and buttocks joined in the grip of an adhesive, steaming sweat, the result of miscalculating the effects of your duvet with another body in the nest - all these are still miles, kilometres, *light-years* better than watching a fricking TV show. What you feel from another person is *real*. TV is just light and sound, illusion, an electronic dream, shadow without substance. Even the most erotic image on television is just that - an image, and sex between two of the most ordinary, unphotogenic people in the world would still be many orders of magnitude better. I avoided talking about the act of sex itself - there are minors present, after all - but those that *have* indulged must surely agree that the look in the eyes of your partner, the sounds they make, the grip they place on you, as you make them feel as intense and exquisite and delicious and ecstatic and blissful and satisfied and insatiable as they can ever feel, and you find yourself looking and sounding and feeling exactly the same way... well, a moment of this is worth a lifetime of Babylon 5, all incarnations of Trek and all past and future Star War movies. And those that think otherwise, either haven't done it, never will, or, as Dawn suggest, they're obviously doing it wrong. Maybe if they found an onject of desire who didn't need to be inflated... Derek - it's too late to be handing Uncle Derek these challenges, children...