WHEN Channel Four announced it would no longer be screening Big Brother I was moderately pleased.

After summer this fatuous freak show will no longer pollute our screens.

But it will, of course, be followed by numerous ‘reality’ show where nobodies and washed-up celebrities sell their souls for 15 minutes of humiliating ‘fame’.

This will continue for the foreseeable future because there is a wider issue at work. It is because we are obsessed with ‘famous’ people’s lives.

Our newsagents’ shelves are crammed with magazines packed with frivolous celebrity gossip.

Such stories could feasibly include ‘Cheryl Cole’s sun tan has faded’ or ‘Coleen Rooney ate full-fat crisps last week’.

We are only interested in these trivial – and quite private – details precisely because the people in question are famous.

We like to experience the presumed highs of fame from a safe distance – and then watch with a car crash fascination when someone goes off the rails.

This bizarre fascination serves as a distraction from the crushing fact that our lives have become boring and meaningless.

But they need not be. There are plenty of better ways to occupy our time. So instead of focussing on other people’s lives, why not examine your own and work out how to make it better?