Review: Fashion victims

The spoiled brats of Blood, Sweat and T-Shirts. Photo / Supplied

Tis the season to be full of self-loathing. Just in case you aren't feeling queasy enough about Christmas conspicuous consumption, Tuesday on TV One sees the arrival of Blood, Sweat and T-Shirts, a documentary series that will make you feel far too guilty to go to the mall. The premise for the show - billed as revealing the dark truth behind high street clothes - is that you take six smug, young fashion-conscious Brits to where their stylish duds are made.

They get to toil in a sweatshop in India and live with the local workers. But basically it is simply a treatise on spoiled brats.

Georgina, described by her own mother as one of the most selfish people in the world, says "I love that you can buy something very, very cheap and wear it once and throw it away".

Richard, who has windswept hair and runs his own advertising agency, thinks that people who are not successful are simply lazy. He believes anyone can pull themselves out of poverty if they work hard enough - and use enough hair product.

Amrita, a second-generation Indian immigrant, says, "it doesn't really affect me if my clothes are made by a 3-year-old or a 50-year-old".

Tara seems the most thoughtful of the bunch but even she is in denial. "You can know that something is going on but if you haven't seen it it's almost like, is it real? Which truth do you believe?"

I'd like to think if you took some practical young Kiwi people to live in a completely different culture they would fare a little better than this. "Ohmigod!" is the response when the subjects find they are getting 12 rupees (36 cents) for each garment they make. "Ohmigod!" is the response to the toilet facilities. "Ohmigod" is the response to the cow dung smell.

This is certainly not a rag trade Intrepid Journeys, with all its tip-toeing cultural sensitivity. Here is Richard's response to rubbish in the streets: "How f***ing difficult is it to put your rubbish in a tip or something. Do me a f***ing favour. This is a disgrace. I thought I was going to see India and all I've seen is a f***ing shithole." Frankly, I think I preferred "Ohmigod".

The programme is just an hour-long teenage pout. "Factory work is so not my thing. It's not creative. It's not interesting. It's not mentally stimulating," sulks Amrita.

Blood, Sweat and T-Shirts is not a glowing endorsement of British multiculturalism and tolerance programmes. "I'm not going to be nice to people just because they're factory workers," says one of the brats. I can't remember which one but you can be certain they were pouting and wearing hair product.

You know there are going to be some profound life lessons along the way in this gig, but in the meantime it is gruesome. Three of the group get demoted from being machinists to doing ironing and then demoted to closing buttons. You know you're a loser when even your ironing is deemed to be substandard.

The only consolation is that if these pampered young fillies survive, they are going to be nicer. It would be hard to be more horrible. Here is Georgina having a moment: "They just love their families and have respect for them and they just work so hard to put food on the table and there's me just going and buying these clothes and just disrespecting my family and not even caring." She then rings her mum - the one who said she was the most selfish person she knew. "Hi mum, I've been a cow." Ohmigod.

This programme should be compulsory viewing at every private school - although I suspect one of the messages of the show is that you should keep buying cheap tat or the horrible conditions of working in a sweatshop will become even more horrible.

* Real Life: Blood, Sweat And T-Shirts debuts on TV One, Tuesday at 9.35pm.