Ten boys vs ten girls were left unsupervised in house for a week and the results were unnerving
Topics: Channel 4, Documentaries, Weird
Britt Jones
Featured Image Credit: Channel 4
Topics: Channel 4, Documentaries, Weird
Classic British television is hard to come by these days, but there’s one for your watch list if you’ve not seen it yet that’ll shock you.
Do you ever watch something on telly and wonder how it ever got the green light?
This one’s like that.
A show about ten boys and ten girls left unsupervised in a house for a week as part of a social experiment was something that both shocked and intrigued viewers.
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It was obviously a 2000s show, I mean, look at those clothes, but Channel 4’s Cutting Edge documentary titled Boys Alone was fascinating.
If you’re wondering why, it’s titled boys alone, it’s because they were completely unsupervised.
For the doc, they took ten boys aged 11 to 12 to live in a huge home in Hertfordshire for five days with a camera crew.
The house and garden were decked out with toys, books, games, junk food and fizzy drinks as well as ingredients for hearty meals.
Airing in 2002, it was quickly followed by another experiment, which was conducted with a group of ten girls.
You’ll already know that the outcomes were totally different.
The boys decided to split into groups and destroy everything within the house, living off fizzy pop and snacks.
One boy, Michael, was tied to a chair in the garden at one point.
But the girls were the epitome of organised chaos.
Some of the girls took it upon themselves to be the cooks and cleaners of the house, while others would organise fashion shows and nightly entertainment.
Even though it was an entertaining watch, a lot of people were furious about allowing a group of kids to live alone for this length of time, including some of the parents whose children participated.
Speaking to The Mirror in 2009, Ruth Lewis, a mum of one of the boys named Sam, spoke out about Channel 4’s choice to try another type of show.
She said: "That show was awful. If I had my time again I would say no to allowing him on the show. It was just chaos and mayhem.”
"Watching this new show, I did think I can't believe I did that to my son. It was horrible watching it again. It's an awful lot for a child to go through at that age."
Sam, then 19, added: "Any boy would say yes to an opportunity like that, but that doesn't mean it's the right thing to do. I'd never missed my mum more in my life.
"It was mayhem and became depressing as the house divided into the two gangs and war broke out.
"The place was trashed and I'm ashamed to say that I even turned into a bit of a hooligan."