The Block was always real estate porn – good riddance

The Block NZ cancelled as homes near completion

Just as four townhouses in Browns Bay are readied for contestants on The Block NZ, Warner Bros Discovery has cancelled the 11th season of the show and intends to sell off the houses.

Speculation had been rife that the show would not go ahead this year due to cost cutting by the company, which has already scrapped The AM Show and The Project and announced plans to scrap Newshub – a new TV news service will be provided by Stuff from July 6, 2024.

A spokesperson from Warner Bros Discovery said today: “When we announced our business restructure earlier this year, we indicated that WBD would no longer make fully funded local shows, which includes The Block NZ. Existing sponsors had been told that we would contact them if the show was going ahead, and they would have first right of renewal.”

Is it just me or did The Block manage to sum up everything that is wrong about our culture and economy?

I like that The Block has ended, not as a personal attack on these grasping desperate teams, they are just a symptom of the problem, but the whole concept is disgusting and perverse and I for one love that it failed!

Fetishised property speculation porn as mass entertainment in a country of homelessness & poverty.

I wonder if State House tenants tuned in? The auction will be the closest they ever get to home ownership.

It’s as equally harrowing as the thought of all those hungry children watching MasterChef or MKR.

I wonder if those hungry children lick the TV screens?

Property speculation in this country and the way homes have been commodified into an asset base rather than homes is one of the greatest generational robberies ever committed in this country.

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