IF WE go on like this we shall soon all be back in our prams, shaking our rattles and crying: "Goo!" The whole country seems to be in its second childhood.

Examples? Millions of us last week tuned in to watch Celebrity Big Brother: glued, transfixed to the small screen for hours; talking about little else at work or on the bus. Can anyone tell me what was interesting about this programme? Like everybody else, I tuned in - if only to see what all the fuss was about. Conclusion? Those celebrities didn't actually do anything during their period of incarceration. Well, that's not strictly accurate. They did engage in long conversations about the most mindless topics. They swore a lot and kept taking their clothes off.

But don't take my word for it. I confess I dipped into The Times newspaper - the once great "Thunderer", respected the world over for the rationality of its opinions, its fine English style and the quality of its feature writing. This is how that "quality" newspaper described Celebrity Big Brother. "Watching one of the celebs was a joy as pure and uncomplex as watching a dog with its head stuck out of a moving car: he nominated his one luxury as a Mexican meal for everybody; got Vanessa drunk and on to the subject of masturbation; started a Tuesday morning conversation with: 'I've had my first poo today'; and revealed that, when working as a strippagram, he used to get erections."

Really? Who cares? So that's what the word "celebrity" means, is it? - a brainless, foul-mouthed idiot, lewd of speech and manner who comes on television. Not one of them picked up a book or listened to a piece of decent music. If anyone did anything at all apart, from sit around cursing and moping, it was to tittivate someone else's hair. Oh come off it, please! What remains to be said of a nation attracted to this rubbish?

It's not just Celebrity Big Brother. Trawling the "serious" newspapers, I found this review of a stage-play: " 'If this doesn't pull an audience', Brian McMaster, the festival director, cheerfully told me a fortnight earlier, 'it could completely f*** the future of the festival'. And boy, did it not pull an audience. Four hours of necrophilia, murder, masturbation, satanic ritual and explicit rape..."

Or take this about a pop song: " 'A word to the wise/there's sweet cherry pies/and truth inside/r avant garden'. This is one of the worst, most misguided and illiterate songs I've ever heard. I will, of course, cherish it forever". Ask the reviewer why and he'll say he was being "ironical" and that the alleged song is a satire. But he isn't and it isn't.

All that I have been writing about is the cultural equivalent of the rubbish that litters our streets. It is nothing but a stinking mess. A society that goes in for this sort of entertainment is on its last legs.

The same feature pages that give us perverted sex, disgusting film and theatre reviews and speak approvingly of a clapped-out popular music industry also issue serious warnings about our health. These diet-obsessed hypochondriacs tell us every day that we are what we eat - and so we have to be careful what we eat. Why can't they see that what's true for the body is true also for the mind and soul? If you fill yourself with nothing but chips and burgers, your body will end up in poor shape. And if your cultural life consists of filth and inanity, then your brain will rot.

What we have today, even in the so-called "quality" newspapers, is the yob culture: a culture of violence and sexual perversion. No wonder many of our streets are no-go areas and a depraved underclass threatens civilised values. Don't blame the underclass. Blame their chic, well-paid instructors who write the "quality" papers and appear on television.

Published: Tuesday, March 20, 2001