My gaydar is normally pretty accurate in the real world but I must say I totally missed Howard - I was actually surprised when I read in the papers that he's gay.

My straightdar says your both wrong .

mmmm...i agree.
he has a small mean mouth that doesnt go with the rest of his face..i think he looks a bit like a young Dustin Hoffman.

I tend to think I have a good gaydar but I totally missed Howard as well.

Ben isn't as attractive as he thinks he is.

Im really not liking howard ive goto be honest.
Ive got a feeling as the weeks go buy hes going to really sell some of them out given the chance.
But tbh im amazed not one of them last night didnt realise how horrendous that black box was going to look it reminds me of what they used to shine shoes..

Now you see, he didn't show up on my straightdar so I assumed he was gay / a.

I agree about his mouth but i think he looks like Gavin henson, or possibly Jim hensons muppets

Im not sure hes even as attractive as we think he is

Absolutely.
My gaydar missed Howard and doesn't think that James is, was or should ever be gay.
Ben however might as well give up the straight ghost and start admitting he'd rather spend a night down Vauxhall dressed in leathers and a boa dancing to Kylie.

He makes me laugh though.

"Can I suggest you don't slap your own arse - whilst it was helpful to point out the 'arse area' I'm sure they know which bit it is"

I agree, i tend to have good gaydar and Ben is either gay or a straight man who has not had that chat with himself yet

Do you have to be gay to have gaydar? Just I'm a straight female, and could tell Howard was gay from a mile off.

I'm a straight female too but tend to have a pretty good gaydar! I've been right many a time, although I missed this one!

I agree with the poster above (edit - OathBreaker) who says they're not too keen on Howard - I liked him at first but as time's gone on I think he's definitely 'worth the watching' and would sell his granny if necessary to get on in the programme.

Incidentally, I don't get any gayness vibes from James at all.

I don't like Howard either. He seems v scheming, as does Ben. James seems a bit naive in a way, but I don't get any gay vibes about him. Ben seems to be too much up his own b**side, which is probably a defence mechanism about something. He reminds me of the awful loudmouthed louts in 1980s stockbrokerland. Perhaps its not just about he 1980s. I think its why I got put off my former job as an accountant. Didnt want to associate with t*ssers any more, so I got out and am happier with a lower paid job

He does! I can't stand him and think he is a knob.
Howard's eyes scare me
Any thoughts on Apprentice lesbians this year?


(OT but does anyone know if the swimmer Mark Foster is gay? We are trying to find out! He is so stunning and tall , only gay men look that good nowadays.Sigh!)

Totally agree, peely.

Also, Ben's accent is very strange (don't get me wrong, I like it) - I know he's Northern Irish but WHERE FROM? As a west of Scotlander I've been asked a few times by English folk if I'm Northern Irish, and I could never work out why until I heard Ben speak - he pronounces a lot of words they way I would and it just seems a very different NI accent than I'm used to....

Sorry, that's totally off-topic! (But I'm interested!)

It's very posh Northern Irish. Very upper middle class. I'm guessing Belfast or the upmarket surrounding towns (Bangor for instance) but I could be totally wrong. I'd love to know where he went to school.

Hmmmm....he may be upper middle class financially or even educationally, but he is no gentleman. In fact his comments about some people bordered on the chav-like....lol...I'm getting more and more pompous, but manners maketh the man, lets hope SAS realises that.

I would never, for the slightest second, suggest that Ben has good manners. Obviously he hasn't.

I don't really understand the connection you are making between class and manners. I've never found them to have anything to do with each other - apart from social niceities like knowing what cutlery to use, which most people tend to see as superfluous and not what true good manners are all about anyway.

Everything about Ben - his accent, his clothes, his job, his manner - all point to a particularly upper middle class Northern Irish background. I've come across many like him in my time and the loutishness and arrogance is quite typical of them (though obviously not all behave like this). He's very young too and privileged kids his age, just out of uni have a tendancy to think they rule the world. A few years of graft in the workplace will knock this out of them, but Ben hasn't had that yet.

I'm not trying to take away from the fact that he's a tosser though.

Ahh, right, that explains things a bit! Not that I think for a minute than I sound at all posh, but that pronunciation style seems to come across as much more posh in an NI accent than a Scottish one!

Mark Foster..oh yes.fraid so.
I think hes with Colin Jackson.
allegedly.

I suppose I mean that if he wants to be considered superior to the others, because of his background or education, I would also expect him to have good manners. However, my view of manners is not the same as yours, in that its about how someone behaves towards other people (ie taking them into consideration), not just knowing what cutlery to use. Its not necessary to be sneaky, underhand or a dictator to get ahead in life.

Did you read what I posted? I said that good manners and class had nothing to do with each other except for social niceities like knowing what cutlery to use which most people see as superfluous and not what true good manners are all about anyway.

We're basically saying exactly the same thing about Ben.

The one thing I don't understand about your position is that I made a comment about social class, which you seemed to immediately link to manners (or the lack thereof). As I've said before, class and manners don't have much to do with each other in my experience.

Also, this notion that Ben might "consider himself superior" on account of class or educational background didn't come from me. All I did was comment on what I perceive to be his socio-economic background, as a response to a question about his accent. I wasn't inferring anything about Ben as a person from that, I was only observing. Because I'm from Northern Ireland it's of interest to me, but I don't expect it's of great interest to anyone else.

I don't think I did say that Ben's superiority complex on account of class/educational background came from you. I just think that he should behave better, and his supposed "superiority" is questionable if he doesn't. I'm presuming you are right about the accent as an indication of how much money his parents threw at his education as I'm not from Northern Ireland, but his position in terms of socio-economic status should be based as much on his behaviour and attitude as the job he does, his education or how much money he's got. In my book behaviour and attitude are to do with manners and betray where you come from, not which fork goes with what dish.

However, I could just be a grumpy old woman and think its a sad reflection of society that someone can be called upper middle class simply because they have been to a particular college in Northern Ireland.