Oxbridge, Love Island and some other fatuous comparisons
You may have noticed the stats doing the rounds on twitter this week: more people applied to be on ITV’s hit show Love Island than applied for Oxford or Cambridge University this year.
It’s true. According to ITV more than 85,000 people applied for a place on this season of Love Island. Meanwhile, 19,938 applied for undergraduate degrees at Oxford, and 17,189 to Cambridge, making a total of 37,127.
Love Island didn’t just have more applicants than Oxbridge, it had more than double.
For the uninitiated (where have you been?) Love Island is a reality TV show where young, single and beautiful people move into a villa for the summer and attempt to couple up. The best couple at the end of summer, as voted by the public, win £50,000 between them. Sex, drama, the balearic sun – Love Island has it all. Oxbridge on the other hand, has perhaps a maximum one of the three.
So what’s with the comparison? Despite giving smug twitter-hacks another reason to decry the state of modern British society, this comparison serves no one well.
Applying to Love Island doesn’t somehow bar you from applying to Oxbridge (although one would assume there is not a massive overlap). Applying to Oxbridge doesn’t even necessarily make you smart, and applying to Love Island doesn’t make you stupid. Both however do require you to have the unfortunate combination of a massively inflated ego and deeply ingrained insecurity… alas, an issue to be discussed another day.
So, if like us, you too are into utterly fatuous comparisons masquerading as genuine insight into the state of British society, look no further. We’ve compiled a list of other things that had more applicants or attendees than Oxbridge in 2018.
1. Glastonbury attendees
In 2016 135,000 people graced the green and pleasant lands of Somerset compared to the paltry 37,000 who sought a future among the dreaming spires.
Swapping a life of Cicero and grumpy dons for hedonism and overdone Coldplay? Count me in.
2. The number of X Factor entrants every year since its conception
Even Series 1 of the much maligned Simon Cowell vanity project had 50,000 entrants. To be fair, making a name on X Factor sets you up for a life of paid Instagram promotions, regional open mic nights and possibly a half-hearted record deal which sees you struggle to get into the charts and then fade into obscurity forever. At least it’s marginally better than being swallowed up by the faceless world of consulting.
3. Labour Live attendees
Okay, this one isn’t true. A heartening fact that we can all be proud of.
4. Members of the flat earth conspiracy Facebook group
There are a stunning 189,000 members of the largest Facebook group dedicated to the flat earth conspiracy. That’s more people than have attended Oxbridge over the last 15 years combined (this figure is the result of my slightly unscientific maths).
5. Bradley Walsh’s debut album sales
Well over twice as many people bought Bradley Walsh’s debut album in 2016 than applied to Oxbridge this year.
Who is Bradley Walsh, I hear you ask. Well, only the game show host turned jazz artist extraordinaire who managed to be the only British debut artist to reach gold that year.
6. Number of French casualties at Waterloo (41,000)
If only they had applied for PPE instead.
7. Number of people who voted Conservative in Glasgow in the last General Election.
8. Tesco Club Card holders
This one comes courtesy of food writer Jack Munroe.
Over 17 million people use a Tesco Club Card. I know, this frankly ludicrous figure shocked me too. An Oxbridge degree might be great but it’s not going to get you very far if you’re passionate about discounted produce and supermarket reward schemes.
There ends our list. We hope you learnt as much as we did along the way.
You can catch Love Island tonight on ITV2 at 9pm. I suggest you do.