Deceit is integral to success in Destination X

Travel and trickery make for a miserable journey

Cameron Wiltshire-Plant

Cameron is training to be a vicar in the city of Leicester.

A composite images show a map of Europe with Destination X contestants pictures above.

BBC.

Like me, you may have recently been watching Destination X, where 13 contestants compete to win £100,000 by guessing where the coach they are travelling on has stopped. Blocked from seeing out of the windows and given just a few clues to their locations, the contestants have to work out where they are. Similar to Traitors, it tries to give reality TV a respectability while also providing the gossipy drama that underpins the format.

Opportunities for extra clues are possible, with contestants competing against each other to receive them. Only some of the competitors are allowed to view the extra clues. This secret knowledge quickly causes thirteen pretty nice contestants to mistrust, lie, suspect, accuse, and keep secrets. After three new players are added in, there is a clear divide between the ‘OGs’ and the rest. It reminded me of Lord of the Flies, with alliances, rivalries, and judgements of player’s usefulness taking scarily little time to flourish.

The breaking of societal expectations to be truthful, reliable, and work for the common good is perhaps the appeal of these shows. The Judeo-Christian Ten Commandments still underpin the Western world, and lying, greed, and selfishness are all still denounced as wrong by mainstream ethics. There is an enormous amount of talk in Destination X, as there is in the Traitors, about ‘playing the game;’ legitimising breaking normal behaviour in order to win the competition. We watch on, enjoying the chance to wonder how we would manage in a world where lying, cheating, and manipulating is expected and encouraged by the rules of the game.

The thing is, breaking these rules seems to make everybody so miserable. In the first episode, Deborah won a big clue, chose only to share it with one teammate, and was so burdened by the guilty secret that she lost the first location test and left the game immediately. In another episode, some OGs win a challenge and choose to deliberately misinform the others, including the rest of their gang. When the disinformation is revealed, and directly causes the exit of another OG, the sense of guilt as others realise the deception is plain to the viewer. Time after time, players begrudge ‘the game’ for the lies they are telling- but it is their own decision to keep the secrets to themselves.

Perhaps the most striking thing is how quickly people lose track of the artifice of the game, and how integral to their reality their deceit has become. Towards the end of the series, as the money gets closer, the contestants harden further towards each other, and deception seems to come more easily. Perhaps this is why the guilt makes them miserable- with a little encouragement, their sense of right or wrong has disintegrated into instinct for survival.

The people that seem to be having the best time on Destination X are Daren and Claire, perhaps the two players who are happy to trust their colleagues the most, and lie to them the least. Both of them do better in the competition than other contestants who embrace a selfish and cynical approach.

Obviously these shows are games, and the contestants exit to their normal lives and resume being nice people. But they reveal a deeper truth that living cynically does not make a person happy. Although lying, cheating, and making the most of advantages might bring wealth, success, power, fame, and so on, living selfishly only makes a person miserable.

People who lie or cheat may seem to get ahead, but it only poisons their heart.

This reveals our design as humans to be communal, selfless beings. Describing the state of humanity before evil entered the world, the first verses of the book of Genesis describe a generous care between the first humans and their world. The very first books of the law in the Old Testament continually exhort God’s people to show love to their neighbour and compassion upon foreigners and the poor.

Jesus used to have this great phrase for those who would follow his teaching for a selfless life. He said that they would inherit ‘life to the full,’ or ‘life that is truly living.’ It was his conviction that simple acts like telling the truth, desiring others to prosper, and being generous were the way to a content and satisfied life.

But the kicker in Jesus’ teaching was not just that the person would receive a more satisfied life, but that each act would make the person more Godly. These acts stack together- to make a life of generosity rather than selfishness that nourishes our humanity- but also to form us towards being a better human. It creates a virtuous circle. A good act leads to a purer heart which leads to another good act. St Paul terms this ‘going from glory to glory’ in one of his letters encouraging a congregation to do just so. This circle deepens the contentment in the ‘life that is truly living’ that Jesus promises- living as God created humans to do reaps the relational, communal satisfaction that God intended the human experience to contain.

It works the other way too. People who lie or cheat may seem to get ahead, but it only poisons their heart. Becoming de-sensitised to their acts, further selfishness follows. Each act separates them further from the human experience they were designed to enjoy, and dissatisfaction follows. Often this is exacerbated by more attempts to cover the feeling with selfish ambition.

People who treat the real world like competitors treat Destination X, as a game to be won, with prizes that come at the cost of disinheriting others, may find wealth or power. But they will not find the contentment of life to the full that the way of Jesus offers and their humanity craves.

Whilst we sit at home enjoying players’ ability to break cultural taboos and suffer the emotional consequences, we might reflect that it is better to be content than victorious- and miserable.

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7 May 2025

4 min read

Why does the Pope matter today?

The personal, vivid link to the origins of the movement that changed the world.

Graham Tomlin

Graham is the Director of the Centre for Cultural Witness and a former Bishop of Kensington.

An Anglican bishop wearing purple shakes hands with the Pope.

The author meeting the late Pope, 2024.

There is something about the way popes are elected that captures the imagination. Whoever dreamt up the idea of black smoke for ‘no decision’, and white smoke for ‘habemus papam’ – ‘we have a new pope’ - was a genius at marketing. So much better than a press release or a tweet from the Vatican X account.

The conclave was brought to our imagination so vividly by the recent film with Ralph Fiennes. We love the idea of secret debates, intrigue, people locked away from the world until they come to a decision with arcane ancient rituals and an uncertain outcome. Was there ever a film whose release was better timed?

There are also the sheer numbers involved. There are approximately 1.4 billion Catholics in the world today – roughly the same as the population of India and China, the world most populous nations. Yet the identity of the new pope is of matters to the rest of us too. The leader of China of India is of interest especially to people living in China or India, but maybe less so for those of us who don’t. The new pope is the head of churches round the corner from where you live, or of people with whom you work, or, if you are Catholic yourself, your own spiritual leader. This appointment matters.

Yet it’s not just the optics, the drama, the numbers. And it’s not just for Catholics either. I am an Anglican, and since the Reformation of the sixteenth century, we have had in our own 39 Articles the statement: “The Bishop of Rome hath no jurisdiction in this Realm of England.” That might seem to settle the matter that it’s of no interest to English Protestants. But that would be wrong.

I met Pope Francis once. It was at a gathering of Anglican Archbishops in Rome last year. We all were led through magnificent Vatican corridors into an imposing state room, adorned with fantastic frescoes, where the white-robed Holy Father was brought in on his wheelchair to deliver a brief 20-minute homily to us all.

It was a good talk, thoughtful, well-constructed, but in many ways unremarkable. It didn’t say anything much that I hadn’t heard from other sources. Yet somehow this was different. His words carried a weight, a gravity that went beyond the content of the lecture itself. It was as if, when he entered that room, he carried with him two thousand years of church history.

The line of Bishops of Rome goes back to St Peter, the gruff, unschooled fisherman who Jesus called from his mundane life to become an apostle, and who then on, was so captured by the person of Jesus that he gave his life in the cause. I left that room conscious of the weight of the office of the papacy, even if I don’t recognise him as my direct spiritual father.

Listening to this successor of St Peter felt like you were listening to one of the friends of Jesus – and this was not just the personal quality of the man himself, but something about the office he occupied. It was a personal, vivid link to the origins of the Christian movement, the first stirrings of the revolution.

The papacy is one of those unique things in modern life - an umbilical link to the past.

Of course, there have been some pretty terrible occupants of the papal see, whose personal lives showed scant evidence of any knowledge of, or relationship with Jesus. The sixteenth century Roderigo Borgia (Pope Alexander VI) comes to mind, who despite the rule on clerical celibacy, had several children from various mistresses, won the Papacy by bribing cardinals, and made his favourite son bishop of several lucrative sees at the age of eighteen, and a cardinal at nineteen. So, there is nothing automatic about this – which is why the Protestant Reformers denied the idea of any blanket automatic papal authority.

Yet when a person of evident holiness is combined with this notion of the weight of the office, the papacy becomes a gift to all of us, linking us back to the earliest followers of Jesus – even to Jesus himself.

The papacy is one of those unique things in modern life - an umbilical link to the past. Monarchies do something similar – linking us to the past through the long line of kings and queens of England, Denmark, Spain or wherever, yet more often than not, the events they lead us back to, the process by which those families took power, reveal murky politics, bribery and bloody battles.

This is a line in history that links us to the event that, if Tom Holland’s Dominion is to be believed, has had more impact in shaping western culture than any other – the remarkable life, death and resurrection of Jesus – a radical life full of love, self-giving and transformative power – for both individuals and whole civilisations. And for that, whether we are Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, or even, perhaps, unbeliever, we might raise a prayer - or a glass - of thanksgiving.