Since MTV’s latest reality show The Valleys aired earlier this week, the show has come in for a lot of criticism from the media and from viewers who claim that the stars of the show are casting Wales in a bad light.

The first episode of the new show featured members of the cast flashing their boobs, urinating on each other and swearing… a lot.

Rhondda MP Chris Bryant said, “It’s all about people getting very drunk and being as deliberately outrageous as they possibly can be.

“That’s not what the Valleys are like.”

Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood added that The Valleys is “cheap, tacky and over-promoted”.

And on Twitter, one viewer wrote, “I’m now British not Welsh…”

However, Anna Kelle – who mentors the younger cast members on the show – has hit back, saying on Radio 1’s Newsbeat, “They’re kids having fun.

“I’m 31. At 16, 17, I got my bum out, flashed my boobs. Who hasn’t?”

And The Valleys star Nicole Morris added, “It’s not for old people, for nannas and stuff.

“If you’ve got a bum like me, let me tell you it’s banging, so get it out.”

Well, as I reported after seeing an advance screening of the first episode – and despite being a nanna myself – I loved the show…

I thought it was extremely funny, and I have to say, the people who have taken exception to it and how it represents Wales need to take a step back and note that The Valleys isn’t saying it represents Wales.

So if that’s your issue, get over it. At no point has any of the cast implied that they’re representing – or representative of – Wales. And you’d have to be a tad dumb to think that any reality TV show is a realistic snapshot of any particular place…

Except maybe TOWIE... I jest…

What did you think of The Valleys?