Talent, humility, and specialness

Okay, I find myself getting peeved at how democracy has affected everything. There's a mentality out there which democratizes suffering by saying stuff like, "Everyone suffers." Well, yeah, everyone suffers. But a woman suffering in India because she lost four children has suffered more than a rich man in America who has lost all his money. Plain and simple. Perhaps we democratize suffering because we don't want to be left out...we don't want to think we really should worry a little more about other people...or perhaps we just want to always be equal to everyone.

The same thing goes for the idea of talent. Did you see American Idol last night? I swear I am so in love with that little kid David Archuleta. Talent, charisma, humility.

I didn't know I was such a respector of knowledge and authority. But folks whose job it is to know talent and to understand giftedness should be respected. Trust me, I'm not Little Miss Superwriter but I know what it's like to butt my head against a wall trying to talk to a writer who thinks she doesn't have anything else to learn. So let's get to the point: Simon Cowell knows his stuff and when any contestant starts arguing back with him I get just about as steamed as Simon does. I'm like...who do you think you are kid, talking back to Simon like that?

Okay, okay, I understand that Simon has had his moments of extreme shallowness when he picks on a singer's personal appearance and I don't much like that -- he's a rich milliionarie who hangs around the pretty people. That kind of shallowness shouldn't surprise anyone. But when it comes to singing and knowing what talent is...Simon is dead on.

Last night Simon told a guy with no charisma that the guy had no charisma. The guy said he did. Upshot..i don't even remember the guy's name. If I don't remember his name, then the guy's charisma didn't make him memorable. I don't know what charisma is all about or if there is generalized charisma and specialized charisma. (Some folks have a face which feel as if they are overflowing with joy or have a deep grief or are very simply loving or good people. Some have a kind of demonic charisma.) Maybe there's a kind of charisma this particular guy has .....he just doesn't have it in a general way. I don't want to heal him, care for him, protect him, or sleep with him. Nothing about him attracts or makes him memorable and there he was talking back to Simon. Simon told him pretty much to stop whining and asked that if it was the Oscar show the music would've started to drown him out....and mercifully the music came on. I just don't like folks who aren't humble or who have way too much sass. As Simon said, "You are a quite-good singer but you are not an idol, you are not a star." So why can't these folks accept their small talent or work to make it better? Why can't they just accept the fact that perhaps they are a little mediocre? Why the heck do they want to believe they are stars already? It just makes anyone with a teacher's soul want to scream.

Other guys i DO like and who i voted for were Jason Castro. Gosh, is he a sweetie. Very kind face....almost feminine. Dreadlocks. Sensitive soul. Then there was David Hernandez...who didn't do much for me but who is really talented. So there's Jason who needs to bring more game and show his stuff more and is cute, then there's David H who always sings wonderfully and whom i feel other women would like but who does zip for me...and then there's David Archuleta who is a sweet good little kid from Utah....with the most wonderful talent.

Will see what happens with the women tonight. I can only hope I don't have to deal with listening to their attitudes.

Face it, American Idol Rejects, the audience just wasn’t into you.

I've got to be one of the most uneasy fans of American Idol. I guess it's because I want the black singers to do well after they've won the show. Fantasia is on broadway, Jennifer Hudson won an Oscar. But what about Ruben? And none of these folks have had the radio success as Carrie Underwood and Kelly Clarkson.

But there's something else that makes me uneasy. It's seeing the utter lack of sportsmanship on the part of the American Idol castoffs.

I swear! Not only do some folks not know when they have it good, they don’t know it when they have it bad. It might only be me. (I’ve got issues, I’ll admit it.) But frankly, I am getting very tired of seeing recent American Idol Rejects making the talk-show circuit complaining about their terrible lot in life.

With the noble exception of Brandon Rogers, who laughed at himself and was amazingly gracious, the common complaint from these castoffs seem to be that the judges wronged them somehow.

These folks – notice I don’t call them “losers” – say:

 They lost themselves somehow because they were trying to please the judges.
 They sang in a different style from Melinda and Lakisha and the judges were always comparing them to better singers.
 The audience understood neither they nor their creativity.

Okay, folks, whatever happened to graciousness?

Puhleze! Flip the channel over to C-Span and see how true competitors accept defeat. Learn a lesson or two. Say how wonderful your competitors were! Say humble, self-deprecating stuff. Tell us what a wonderful experience it all was and how blessed you felt to even have been nominated! Say, you are the luckiest person in the world for having had such a wonderful opportunity to experience the joy and character-building that was American Idol. Say something nice, for heaven’s sake! I, for one, will like you much better if you do. Have you no gratefulness for having arrived so far? Good Lord, folks! You got to be on television and taste fame! You’re going on the national tour, for heaven’s sake! That’s more than the rest of us can say.

Whatever happened to self-assessment?

I’m not saying you were bad singers. Hey, I’ll shout it out: you all were good singers. But you just weren’t THAT good. The voice is an instrument. You had no control over it. A star should be able to hear advice and comments without faltering. Admit that the audience did understand your limitations – lack of talent, lack of personality—and we just weren’t so into you.

In one interview, Chris Sligh said he tried to be different but the judges just didn’t understand him. Okay, perhaps he was trying to be different. I kinda saw it. But, the guy didn’t have the musical skills in him to be different. Let’s not think of ourselves more highly than we ought to think. Compared to Chris Richardson and Blake Lewis, Chris Sligh just wasn't able to show the music flowing in his soul. Chris Sligh's CD, Take a Chance on Something Beautiful is super! But he obviously wasn't able to bring it before a live audience. A good storyteller should be able to tell someone else's story in addition to his own, and he should be able to tell the story to a large audience. Others simply didn’t understand music. Period. Only a good storyteller can go without a plot, and some of these folks were novices when it came to understanding the elements of musical storytelling. Okay, I understand the need to defend oneself after being slammed in front of America and after not receiving enough votes from the audience. I’d be on the defensive too! But check the “misunderstood artist ego” at the exit door, guys. Buck up, and shut up.

The women, alas, have been the worst at whining.
From The Ellen Degeneres show to The View to American Idol Extra to Regis and Kelly, these cast-off women are complaining that

 Judges Paula, Simon, and Randy—were always comparing them to better singers, Melinda Dolittle and Lakisha Jones who had different “styles” than they did.
 Their feelings were hurt.
 The judges turned the audience against them.

Whining Women, please, please stop it! Chill, please! Stop hinting you were robbed! You weren’t!

 First of all, it’s a competition. Your feelings are going to get hurt. It’s called show business. It’s not a talent show. Folks aren’t lining up to praise you. We ain’t family, and this ain’t church.
 Secondly, admit your imperfection. LEARN to admit it. If Melinda and Lakisha had sung the songs you had chosen and performed them in the same singing styles you did – all things being equal—those girls would have sung those songs waaay better than you.
 Thirdly, and most important: you gals don’t seem to acknowledge that you – who are, for the most part. pretty gorgeous—have benefited from some advantages. Why aren’t you talking about that? Racism and Ageism still exist, girls! Your skin color, sexy dresses, thinness, and youth certainly didn’t hurt you. But why aren’t you talking about that?

In the Book of Ecclesiastes, The Preacher states, “the race is not to the rich, nor bread to the wise, nor favor to men of understanding, but time and chance happens to all men.” We humans complain all the time when we don’t get things we think we deserve. But do we ever complain when we get good things we don’t deserve? Heck, I for one, know I’ve gotten a few jobs that others were better qualified for. And certainly in the eyes of many, I (overweight, vaguely depressed, dark-skinned,) don’t deserve the saintly handsome studly Irish-American artist hubby I’m married to.

In our society, Youth, Thinness, and Beauty expect to win. Folks who live entitled lives – people with wealth, beauty, youth, blonde hair, light-colored skin—don’t realize how favored they often are. And when challenged by actually having to earn something girls like Stephanie, Haley, Gina, and Sabrina get all hot and bothered and whiny. Part of their sorrow is forgivable. They’ve lost a competition. I can accept that. But the other part of their sorrow – the angry part-- is surprise and outrage. This is the aspect of their sorrow which I personally cannot accept. Suddenly their beauty and youth aren’t working for them and – Aargh—their world topples. They are losing to women who – in their opinion—are not as beautiful as they are. Beauty, they believe should win, and so they spend my valuable television-viewing time hinting that somehow Lakisha and Melinda have robbed them. Unfortunately in this season’s American Idol, those gals who had depended on their youth and beauty to open doors, are being faced with the real world and they can’t handle it.

Recent mentor, Peter Noone, challenged Judge Simon Cowell’s contention that American Idol was a talent competition, stating flat-out that it was a voting competition. True. And Sanjaya Malakhar’s position in the top ten attests to that. But this also a talent competition. Flat-out. The female winners of American Idol tend to be women who are either

 talented, or
 talented and beautiful.

Beautiful untalented women have never won and they never will. In that little area of the beauty-obsessed entertainment world some fairness exists.

You American Idol losers should just accept this sad fact: they just weren’t good enough. Then maybe I won’t think you’re all such losers!