Somebody please explain to me why we even watch American Idol?

[keithyboy]

The last episode convinced my it's not about talent. Racism is still alive and well. And white people in America will never be objective, honest, of fair. And before you attack me...please know, I am not an African-American.

[JanMichael]

1. I've never seen an episode. However I feel your pain.

Metaphorically that is.

[LittleApple81]

2. I only watch it when channel surfing. And that is plenty! n/t

[MissB]

3. Can you explain for a non-viewer?

I don't watch reality tv, so I'm puzzled by what you said about racism and AI. Can you tell me what happened?

[MSgt213]

4. Because we are poor pitiful fools with no desire to think

[Syrinx]

5. I guess racism explains Ruben beating Clay Aiken last year, too.

[bkcc]

6. that's only part of the problem

Is there racism involved in the voting?
Probably to some extent.

I think the major problem with the voting on that show is the dumb little white teen girls who vote for the cutest boy contestant, rather than the most talented.

How else can you explain that dopey looking redheaded kid making it this far? He's dreadful. Actually, the whole show is dreadful, but he's bad enough that he rises head and shoulders above the pack with his lack of talent.

[sadiesworld]

7. "we" don't

[City Lights]

15. Thank you, sadiesworld.

:-)

[Liberal Veteran]

8. I don't think it's racism....

I think last week was a fluke of three very simlarly talented women having the voting pool split between them.

Jennifer did NOT deserve a boot before the crooner, but Latoya and Fantasia are both better singers than her in my opinion.

Fantasia's rendition of Summertime was so good, I became an instant fan, but I think Latoya has more presense.

[TeeYiYi]

22. Fantasia rocks my socks . . .

. . . that performance of Summertime blew me away. I hope they release that on DVD with some of her other performances. Although not her very best vocally, I thought her gospel take on a Barry Manilow tune Tuesday night was stellar. I'd love to have that on DVD as well. I hope Fantasia takes it all.

I thought Jennifer Hudson's performance Tuesday night was the best of the evening. Her voice is amazingly powerful. She did a duo with Barry Manilow on Ryan Seacrest's show yesterday, and after a rough start (on Barry's part) he turned the song over to her and she owned it. She obviously didn't deserve to be voted off Wednesday night but I'll bet she's signing a recording contract as we speak.

TYY

[cosmicdot]

9. don't know, can't tell ya ... but, I share your pain, too

[Warpy]

10. My gawd, the MATERIAL

...they give those poor kids to sing! That stuff was old when I was young, and I'm older than dirt.

Why do they try to force these kids into lounge act material? Why do they discourage them from doing their own material? Why don't they broaden their focus to include stuff other than old age home music and sappy pop songs?

That's why I gave up on it. All that hackneyed crap is boring, no matter how talented the singer.

[Scurrilous]

30. I agree...

My 13 year old daughter watches the show. When I saw that the contestants were going to sing Barry Manilow songs, I asked myself how Barry went from being a punchline ( John Bender: Does Barry Manilow know that you raid his wardrobe?) to having his songs sung on a top-rated television show. Is there some rule that these poor kids must sing crappy material?

[Toucano]

11. I don't think it's necessarily racism.

I think people who favor the OBVIOUSLY more talented people like Jennifer and Fantasia tend to take for granted that they will win.

You noticed how George went to La Toya, Fantasia and Jennifer's group when he was told to go join the top group? He, like many others, assumed La Toya, Jennifer and Fantasia were safe.

Deranged freaks who like John Stevens are more apt to vote because they know he needs their vote.

:) Just 2 cents.

[TeeYiYi]

24. That's exactly what happened. . . .

It's time to start voting for who you want to win and not for who you don't want voted off. I think that the only way the AI voting system will ever be fair is if they start charging a dollar a vote.

I'll be throwing a few votes at Fantasia next week. :7

TYY

[lastknowngood]

12. I don't as a matter of fact I watch no network tele. I watch tapes

discovery, comedy central and National Geo. I can't watch that mindless drivel anymore it hurts my brain.

[AlCzervik]

13. I stopped after last year

actually i stopped watching most reality tv cept for survivor and i only watch the last 10 mins of that. I watch alot of cspan and than the exact opposite...comedy central.

[unblock]

14. you've never heard of splitting the vote?

first off, having people vote for their favorite person in order to determine the least favorite person is actually stupid already. if the goal is to determine who gets the boot, people should vote for the person they want to see booted.

so, surviving in a large field only requires a modest following. the folks who ended up in the bottom three had the problem that they all needed votes from the same market segment -- they split the vote among people who like talented, powerful, female, gospelly (to varying degress) singers.

bottom line is that the voting methodology is flawed. the most talented person can certainly get the boot with the wrong combination of competitors.

oh and, btw, phones were down in chicago (the loser's hometown) during the voting due to a tornado. that might have had something to do with it....

[MrSandman]

16. WE?

:puke:

[Oddman]

17. What network is American Idol on?

Is it Fox?

[NNN0LHI]

18. We? Got a mouse in your pocket? I have never seen a minute of it n/t

[unblock]

19. another methodology problem: busy signals

the idiots have separate phone numbers for each contestant.

a FAIR contest would have a single number, then you vote by touch-toning your vote. easy 'nuff.

the problem with having separate phone numbers is that each number only has so much capacity. so people get busy signals. that happens when there's only one number, but when there are different numbers, the busy signals affect different contestants differently.

consider how the ruben/clay final was oh so close: each phone line was PEGGED. at&t was probably taking phone calls as fast as they could process them. up to the limit on both lines. they can only process so many calls in a given time frame (this in part depends on how the phone company has configured handling the line, which, in turn, depends on what the goals of the american idol producers are). so, say they can handle about 1,000 calls per minute. each minute, clay got 1,000 and ruben got 999. next minute, clay gets 998 and ruben gets 1,001. clay might have been twice as popular, or half as popular, but as long as both had enough fans to reach at&t's limits, we'll never know. so the winner was probably determined based on the dumb luck of random timing that led to more successful calls going through on ruben's line than on clay's.

at least that would explain why the vote was so close. maybe the vote honestly was really close, but we'll never know because the methodology is so flawed.

[pop goes the weasel]

20. something to talk about with our moms

Most of us have families who are just nice, average people. Sometimes we are lucky, and they share our politics and religion. Sometimes we aren't. American Idol exists so that we can say, when the conversation turns to why we never go to church with them, "Speaking of church, did you know that girl you like on Idol started singing with her church choir when she was 4?" And thus, family harmony is preserved, and all "we" had to do was read a couple of gossip columns and catch 5 minutes of the show.

[LizW]

32. LOL

That is so funny 'cause it's true! :D

[Lars39]

21. The cartoon maxim: Never watch anything dumber than yourself.

Life's too short.

[question everything]

23. I can't. I don't.

I watch 24 and switching to Fox right before it starts, having to watch the last minute or so of Idol is painful.

[Fescue4u]

25. Oh save the damn race card

13 year girls voted for the "cute boys"

Im so sick of racism being used to explain how the universe works.

[Skittles]

26. speak for yourself

I don't watch such utter garbage

[malachibk]

27. Actually, there was a power outage

in the Midwest that prevented tens of thousands of calls from getting through. Heard it on CNN.

This Jennifer Hudson fan will expect to see ALL seven back next week since my girl deserves to stay!

[MrSlayer]

28. Who is this "We" you are referring to?

You have a mouse in your pocket? I wouldn't be caught dead watching that crap.

[kimchi]

29. Because my toddler loves to watch people sing.

She has a fit if you turn the channel. I can't believe that red-headed kid even made it to the top ten. Must be the sympathy vote, cause he can't sing.

[aquaman]

31. The vast amount of the population that watches this crap.....

further proves that there are a significant number of people that are really boring and intellectually challenged.

[LizW]

35. Oh, save your pop culture snobbery

What do you do, perform nightly works of Shakespeare for your family?

[aquaman]

37. I can say whatever the hell I want......

ya dingleberry. Boo.....

[nonconformist]

33. The problem is people purposely sabotaging the show

Some people vote repeatedly for the token bad contestant, in this case John Stevens, because they think it's funny. There are plenty of them that organize on other message boards. Now, this season it's been more successful than most others - probably because the "success" of William Hung has made a complete mockery of the show.

[No2W2004]

34. The only things I know about it

are one of the judges is an asshole and some guy was so bad on it that now he's making thousands of dollars for appearing around the country and repeating his awful performance.

Only network show I watch is The Simpsons when I remember it's on.

[Heyo]

36. I have a theory....

I only skimmed the thread, so forgive me if this threory has been floated...

I am not an avid viewer but my girl is so I watch....

Anyway, do you think it's posible that the three girls who sang best, did SO well, that people neglected to vote for them because they were just sure they would win and they didn't need to vote?

I mean, since it's just a 2 second phone call sometimes I vote...

And I thought those girls, one in particular did damn god.. but I was all on the coutch with my blanket and the cat resting on me.. phone on it's cradle in the kitchen which is like 10,000 miles away. (15 feet)

So I didn't vote.. I was sure they'd win.

I wonder if they killed their chances by being too good.

That version of 'Mandy' was WEAK, as nice of a guy as the dude is.

Heyo

[et in Arcadia ego...]

38. Thanks, but I'd rather see reruns of the Monkees.

Actually, I've never seen this so-called American Idolatry show.