take that, american idol
I started a post last night that was a bit of an American Idol rant. Okay, so all of it was an American idol rant. But I didn’t finish it cos I got distracted by mom’s display of shopping exploits from her recently-returned trip from India. (She bought me some pretty cool stuff too…yippee. It almost makes up for not having been able to go there myself.)
Suffice to say that I was pissed off that Mandisa was voted off, and I’ll probably never watch American Idol ever again. Guess America just can’t handle the idea of a big, beautiful, smart, sassy, self-assured Black woman who can sing better than most of the other contestants ‘making it’ in pop culture. Not a surprise, but still disappointing. I realize it’s a bit of a flaky thing to get upset about, but you gotta indulge yourself sometimes.
Meanwhile, I applied for my share of the ‘Progress Package’ last night (also known as the gentle-reminder-to-vote-for-the-‘right’-party-at-the-upcoming-General-Elections package). I mean seriously, does the government really think that folks who are on the fence about voting PAP at the GE are gonna be convinced by throwing some money at them? Cos frankly, I’m insulted. $600 is not enough to buy my vote. And I just thought it was kinda lame that they kept emphasizing that the Workfare Bonus is just a one-time handout and not a welfare policy. Welfare is such a dirty word to this government. They might as well just come out and say straight up, “Look, ya’ll can forget about us ever implementing any kind of policies that will structurally even out the wealth gap. We might hand you a few crumbs now and then, but don’t go getting any ideas about, (gasp), redistributing wealth towards the poor. Cause, ya know, they’re just not working hard enough.” As opposed to corporate CEOs and millionaire businessmen who sit in air-conditioned offices all day making big decisions and signing important papers. Oh, and playing golf. Playing a lot of golf. Boy that's hard work.
Then again, I’m reminded of the first 2 lines in one of my favourite Dead Prez songs (the secret track on the Let’s Get Free album):
You can’t fool all the people all of the time
But if you fool the right ones, then the rest will fall behind
Some might argue, however, that I have no reason to complain. I get 600 free dollars simply for being a Singaporean. Aah, membership sure has its privileges.
Suffice to say that I was pissed off that Mandisa was voted off, and I’ll probably never watch American Idol ever again. Guess America just can’t handle the idea of a big, beautiful, smart, sassy, self-assured Black woman who can sing better than most of the other contestants ‘making it’ in pop culture. Not a surprise, but still disappointing. I realize it’s a bit of a flaky thing to get upset about, but you gotta indulge yourself sometimes.
Meanwhile, I applied for my share of the ‘Progress Package’ last night (also known as the gentle-reminder-to-vote-for-the-‘right’-party-at-the-upcoming-General-Elections package). I mean seriously, does the government really think that folks who are on the fence about voting PAP at the GE are gonna be convinced by throwing some money at them? Cos frankly, I’m insulted. $600 is not enough to buy my vote. And I just thought it was kinda lame that they kept emphasizing that the Workfare Bonus is just a one-time handout and not a welfare policy. Welfare is such a dirty word to this government. They might as well just come out and say straight up, “Look, ya’ll can forget about us ever implementing any kind of policies that will structurally even out the wealth gap. We might hand you a few crumbs now and then, but don’t go getting any ideas about, (gasp), redistributing wealth towards the poor. Cause, ya know, they’re just not working hard enough.” As opposed to corporate CEOs and millionaire businessmen who sit in air-conditioned offices all day making big decisions and signing important papers. Oh, and playing golf. Playing a lot of golf. Boy that's hard work.
Then again, I’m reminded of the first 2 lines in one of my favourite Dead Prez songs (the secret track on the Let’s Get Free album):
You can’t fool all the people all of the time
But if you fool the right ones, then the rest will fall behind
Some might argue, however, that I have no reason to complain. I get 600 free dollars simply for being a Singaporean. Aah, membership sure has its privileges.
posted by burgers and durians at
9:15 PM
2 Comments:
Hey,
I luuurrve american idol. I know, the shame. I hate it cause I love it.
Yeah, Mandisa was really good. She kind of snuck up on me - I didn't notice at first, then I all of a sudden realized she was good.
I was rooting for Paris - I thought she did a killer version of "i cover the waterfront" (think that was the song - I know it was a Billie HOliday standard) in her audition. She's a really strong singer. She should stick with the torchy jazz stuff though. I mean "wind beneath my wings"? please.
I hate the bald firefighter guy. He looks like a walking penis and he sings like he's having a poo.
I hate Simon Cowell, who told one of the Black men that he "hates his smile" to and then we had to watch the sad and enraging sight of the man trying not to smile because he was embarassed.
-jlefty
I dunno, i'm started to find Paris a little annoying. She comes from a family of generations of singers, and you can tell she's already been prepped to be a performer for the rest of her life. She certainly has an amazing voice, but the reason why i loved Mandisa was cos she was so real, funny, confident, sincere. And somehow you knew this was all in spite of coming from a place of struggle.
You don't like Chris the rocker? He does have a good rocker voice, but kinda meh at the same time. What i really wanna know is why the hell Ace and Bucky are still even in the competition. My sister's description of Ace was quite fitting i thought - he's the filler guy in a boyband so that they have an odd number of people perfect for cheesy dance routines.
Simon can be really offensive sometimes, but he's also brutally honest, even if he knows it's gonna make him unpopular.
The person who i find the most annoying on the show is Paula Abdul. I mean, straight up now, Paula, do you ever have an opinion? She is so stereotypical - she almost never has anything bad to say, and when she does she tries to couch it and has trouble getting the words out. She squeels, she acts childish, and she probably doesn't understand the meaning of the words 'constructive criticism'. In other words, she's the stereotypical 'nice girl'.
Phew. I guess there was another Idol rant lurking in there that needed to get out!
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