Spoiler alert if you record the show like I do. And, yeah, American Idol is one of my many guilty pleasures along with Ru Paul's Drag Race and Top Chef. Tonight, nine contestants were up for elimination and one of the obvious potential finalists, Pia Toscano, got sent packing.
So, once again, the flaws in the show are glaring. When you allow the American public to vote in a competition like this you can almost bet on a bad choice.
Pia Toscano, granted, was one of those diva-style singers I detest. Well, that style at least. Like rap, I was hoping America was done with that stuff back in the '90s, and maybe this result is final notice for divadom; but, that aside, the girl could REALLY sing. After all, American Idol is a singing competition despite the chosen genre of the singer.
Whatever happens after this though, Pia Toscano will have a huge recording career. I'm sure there are plenty of people talking to her right now who are thankful that she won't be bound by any contracts with Idol other than their summer tour.
I think what happened tonight is that the vast majority of people voting on Idol are young, white girls. Period. The other two hopefuls in the bottom three were a black male and a kinda Latino, ethnicy looking male. The highest vote getters, your top six, are all white.
You can further add into the mix that the other two in the bottom, Jacob Lusk and Stefano Langone, set my gaydar off like nobody's business. Not totally sure about Stefano but Jacob is so obviously gay and in denial that it's just silly. There was an awkward little clip on this evening's show where he flirted with a rather large black girl in the TMZ studios that was as uncomfortable as going back and watching old movies where Rock Hudson kisses Hollywood's most famous leading ladies.
Maybe you remember Adam Lambert and that whole scene with him being gay. America caught on to that late in the season as if it wasn't obvious from day one and I think America is getting a little more sophisticated with their advance gay warning systems.
Just a side note, I stopped watching last season after my favorite, Siobhan Magnus, got sent home way too early and the god awful and talentless Lee Dewyze ended up winning so I'm glad I stopped in time.
The big deal though is that Idol does get careers launched and gets people discovered. Sure, they usually end up in the kind of trajectory where people are writing made for radio pablum for them to fill our ears with but still ... I enjoy that there is that kind of opportunity for talented people who want that sort of path to be able to pursue it. Good for them.
But to think that an elimination by voting system is going to get you the best is just way off base. I'll just keep saying George W. Bush every time the benefits of a democratic system are mentioned.
I'd like to add a little comment about a remark Jacob Lusk made on the show. The performances this week were taken from anything from an artist in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. To say that the term "rock and roll" is used loosely here is an understatement. Jacob Lusk was at first going to perform rock and roller Marvin Gaye's "Let's Get it On" but backed out over moral concerns. And yes, he's that much in denial.
So, he went with rock and roller Michael Jackson's "Man in the Mirror". Being asked about the choice to change songs he said that if he was in the bottom three this week it would be due to America's inability to look in the mirror at themselves. Let me just say that, if I was gay, I'd be the loudest, proudest queer on this planet. And I think it's high time Jacob Lusk took a look in his mirror and started being real about himself and encourage other gay kids who watch Idol that you don't have to live that kind of closeted life just because of your religion and your family.
He needs to do himself and his future wife/beard a favor and man up and grow a pair. Don't get me wrong, the kid is a mind-blowingly phenomenal talent. Maybe the best singer who has ever been on Idol. It just sets gay people and especially gay teens back years when guys like him are afraid to face the man in their mirror.
In other news this week, great movie came out on DVD, "I Love You Phillip Morris" starring Jim Carey and Ewan McGregor. It's got a pretty good bit of graphic guy on guy sex stuff in it and I'm already getting the anticipated Bible Belt feedback at my work.
For all the gay people out there who have to deal with straight folk douchebags on a daily basis, please let me apologize. I know that you know that we're not all like that but I'm sure it's easy to forget from time to time.
Populist rants from a little blue dot in deep red Alabama.
Thursday, April 7, 2011
Sunday, April 3, 2011
Bob Parsons - Douchebag of the Month (For March at Least)
Recently, GoDaddy.com founder, Bob Parsons, caused a stir with a video he posted on his own blog of him on a visit to Zimbabwe. The video is of him with an elephant he has killed and then feeding villagers, wearing GoDaddy caps, with the carcass.
Parsons has explained the killing as a humanitarian effort. The elephant was trashing the crops of the villagers and by killing the elephant and using it as food he has saved several of these villagers from starvation.
So, let's be clear; Bob Parsons is one of those self-made men you occasionally run across in our wonderful, capitalist system. He came up having nothing, according to him, and, simply through the will to be successful, has made millions. He's driven by intense greed and the need to constantly prove himself. I guess he's what Ayn Rand would call a prime mover.
In the case of Bob Parsons, however, he's made his money off of reinventing what's already out there. First, making and selling home accounting software, then taking domain name registration and turning it into the sex and testosterone driven thing that is GoDaddy.
I guess that if I had the seed money, and the greed, and lack of scruples I could take something like a library, advertise it with sex, make the librarians look like Hooters girls and make a fortune.
Anyway, regardless of how Bob Parsons got to where he is, the primary thing is that guys like him strive constantly to prove themselves to themselves. They have to continually press the point home that they are something extra.
Killing elephants is right up the alley of guys like this, like Ted Nugent stuff. "I'm a self-made man, and yeah, I'm killing a beautiful and smart creature, get over it!" That sort of thing. "Nobody tells me how to live; I'm a self-made man!" It's what I like to call douchebaggery.
Bob Parsons has gone to lengths to justify killing elephants after backlash from groups like PETA who nobody pays any attention to anymore. PETA has become so extreme that it's easy for anybody to discount them. They just give Bob Parsons the opportunity to look good to other conservative douchebags out there. Well, I feel pretty safe in assuming that Bob Parsons is a conservative. Smells like one.
At any rate, if it were about the villagers, Bob Parsons could easily take the money he spends on weapons, guides, planes, etc. on a trip to Zimbabwe, and give them enough protein to last a year rather than the week's worth of meat they get from an elephant. He could erect barriers to keep the elephants away from the crops, arm the villagers with elephant guns, all that.
Bob Parsons just wants to kill an elephant because killing a beautiful and powerful creature makes him feel powerful.
What kind of sick fuck just wants to kill an elephant? What kind of sick fuck would then try to justify it as a humanitarian effort? Well, the same kind of sick fuck who would sell internet domain name registration by using implied lesbian sex in Super Bowl ads. The kind of sick fuck who must constantly seek to prove himself to himself. My guess is that penis enlargement surgery wasn't an option for Bob Parsons and he has to seek other ways to prove his manliness.
I agree with PETA that we should boycott GoDaddy but, as always, that just feeds the need. Any PETA protest just cements the deal for all the other douchebags out there who equate domain name registration with hot lesbian sex. That category would be poorly endowed, conservative, American males, aka, Tea Party folks.
Runner up: Charlie Sheen. No need to go into that.
Parsons has explained the killing as a humanitarian effort. The elephant was trashing the crops of the villagers and by killing the elephant and using it as food he has saved several of these villagers from starvation.
So, let's be clear; Bob Parsons is one of those self-made men you occasionally run across in our wonderful, capitalist system. He came up having nothing, according to him, and, simply through the will to be successful, has made millions. He's driven by intense greed and the need to constantly prove himself. I guess he's what Ayn Rand would call a prime mover.
In the case of Bob Parsons, however, he's made his money off of reinventing what's already out there. First, making and selling home accounting software, then taking domain name registration and turning it into the sex and testosterone driven thing that is GoDaddy.
I guess that if I had the seed money, and the greed, and lack of scruples I could take something like a library, advertise it with sex, make the librarians look like Hooters girls and make a fortune.
Anyway, regardless of how Bob Parsons got to where he is, the primary thing is that guys like him strive constantly to prove themselves to themselves. They have to continually press the point home that they are something extra.
Killing elephants is right up the alley of guys like this, like Ted Nugent stuff. "I'm a self-made man, and yeah, I'm killing a beautiful and smart creature, get over it!" That sort of thing. "Nobody tells me how to live; I'm a self-made man!" It's what I like to call douchebaggery.
Bob Parsons has gone to lengths to justify killing elephants after backlash from groups like PETA who nobody pays any attention to anymore. PETA has become so extreme that it's easy for anybody to discount them. They just give Bob Parsons the opportunity to look good to other conservative douchebags out there. Well, I feel pretty safe in assuming that Bob Parsons is a conservative. Smells like one.
At any rate, if it were about the villagers, Bob Parsons could easily take the money he spends on weapons, guides, planes, etc. on a trip to Zimbabwe, and give them enough protein to last a year rather than the week's worth of meat they get from an elephant. He could erect barriers to keep the elephants away from the crops, arm the villagers with elephant guns, all that.
Bob Parsons just wants to kill an elephant because killing a beautiful and powerful creature makes him feel powerful.
What kind of sick fuck just wants to kill an elephant? What kind of sick fuck would then try to justify it as a humanitarian effort? Well, the same kind of sick fuck who would sell internet domain name registration by using implied lesbian sex in Super Bowl ads. The kind of sick fuck who must constantly seek to prove himself to himself. My guess is that penis enlargement surgery wasn't an option for Bob Parsons and he has to seek other ways to prove his manliness.
I agree with PETA that we should boycott GoDaddy but, as always, that just feeds the need. Any PETA protest just cements the deal for all the other douchebags out there who equate domain name registration with hot lesbian sex. That category would be poorly endowed, conservative, American males, aka, Tea Party folks.
Runner up: Charlie Sheen. No need to go into that.
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