|
So is Susan Boyle a freak? The program introduced her as one, yet she has amazing talent and is a firm favourite to win the show. However, she is in many ways a freak and this forms part of her appeal. Her voice seems wholly detached from the media generated image of what the female singer should be. Therefore, in order for the media to protect their true image of what a female singer should look like, they must treat Susan Boyle as a freak, a one-off that exists outside of conventional celebrity rules. Hence why the tabloid media constantly repeats the phrase 'hairy angel' in almost every headline concerning her1. The majority of tabloid newspapers refer to Susan Boyle the 'hairy angel', but most of the time they use inverted commas to distance themselves from the term - as if someone else created it and they are reluctantly repeating it to be factual. Yet, as far as I can see the first use of 'hairy angel' originated in a Daily Mail article by Liz 'I hate fellow women' Thomas who uses it in her headline: Middle-aged ‘hairy angel’ wipes the smile off Britain’s Got Talent judges' faces.
The article appears to have been updated numerous times, as Google has several variations cached, some with 'hairy angel' in inverted commas, some without. But the 10th of April seems to be the earliest use of the term, and judging by the rest of Liz Thomas' article I would hazard a guess that Liz came up with the term 'hairy angel': Middle-aged, dowdy, with thick eyebrows and an unfortunate gait, she couldn’t have looked less like a star... Unemployed and single, the 48-year-old has thick unkempt hair, bushy eyebrows and downy fuzz is noticeable across parts of her face. I don't think Liz Thomas has ever heard of the term 'sisterhood'. The portrayal of the tabloid media seems to be that she Susan Boyle is a freak because 'someone like her' has such an amazing voice (the telling phrase is: 'she couldn't have looked less like a star'). The tabloid media with celebrity driven gossip sales and advertising revenue have a lot invested in their view of what a star should look like, so they have to attack Susan Boyle for subverting this image. With over 100 million views on Youtube and a full diary of interviews across the world Susan Boyle would do well to turn her back on the freak show that just wanted to exploit her. Yet the 100 million plus views on Youtube shows the fascination that unusual people still hold over the public. Take Shaheen Jafargholi for example. He is presented as a nice young boy, with a single mum who shares his dream of being a star - whilst melancholy piano music is played in the background. The message is clear: support this boy. Yet for all this (and the amazing rendition of Whose Loving You by Michael Jackson) he has attracted little of the media frenzy surrounding Susan Boyle, and nowhere near as many Youtube hits. It seems that deep down we have a kind of fascination with the unsual, the freakish. TV producers know this, newspapers know this and the Daily Mail in particular exploits this.
1 - The Daily Mail has today used hairy angel in another headline - without inverted commas: No longer a hairy angel: Britain's Got Talent star Susan Boyle gets her brows plucked. The article comes complete with helpful pictures detailing a minute change of eyebrow, as if somehow this was important. The freak show tradition of a hairy women should have died out long ago, but there is little chance of this happening when the image-obsessed tabloids are still able to sell their offensive tripe.
Part 1is here For those of you who don't believe that people are judged and victimised because of their looks then I insist that you click this link and listen to Susan Boyle singing 'Cry me a river' in 1999. The CD was recorded in celebration of the millennium with 1000 copies sold. Tell me, how did no-one present at that recording do something about signing her up? It is a sublime rendition, which if performed even half as well by someone considered beautiful would have resulted in that person being signed up instantly. |
