Sexism on American Idol

By: Freewomyn

Last night, Simon Cowell put his foot in it again when he make sexist comments after the performance of Haley Scarnato. “I think you’ve got a very good tactic at the moment, Haley. Wear as least amount of clothes as possible.” (Never mind the poor grammar or the fact that Simon is English and should have a mastery of the language by now.) This follows Simon’s remarks after last week’s performance, when he told Haley “you’ve got great legs,” rather than commenting on the quality of her performance.

Let’s pretend for a moment that American Idol is a job interview and that Simon is Haley’s prospective boss. Under any other circumstances, what Simon said would be considered sexual harassment. However, when polled by US Weekly, 63% of viewers said that they didn’t think the remarks were sexist.

It may be true that Haley isn’t the best singer in the group. But I think that telling her that she should rely on sex appeal to gain popularity sends a dangerous message to the young girls who are the show’s target audience. (Can we ever forget the shots of that little blonde girl with the unibrow crying over Sanjaya?) In this kind of climate, is it any wonder that starlets like Paris Hilton and Britney Spears feel that they have to bear their goodies to get attention?

To Haley’s credit, she responded very diplomatically to Simon’s comments by saying that she “appreciate[s] all the judges.” I think that Haley may end up with a very good singing career, even if she doesn’t win the competition. She has lasted this far, even though Simon couldn’t remember her name during the first two episodes of the Final 12. She fell down on stage and got back up again. And I think that she will bounce back from this week’s comments as well, even if she doesn’t run out to join her local chapter of NOW. Keep on singin’ Haley.