Beckii: Schoolgirl Superstar at 14 - BBC Three
Agent F
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Just randomly switched this on. About a 14 yr old girl from the Isle of Man who is an 'internet sensation' in Japan.
Mother laughing about some Japanese man who sends her gifts and has 'befriended' the family.
"He knows they can't be boyfriend and girlfriend... there's quite an age gap... but he does like her a lot"
Yet she encourages her daughter to stay in contact with him. WTF?
Mother laughing about some Japanese man who sends her gifts and has 'befriended' the family.
"He knows they can't be boyfriend and girlfriend... there's quite an age gap... but he does like her a lot"
Yet she encourages her daughter to stay in contact with him. WTF?
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It really is a 'Deal with the Devil' type situation. Yes she gets wealth, fame and adjulation....but there's a very serious seedy side to it. It's all a bit paedo and very stalkerish. The most telling bit in that documentary is when that other wannabe idol found out that the most views of her videos were coming from middle aged men.
What God awful parents. Pushy father and far too lax mother. I mean, even the Japanese manager was telling her not to reply to the obsessive fans, yet her mother was encouraging it?!
The depressing thing was that Beckii (by the end of the documentary anyway) seemed a lot more sensible than either of them.
I'm afraid the lot of them are deluded if they think she is going to be a global star - even autotuned, she just can't sing, and her image won't have the same appeal in Europe as it does in Japan.
(Meanwhile her no 1 fan in Japan sends her a Fender bass!!!)
Personally I think she should have just enjoyed her little Japanese adventure instead of thoughts of global stardom.
The whole thing about older people talking to her sounds creepy because thats exactly what it is. Creepy. Which is sort of a shame they didnt mention a certain project. Not only did she release a photobook but she released an idol dvd. Which is essentially a DVD of her posing, dancing and being jailbait for the people who watch that shit.
According to this article, her DVD reached #8 in the Japanese DVD charts. A lot of creepy old men interested then - http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/feb/07/rebecca-flint-anime-beckii-cruel
It mentions an album in the article and has some interesting tidbits. How well did the album really do?
*nods* what I thought was telling was at one point the father said something along the lines of 'well all our money we're making from this...oh I mean HER money, HER money of course' :rolleyes:
and then later on he's trying to say that he supports her because she's making money from it that'll help her later in life etc. and that of course its hers BUT 'of course if she decides to buy me a car or something then I wouldn't say no' or words to that effect!
:rolleyes:
oh and was I the only one thinking about the Lucy Blackman case when they brought up the issue of older men showing an interest... and the mother, I think it was, tried to dismiss it by saying well ok so middle age men tend to watch her videos, its not right to just presume that their all paedo's or stalkers, they could well be perfectly nice people - ummm :-/ thats like middle aged men not being paedo's but actively seeking out young teens dancing/singing, I mean unless she really does have a good singing voice or whatever, ehh idk, I don't really buy that most of those people aren't 'buying into her' or watching her vids, whatever because their attracted to her... its def. creepy!.
Nothing wrong with that, me and my brother got the same when we were younger!
I agree with the other posters though, i was a little creeped out with the programme, if she had been my daughter i would have been extremely freaked out about the older guy sending her gifts.
Fair play to her as she's just 14 and all that, and it does take courage (I've done it myself - sang on YT)... but WTF was that?
Aye we're not sure why it mentioned an album because all she's done is singles;
http://www.cdjapan.co.jp/list_from_code_banner.html?key=494928
The two indie singles she did didnt chart at all. The single she did with the two other girls leveled out to about 98 on the top 100.
I loved the contradiction of 'Oh I only give my PO Box number to certain people' and then near the end of the program a clip of a Youtube video of her going O MY PO BOX NUMBER IS HERE
*Goes to make video of myself dancing*
Japanese people seem to love it.
Yeh, I'm guessing the producers put that in on purpose. If she was my 14 year old kid, she wouldn't be doing it.
The bit where her father said he would accept 50K for 'unsettling her' during her revision for her GCSE's and the possibility of her failing ... i thought FFS, somebody needs to prioritise.
their culture is the most obsessive in the world for a good reason, and once something starts down that mountain it keeps going ..... collecting things like katamari ..... and even when it reaches the flatlands at the bottom it keeps going
and continues until it grinds down to nothing!
but there is that conveyor belt to all this, keeps the whole thing going, so it never really stops!
but japanese culture is so alien to us that inevitably "those" things come up about it, that's OUR mentality
and there's the underlying IMAGE situation too, i think it's about the image more than the physicality and sexuality aspect (although don't go near any suspicious vending machines
and that's why you see OUR typical parental attitude to it all, and for those in the know compare the japanese parental reaction to it
for rebecca she saw the dancing as part of getting her mind off the exams, and for a bit of fun really, but now it's all SUPERSTAR and DOLLAR SIGNS glittering and such and such ..... PURE WESTERN ATTITUDE!
tell you what, she did the moves damn well, and she can be seen as a bit of a trendsetter (for that particular dance)
must also be wierd to get boxes of food though
She was on GMTV this morning with her parents too, see:- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdJn39K5a30
I'll ask my Japanese friend if she's heard of her
I do have some Japanese music, but not quite like that.
I find the stuff about middle aged men watching her creepy, sounds as if she's being exploited
Very weird to say the least, i'm pretty sure the mother is grooming her own daughter so the freaks and creeps can knock one out viewing her.
Can i just add what a stupid way to spell her name, she should be protecting her special needs daughter from the net.
Sorry i just realised thats her stage name,
I noticed this especially when she said she didn't really want to keep in contact with the older man who was sending her gifts, and that she only communicated with him because it was what her parents wanted.
I suppose its wrong of me to presume that its less safe to be a child star in Japan/Asia than the UK but for some reason it does seem dodgier...
There are loads of great J-Rock bands and musicians out there that are popular in the UK with the niche market that is available but don't really make it "big", so I highly doubt that Beckii is going to make it as big as her dad thinks, though he really doesn't come across well in the programme.
I think Beckii comes across as wanting to enjoy her 15 minutes and to enjoy visiting Japan but her dad comes across as pushy and someone who is more interested in the Western market, possibly because of money.