Why?

Originally posted by zazza
sigh.. at least try to address the points that I was making not straw men that u can then knock down..

1) don't kid yourself he was even fit to lace Lemar's boots

A: I wasn't comparing lemar to kwame in terms of vocal talent..

2) You think people should have kept Kwame in just because of his colour?

A: No, because he is the best singer (for the millionth time)

And for the millionth time, this was 'Comic Relief Does Fame Academy', not a contest to see who could sing best and earn a record contract, like the real FA was. It was for charity, with the emphasis on the 'Comic' in Comic Relief. As it happened, Kwame happened to beat the likes of John Thomson and Jo Brand, who I personally would have much rather seen in the latter stages, purely for entertainment value. They would have inspired me to vote to keep them in or their opponents out, and I assume others would have felt the same from the comments on this forum. More phone calls = more money for charity. It's really very simple. How race even comes into it is beyond me.

3) Lemar's had comparatively mild criticism

A: In your opinion, certainly not in mine...

In comparison to David, and the likes of Jade during BB3, if you think Lemar's had heavy criticism then you're being over-sensitive to the point of paranoia.

4) Are all those people racist?

A: No, not all of them.. but enough to make a difference.

Utter rubbish. By 'make a difference', I assume you mean costing Lemar first or second place, right? So the reason Lemar didn't win Fame Academy is because of racist voters? Sorry, that's crap. He lost because people liked David and Sinéad more, both personality-wise, and in some cases, performance-wise. Get over it.

5) Kwame came across as pretentious and taking the whole thing too seriously. Why shouldn't he be voted out?

A: Will came across as self-indulgent idot.. why shouldn't he be voted out? What's your point?

My point is more Forum members saw Kwame that way than saw Will that way. Why does race come into it? If you prefer one person to another, you vote the other one out, it's so simple. No doubt there are a minority of racists and bigots who would have sided with Will because he is white, but you seem to think that's the only reason for Kwame losing out. It's not, and if you can't see that, that's your problem.

6) You're seeing racism where, from the vast majority of the voting public, there is none.

a: How do you know that, have you ever experienced racism?

So you're saying that voting public during CFA were largely racist? I'm sure I'm not the only one to take offence at that. Whether I've experienced it personally has nothing to do with whether Kwame was booted out witha racist motive.

7) And in doing that, you're harming the very cause you're fighting

A: In your opinion. I am not a subscriber to the 'shut up and the problem will go away' theory.

Neither am I. Racism is a blight on our society and speaking out when faced with obvious examples of racism is the best way to try to eliminate it. But desperately searching for racism where there is none and playing the race card because you're annoyed your favourite lost only makes things worse.

becuase Zazza most people who come from a minority background where they may have been surpressed and had to fight their way up to give themeslves the oppurtunities would be looking for something that gives them more financial stability than a university lecturers pay.

How do you know that?

Intuition, experience and its human nature.

If you had no money, your family had no money but you managed to go to school, do well enough to go to uni. Study at uni and get a 1st class degree, bearing in the mind the financial burden it has taken to get there, i think you'd be looking at a job that pays well. Fact, university lecturers are not paid well.

Basically if Kwame had won the public vote on Thursday, the other students would have voted Will out (because they knew Ruby made the show entertainng and that was their priority - not who could sing great), and Kwame would have go on and won the whole thing.

The reason Kwame didn't win the public vote on Thursday is because more teenage girls fancied Will and kept pressing their redial buttons. Talent shows are never about just the singing. Personality, looks and image always come into it, just like they do in the real entertainment business (even though I think Will is a bit of a minger myself).

So the question comes down to are all the teenage girls who fancy Will racist?

My view of the reason Lemar didn't win is because his type of music is more minority than that of Sinead and David. Look at Popstars the Rivals, 3 black guys looked certain to be picked by the public until one of them confessed he was too old.

Lemar and Ainslie knew they had no chance of winning just because of the type of music they produced. You could argue that there is an element of racism in the way the UK refuses to embrace RnB, but most of the personal comments against Lemar on here (which I didn't agree with, as I thought he was a lovely bloke) were motivated by prejudice against someone who was seen as the top dog. Most posters were annoyed with the teachers praising him and took it out on the poor guy himself. The British do tend to support the underdog which David understood very well and played up to the max.

zazza, you wanted the best singer to win, which is fair enough, but the one issue you have not addressed is that most people on here wanted Ruby to win because it was Comic Relief. Can you not understand that point of view?

why did your original post in this thread say


??????????????.

if you didnt mean all of us, then you might like to amend your statement by naming those in the thread you did think were being racist
Last edited by metafis : 15-03-2003 at 15:52

I'm slightly confused by the supposed racist angle concerning Kwame. Surely any racist would not be voting at all as much of the monies raised will be used in Africa. Just a point but to my mind a valid one.

Anton and Daniel in Popstars: The Rivals. Didn't detect any kind of racist vote there whatsoever.

And before I get it in the neck too, let me just state that yes, I have experienced racism. Not personally, but where I work many of my foriegn workmates get insulted.. getting told to 'go back to where they came from', asked how they 'managed to get a job', when some guys white son couldn't, called illegal immigrants and the like. My best friend and former girlfriend at university comes from Cyprus and another one of my good friends from India, and I've seen first hand what they've had to put up with. And it makes me sick.

On the same token, I didn't want Lemar to win Fame Academy, purely because I felt it should have went to the person who most improved since they entered.. Lemar was great at the beginning. I didn't want Kwarme to win the Comic Relief version, because he was taking a CHARITY event with no prize at the end of it way too seriously.. but I wouldn't have minded if he had. Liked him more than Lemar, anyways.

That's two people. In other reality TV shows, I've disliked Sonia, Korben, Jade, Nick, Darren Day, Ulrika Johnson, Vanessa Feltz... so, would that make me scouseist, a homophobe, sizeist, and.. erm.. swedeist?

I just find it completely ridiculous that you are trying to blame people losing in contests like this on racism. Sure, maybe SOME of the votes against them are going to be racist. It'd take a complete fool to think that a small few stupid idiots somewhere in the UK aren't voting against these people purely because they're black. But please, don't distort the figures.. and don't make it so that people who choose to not like someone who is black is ALWAYS accused of doing so for racist reasons.

For every person who comes into the shop in which I work and insults the black people I work with, there are at least a thousand who do nothing and are completely pleasant towards them. I understand what you've witnessed in the past, I understand why that could make you think what you do.. but in this instance, I don't think it's correct.

That doesn't make me wrong, that makes me a person with a different opinion.

I still don't get why only Reality Tv shows count? What about the numerous people of colour who have won Uk talent shows - which were voted for by the public - if it was unconcious racism stopping Lemar/Kwame winning, how did Lenny Henry -to bring up a name used in this thread - win New Faces?
And as Matthew Above said, Daniel and Anton in Popstars?

Not wanting to intrude on your circular debate folks but can I add that there is a certain demographic nature to competitions like this. If you could work out who it was who did the majority of the voting and then refine that further to find out what genre of music they prefered then you would have a much better idea of what sort of person and music style people are going to vote for.

And on the subject of the BNP - there can be no appeasement for racists like that.

MESOSTIM .Lets be honest we know who does most of the voting in these types of competitions young teens with millions of raging hormones that they have very little control over the girls are far more likely to spend money voteing and buying records and at will always be the young cute sweet boyband type that will win

Exactly. Which is a weakness in the format rather than a statement of talent.

LOL Mes, perhaps we should just admit our ages and leave the youngsters to it?? Have to say, I'm glad Will won. After all he wants a singing career and Ruby has just reinforced what a class act she is.
So, no losers, just a big UP to all for taking part. And, memo to Endemol, WE WANT THIS BACK

I'm sure Endemol want it back too!! It's just the BBC who seem to be unsure of what to do with it!