The Ballad of Susan Boyle or Would You Love Me if I Looked Like a Garage?

To my immediate left is Susan Boyle.

In the last couple days, most American's who have access to any news site is aware of her story. An abridged version of her story (since, if you read blogs, you probably have heard it at this point):

Boyle, 47, is an unemployed charity worker with a learning disability, and she wants to sing so, she auditions in front of a taped studio audience on Britain's Got Talent.

She is brought in front of the three judges (including Simon Cowell) and like Christ before the mob that would free Barabbas, she is immediately met with scorn and disdain from the audience at the taping. There are catcalls and whistles, a girl in the audience rolls her eyes, and apparently the British version of Statler and Waldorf laugh patronizingly at the sassy way she addresses Cowell. In the golden age of awkward-is-funny television, it appears we are moments away from it's zenith.

Then she begins to sing, and to the shock and delight of audience both in attendance and viewing on their telly, she sings well. Really well. The audience has turned in her favor, standing ovations occur mere moments into performance. Outside our zone of perception malignant intelligences who were intending to do away with mankind, give Earth a momentary stay of execution because they are so moved by what they just witnessed on the BBC. She has talent, Britain declares triumphantly.

Then as her story hit's the news cycle, we learn what the hook to the story is:

"Susan Boyle: Unemployed 47-year-old virgin becomes overnight music superstar."- Vancouver Sun

"Frumpy 47-year-old stuns 'Idol' judge, catapults to sudden global celebrity" - WorldNetDaily.com

You get the idea, there are currently 996 articles on Google News right now that are a play on the "Susan Boyle succeeds in spite of her hideous, pathetic self" theme.

The Vancouver Sun at least, I thought was a somewhat reputable source (can't say the same for WorldNetDaily with it's credibility and logic destroying links to Ann Coulter and Michael Savage at the top of their home page), but part of me wanted to post pictures of Chris Parry, writer of the Sun article, and say "look who is calling who ugly, good sir." But a cursory search of a staff picture of Parry yielded several pictures of a frightening-looking MMA fighter who may or may not actually be Chris Parry of the Vancouver Sun.

In the event that they are one and the same, I would just like to say one thing:

Kudos to you, Chris Parry, on your article about overnight singing sensation Susan Boyle. I have nothing but the utmost respect for your prose and your ability not to cave my skull in or put me in a triangle choke.

But anyways, back to Boyle who herself admitted that she "looks like a garage." What else do we know about her outside of the way she looks or how she performed on stage? The main two, that most of the articles seem to be going with the most is that she took care of her dying mother, and the aforementioned fact that she was a charity worker. I can't take a look inside Boyle's mind, but if I were her, I'd feel rather good about myself if having only done those two things. Shouldn't she be judged on that alone?

But anyways, what if it wasn't enough? She can still sing, can that not stand on it's own merit without her looks being brought into the discussion? Has it gotten to the point now that someone who looks like the way she does has become unfathomable to our collective conciousness? What chance would a one-eyed honorary member of the Church of Satan like Sammy Davis Jr. have making it in the music industry today? Or Mama Cass, Neil Young, or Meatloaf for that matter.

I'd hazard to say that a guy like GG Allin would have a tough time getting himself noticed these days. A sad state of affairs, indeed.

Anyways, what I'm trying to say is this whole story shouldn't be that big of a deal. The biggest mention should have been in a TV recap page somewhere. But then again, I'm writing about it too. So I guess I'm part of the throngs that were begging for the release of William Hung and to see the skull of Susan Boyle placed on Golgotha.

Have a good night!