American Idol, Britain’s Got Talent, Sa Re Ga Ma, the list is endless. In every country around the world the hunt is on for talent that never had a chance. Interactive television at its best. It is no longer the educated/trained judges who make the decision but the huge television audience sitting back in the comforts of their living rooms are voting for their favorite talent.
For all the wonderful talent these shows have discovered there is one aspect that I have not been able to reconcile with and that is sending children up to compete in them. Parents don’t seem to think of the trauma a child is exposed to when they are judged by people much older than them, on criteria which has nothing to do with being a child.
No doubt these children are immensely talented. But their talents need time to grow.
At an age when they should be honing their skills and testing the boundaries of their talent, they are being pushed on stage to compete.
At an age when they should be growing in confidence they are being judge and learning to fear defeat.
We have so many examples of what early fame can do to children – Michael Jackson and Britney Spears being just two examples.
Interestingly rather than being talent-discovery contests these could very well end up to be talent-burial contents.
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