TV: The Voice

The Voice

The Voice is a new show on BBC copied from the original NBC version in America. During the past few weeks it has become very popular, trumping previously concrete talent contests like Britain's Got Talent.


The show has just finished its 4 week televised audition stage. What makes this show so different from other talent shows like American Idol, Britain's Got Talent and XFactor is that the auditions are blind.

Here is a short clip from last night's show illustrating how the process works:

Jaz Ellington

The four judges: will.i.am, Jessie J, Tom Jones and Danny O'Donoghue have to sit with their backs turned during an auditionee's performance. Only if a judge commits to having them in their team by pushing their buzzer will they be able to turn round and actually see instead of just hear the contestant perform.

What I love about this show is that it is all about the voice. Nothing else. The judges and audience are encouraged to disregard anything else, including their age, appearance and physical beauty. In the audition stage this is especially true, since no judge is actually able to see a contestant before pressing their  buzzer of approval and committing to offering them a place on their team (About The Voice).

Jaz Ellington is the contestant in the clip shown above. While he is not unattractive, he does not have the obvious pin up poster looks that many producers would be looking for. Jaz said in an interview afterwards, "I feel like in the past, I have lost work because of what I look like" (Jaz Ellington). Many producers these days, particularly those focusing on the mass market want someone with not only a good voice but also good looks as well. This is because as a product, their looks may make them to sell to the mass market if they are good looking. 

This is often true for girls and boys. A book that I am currently reading called The Beauty Myth would refer to this as the 'Professional Beauty Qualification'. The PBQ refers to the fact that many employers in any service or arts based industry would in particular discriminate because of someone's beauty. Even if you are skilled for a job, an employer could legally fire someone who to their mind wasn't attractive enough for the job. Beauty is just one of the many legal loopholes of what "United States sex discrimination law calls a BFOQ (a bona fide occupational qualification) and Britain calls a GOQ (a genuine occupational qualification) (Naomi Wolf, The Beauty Myth).

I hope to discuss the PBQ more in a later post. But I'd just like to say how wonderful that there is something like The Voice in existence. By removing the PBQ out of the media, we can hope to remove PBQ worldwide and get rid of the problems presented by The Beauty Myth once and for all.