Having reached such a state of lethargy that I cannot bring myself to get up to get the remote so I can change the channel, I suffered through "American Juniors" this evening. What a price to pay for laziness!

This is the show that looks like a tamer and less acid version of American Idol. What a travesty.

First of all, some of these kids have mutant like talent. There is no way that a 9 year old should be singing like Mariah Carey (is that how she spells it?). And then there are other kids who are just KIDS and look a bit terrified and stiff and they sing better than I ever could no matter how many lessons I take, but compared to the mutants, they kinda sound, well, sucky. And then they have the panel of "experts" trying their level best ot give a critique without going all Simon on them, so they say things like "You are cute as a bug!" or "Keep it up, you'll grow into your voice," or that kind of thing. I don't know if they have the same people each week, but tonight they had on Debbie Gibson. Has she even sung in the last decade? And they had some guy from Backstreet Boys (I think it was that or it was another boy-band). At any rate, I didn't recognize his name, but I did the band's. And then there was Gladys Knight. With all due respect, these "experts" are kinda....lame?

In many ways it reminded me of the Ted Mack Amateur Hour. I didn't watch it all that much, but I did sometimes. And I always wound up feeling sorry or embarrassed for the poor schmucks that happened to be on during a week where they had some real talent.

The creepier part of this show, though, wasn't the kids or their mutant talents or the judges. It was the parents! They actually sit up there on the stage WITH the kid DURING the performance. Then, while the kid is singing, the camera pans them, identifies them as "Young So-and-So's Parents") and they are gazing lovingly at their kid, all misty eyed...or all tense and mouthing the words to the songs and engaging in subtle body English to coax their offspring's dance steps in an effort to get them to the BIG TIME. This brings the idea of stage mom to a whole new level. These kids are doing all of the work, they are the ones whose ego's get smashed and whose friends probably tease them, and they are ones who don't have time to play baseball or hang out at the mall. And here are the stage parents, smiling as if they did the work. And chauffeuring them around doesn't count as work! If it did, every major league baseball player would have their mom with them when they tried out for their team.

I guess the moral of this whole reality T.V. craze is: Keep the remote with you at all times.

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