Judges Hog Headlines
5th October 2006, 9:30 WST
What’s going on at Australian Idol this week? Judges Marcia Hines and Kyle Sandilands are getting more attention than the contestants but for all the wrong reasons.
On Monday’s show Sandilands, the judge we love to hate, caused a fresh outrage by describing a contestant on the talent show as a “mong”.
Politicians and disability groups called for Sandilands to apologise publicly after he referred on Sunday night to contestant Bobby Flynn as a “full mong” while judging his performance.
Two weeks earlier he had caused offence when he suggested 17-yearold Idol finalist Jessica Mauboy “lose the jelly belly” if she wanted to succeed.
His latest outburst prompted an angry response from advocacy groups for disabled Australians and State and Federal ministers for disability and community services.
The term “mong” refers to mongoloids and has been used in the past as a label for people with Down syndrome.
And matriarch Hines performed a track from her new album, Discotheque, for the nearly 1.5 million home viewers of the reality show this week.
But some viewers in the east accused the diva of miming, a charge hotly denied by Channel 10 in the Sydney press.
We doubt Hines would need to mime in the first place — with a career spanning more than 35 years, she is one of Australia’s most accomplished performing artists.
Oh, and in the competition itself, bald rocker Guy “Mutto” Mutton was the latest contestant to be eliminated.
http://www.thewest.com.au/default.aspx?Men...&ContentID=8737 