Monday 12 May 2014

The Human Being


Today you don't tend to get freak shows in the UK. We seem to think of them as in bad taste and like to think we're more enlightened than we used to be; that people shouldn't be labelled as "freaks", ridiculed and stared at.
On Saturday, Conchita Wurst - winner of Eurovision 2014 - proved that we're just kidding ourselves.
Here, as in the olden days, was a "bearded lady" performing for our entertainment. And, true to form, the media - who, lest we forget, only reflect what we, the British public, are really thinking - had a field day before and after the event.
The Daily Mail, for example, posted this article online (note the URL) detailing her "amazing transformation" "from male singer to Eurovision diva".
Another fine bastion of the UK press, The Metro, posted this article informing it's readers "Everything you need to know about Conchita Wurst".
And The Guardian posted this article by Trans Media Watch representative, Paris Lees, stating that Conchita shows us "what gender diversity really looks like".
Of course, someone like Conchita isn't going to perform to universal acclaim - despite her landslide victory at Eurovision - and you can take your pick from these articles at Pink News to see what I mean.
And when you see the media blitz as a whole, it can seem that an awful lot of time and words have been expended on... a beard!
Is a group of hairs on someone's face really that interesting?!! Of course not!
No, what this is really about is about appearances and someone who won't conform to what we consider to be male nor female.
So perhaps, instead of expending so much time and energy trying to make Conchita fit into our way of thinking, perhaps we ought to save all that time and energy and see if we can simply make our way of thinking include someone like Conchita.
In that regard, I point you to Conchita's website and these words...
it's not about appearances; it's about the human being