Why does the media and public think that it's the teen girls? Options

[jork]

Viewrship down, yet votes at record levels? Who elase has the time to devote to voting at these levels?

I blame the video game console and game makers. They have created thousands of young females deprived of male attention, that they have no better thing to do than devote themselves to some decent looking guy on TV that comes off as nice and sensitive.

That's an interesting hypothesis. I'm unfortunately a gamer as well, so I'm perpetuating the situation, but I see that this is definitely the case.

As for the "teen girls" aspect, the public always assumes that's the case because they always put the teen girls out in front during performance nights on TV and hide the older people in the back. But if it were tween girls voting they would buy the albums of the winners--we see this with Bieber, 1 Direction, etc. The older people have zero clout with mainstream radio, so radio play is moot. If Idol had any tween fans, it would have been obvious on how well the contestants are doing.

[RWG]

People and media probably blame teen girls because that's the most logical theory and makes the most sense. No research, to my knowledge, refutes it.

Seniors in good health make up the most mature and mentally developed segment of the population. Personally, I think they're above mindlessly voting for the same contestant for two hours every week. A 70-year old woman that doesn't see voting for two hours as a waste of time is probably more willing to vote for contestants that outperform their original favourites than a 14-year old girl would be.

That's an uneducated opinion though. I doubt it would be that hard to research the numbers and find out at whom we should be pointing the finger for the WGWGs.

For what it's worth, linking old lady voters to WGWGs isn't unheard of ("Frauian pleasure").

I blame the video game console and game makers. They have created thousands of young females deprived of male attention, that they have no better thing to do than devote themselves to some decent looking guy on TV that comes off as nice and sensitive.

Then how would you account for Beatlemania or the hoards of Elvis' female fans? I think it's normal if not healthy for girls to obsess over celebrity boys, especially before they reach the stage at which they're interested in dating actual boys and vice versa. It's not like the average 14-year old girl would be getting any if it weren't for video games. It's no different with how grown men obsess over sports.

[druth8x]

I think mature women can be just as crazy and once their fav goes they won't go to "Jessica"...they'l go from, Colton to Phillip.

I think that when it comes to fans who vote a lot, we are all easily enough susceptible to "gender crazy fever".

I also think tha there are a lot of teens that are smart and do vote for "Jessica".


No one segment is to blame, per say, all segments have their offenders, even if some % wise are more susceptible.

[aaronarrgh]

I just think the reason why people like Phillip and Kris are winning is because most winners are from the South. 8 out of the 11 winners are from the South. American Idol has always had a Southern bias.