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I was watching the Malaysian version of American Idol the other day. Before you presume anything preposterous about my choice of entertainment, it would do me justice to let you know that those clips were recorded by my friend and I just so happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time to be inflicted with brain damage resulting from watching them. This is the only one thing that I could say after watching those clips: should parents be totally honest with their children? I mean, how many parents would actually tell their child: "Son, I do not think that you should take up singing. Please do not go out there and make a fool of yourself. If you think that music is your soul, then why not take up the trumpet or some other instrument; that way whatever comes out of your mouth gets transduce into something more melodious." That is actually not as bad as you think it sounds especially if you had heard what some of them were singing on national tv.

I am not a singer. Neither do I claim that I can sing. In fact I know that I suck at singing. And because I am so bad at singing, I can easily recognize those that share the same fate as I do. Fortunately, I do not suck at the fact that I realize how bad I sing. And thus I save myself the embarrassment of having to let some other person tell that to my face. Honestly, parents, would you not rather be the bearer of bad news than to let your child suffer eternal scarring from being publicly humiliated in front of everyone on national tv?

The ability to be able to participate in a bathroom concert is not a sufficient prerequisite to the world of stardom. Almost everyone can sing in the bathroom. But only those who have enough talent will be able to entertain more with their voice than that of the water droplets. The same goes for singing in front of the radio or tv or with an iPod. A tv or radio might be able to drown some of the bad singing, but when you sing with an iPod, please spare us.

Then again, there are people out there who really have talent. And I encourage them to go on. However, when your in the same boat as this fellow, it would be wise to just shoot yourself.