Visual Dreams

I've often heard lots of negative criticisms towards a lot of 'singer's nowadays, and the truth is, I think such criticisms are undeserved because the majority of them are not really 'singer's, but are actually idols.

Kim TaeYeon - the most adorable
and lovable girl ever~ >w<♥♥
*biased biased biased biased*

What is an idol? An idol is basically a new breed of performer and/or entertainer. This concept has become pretty mainstream in asian countries such as Japan and Korea, but not very well known in other parts of the world. This is a problem, because idols are not necessarily products of asian pop culture, but rather modern culture in general. I believe the idol evolved from the existence of video based entertainment such as music videos and television programs such as talk shows, variety shows, and reality shows.

The main characteristic of an idol is near-perfect features. And idol must be appealing to the eyes thanks to its visual based nature. You can't be an idol unless your looks appeal to at least a genre of fans. Looks aside, idols also specialize in other skills such as singing, dancing, acting, talking or hosting shows. Nevertheless, the highlight of an idol is almost always their beautiful, cute, cool, and/or amazing good looks. If they happen to be especially talented in anything else, that's just the icing on the cake.

It is this focus on good looks that subjects these idols to malicious comments such as they cant sing, have no talent, and rely solely on their looks to attract people. These are not only singers or actors or what have you, but sadly, most of them are characterized under 'singers','musicians', 'actors' or some other kind of performing title when in truth, they are idols.

I think the classification of 'idol' should be given more recognition. The main thing standing in its way, though, is the fact that it is not a good thing to admit that you like someone for their looks, it's too materialistic, too judge-a-book-by-its-cover. Such behavior automatically puts you into the same classification as shallow, materialistic, playboy/girls. But come on, who doesn't like to look at good looking people? To me, it sounds a lot like denial in the face of society's rules and peer pressure.

Justin Bieber - revered as a god in certain cultures -_-b

This mentality also stands in the way of certain performers wanting to accept the classification of an 'idol', it sounds way too much like admitting to the world that 'I'm a dumb blond durrr ^-^'. That statement isn't really true, though. The ability to be good looking is just as difficult as being able to be good at singing. Idols devote basically their entire lifestyles to maintaining their good looks, not to mention that attitude and characteristics are also very important contributors to being good looking - something they must watch what they do all the time in order to keep up a certain image.

While this is true for all types of performers and entertainers in our modern world, these are especially important issues for an idol, and to the people that think that these idols are 'fake' and are not naturally that beautiful on the outside and on the inside, the ability to keep up that image 24/7 is not an easy feat at all. I like to liken doing this to working as an actor that constantly have to be in character all the time for a movie that will never end until their career does.

The Beatles - don't judge.
chances are that your mom
thought they were hawt XP

I'm not saying that I defend people who are fake or think that looks are the most important things in the world, what I'm saying is that these acts are sadly misunderstood by most people and are automatically tacked with negative associations all the time that it's sad. To me, such things still require effort, and if such idols really are fakers, I still admire them for the effort they put into transforming themselves from bitches into angels on camera. Not many people can do that, and I think that kind of skill is just as admirable as other skills such as singing or acting prowess (in fact, its an evolved form of acting anyway).

The world is full of idols now~ in fact, idols have been around for centuries, beginning from the first performers to use music videos such as The Beatles, countless boy bands, girl bands, and one of the most popular idols in the world today - Justin Bieber.

Of course, all of this is just my attempt to justify the fact that I'm a crazy huge fanboy of SNSD XD and an excuse to put TaeYeon's picture on my blog (again) ;w;  kyaa~♥ lol XP