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Discuss: "American Idol" judge Kara DioGuardi on Adam Lambert: "I think he was always openly out"
Asked by Barbara Walters whether Lambert's perceived sexuality may have influenced Idol voters, DioGuardi said, "Well, first of all, I hope not ... because we should be judging on talent and viability in the music industry and they both [Lambert and Allen] had that." "Either way", she said, "I don't think that Adam [Lambert] was ever in [the closet]," DioGuardi continued. "I think he was always openly out." Kara's honesty and matter-of-factness about Adam is refreshing compared to the tiptoeing that others are doing (i.e. Adam is "flamboyant", Adam is "colorful"), but I wonder how the Idol producers feel about one of the judges breaking the Cone Of Silence? Submitted by on Fri, 2009-05-29 07:58. |
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good...
haha, i JUST made a comment about people simply not saying the words.
At least she stated what most people claim to know.
One more reason to dislike Kara
I think it's good that
Umm, no. Bad Kara
I agree with everything she said, but I'll defend to the death the fact that she doesn't have the right to say it.
Adam's not in the closet, but how blunt he wants to be with that is up to him, not Kara. What Adam was doing throughout Idol, and the following press tour was a job interview with America to be a pop star. He did pretty well in the first several rounds of the interview, but he doesn't have the job yet. He's not selling out his own concerts or getting gold records.
Can you imagine interviewing for a job, getting through several rounds, and having them contact your references (AI judges), and have them give a glowing reference, but toss out casually to the hiring manager they don't know that you're a big 'mo, even if the manager might have gleaned it already? Totally inappropriate.
Enough said.
yes, but ...
Exactly!
Asked or not
And here people are voluteering that Adam should lay his head on a block of thier own fashioning. This is very weird coming from you, Dennis, who I believe has always said that people should be given the chance to find their own, place, time and manner to come out. Why the change of heart?
Adam has made tremendous strides for the GLBT community, we (Perez, et al) owe him. Big. Time. If he wants to wait a month or a year to hold his big coming out party, we owe him our patience and so much more than that.
.
No change of heart
No, I haven't had a change of heart at all. I think we're dealing with perception or language issues here, which as you recall, I've always cautioned against. Here's the key point, as I actually did state in my other posts on this thread: ADAM IS OUT! Yes, I do believe people have the right to choose their own time and method of coming out in a world that's still hostile (even though it's so much better by the day). But ADAM IS OUT!. I don't see any way that anyone could construe he's in any way in the closet. You mean he hasn't yet had the People magazine cover (or perhaps Rolling Stone, in this case) with the huge letters screaming "I'm Gay!"? That doesn't matter in this case. Look at the reams of evidence, look at all his winking comments, look at all the overt, intentional innuendo he gleefully tosses out there, look at the photos, look at the websites that he's affirmed, not disavowed. I don't see any rational way that anyone could make the case that he's not out.
And if he's out, which I firmly believe, and if he has absolutely no desire for anyone to cover for him, which I also firmly believe, then what crime did Kara commit? In fact, I think she would have done a disservice to Adam, and a disservice to all of us, to try to cover for someone who's proud of who he is. Why should she tap dance around the subject as if there's something so awful about being gay that she has to avoid the subject?
The reason you and I are seeing this differently is simply that I see Adam as obviously out, and therefore with nothing to hide and no need for people to cover for him, while you see him as not yet out because he hasn't had the "I'm gay" magazine cover.
Who's story is this, anyway?
The question remains:
Who's story is this to tell?
Who's life is it?
The truth is twisted when you say that everyone believes that Adam is gay and therefore it won't matter to a single person. We all know how false that really is. There are gullible little girls and boys out there and bitter old men and women out there who appreciate his entertainment but the only way they can reconcile their "faith" is if they believe that Adam might be straight. Because otherwise they'll be forced to face the fact that nothing is more wrong in their religion than an unrepentant faggot, and that is surely what Adam will be when he comes out; and they will be forced to choose between Adam and their religion like some parents are forced to choose between a child and theirs.
The truth is also twisted when you suggest that it won't matter if, when and how those three words come out to the public. Because it will have an impact. The impact probabley won't be so great for Adam and the impact certainly won't be so great for you or me, but those three words and, more importantly, how they are presented will have a powerful impact on those religious people I just mentioned. And we owe it to Adam to allow him to decide how and when he wants tell those people. How he wants to tell his story. Saying, "I'm gay", is part of his story, whether you deem it important or not, it still belongs to Adam.
The fact of the matter is, there are people who will not believe he is gay until they hear it directly from the horses mouth. Yes, it shouldn't matter to anyone that Adam is gay, but since it most certainly does, it is Adam's choice how he ultimately decides to tell them.
DioGuardi did not answer the question asked, she was too quick to jump in to make her statement and take the glory. Kara DioGuardi and Ryan Seacrest are not helping, in fact they are trying to steal Adam's limelight. It is that obvious. Funny, because several people here said that Adam shouldn't come out right after the contest because he would have been stealing Kris's limelight! Now, DioGuardi and Seacrest are doing the exact same thing with the impending Rolling Stone Article, and they have impunity. Why are they being and why should they be excused? We shouldn't excuse them.
I have even less respect for DioGuardi than I did after she penned that dirge that both Kris and Adam where forced to introduce on her behalf. We all know that it was a crappy, crappy song who's only chance at airplay was going to be if it was aired on one of the most watched programs, the finale of AI. And what did Adam say about having to sing her little turd of a song when confronted with snarky questions about it in interviews? In the most genuine way he said that he "loved the song" and he said he "loved singing it" and he called it "a beautiful song," and encouraged people to look at the profound lyrics. I doubt that anyone will ever be able to accuse Adam of being unprofessional. Unlike the self seeking DioGuardi and Seacrest.
What if the rumor had been that 16-year-old, Allison Iraheta was pregnant? There is nothing wrong with an unwed girl being pregnant, I would argue, and nothing for her to be ashamed of. As a matter of fact, when she came out with it she might be giving courage to pregnant 16-year-olds, everywhere. Now, let's say that the rumor inside of AI, because the judges and mucky mucks all know about these things before they happen, what if the rumor inside the AI family was that Allison was going to tell the world that she wasn't just getting fat on the show but that she was indeed with child, as the tabloids reported and she was going to Admit what we all knew anyway in the course of a major publication interview. And then, while Alison is making the interview rounds and purposefully flirting with the fact, because an interview was due to come out with her story told in her own way; And at that very point Seacrest and DioGuardi decided to jump into the interview circuit and beat her to the punch to confirm, as DioGuardi did on The View, "yep, she's preggers, I think everybody knows that by now." A dirty trick, I would say, like butting in and spoiling the punch line to a joke someone has been building up to.
I have to believe if you could, you would have heard a collective gasp when DioGuardi said that about Adam on the View; the gasp was coming from publicists across L.A. I hope this comes back to bite her in the ass. Some day she's promoting a song writing gig or trying for a part in a show and the talent scout says, "Hell no, that bitch can't keep things under wraps, she spilled the beans about Lambert being gay on The View, remember?" But we all know that won't happen because there are double standards when it comes to disclosing private information.
The double standards of privacy are no where more evident than in the gay community and amongst ourselves. For those of you who still can't see that, allow me to offer two simple rules.
In this case one vital part of Adam's story has yet to play: him saying those three joyous words in public. I don't appreciate the fact that Seacrest and DioGuardi tried to snatch those words from his lips before he had a chance to say them. In fact I think they are slime. Oozing, pusy slime. Kiss that if you want to.
P.S. Dennis Mpls wrote: "I think we're dealing with perception or language issues here, which as you recall, I've always cautioned against." I think you're just blaming ssemantics again without valdity because your logic is weak; and as you recall, I've cautioned against that as well.
Perhaps Kara just reads AfterElton regularly
Your entire rant against Kara for "outing" Adam is ludicrous, considering you're penning all this on a website that has crowned him Gay Of The Week seven times and prominently designates him as "OUT" on the 2009 Hot 100 List.
This notion that Adam needs to formalize his gayness by announcing it in a national publication or on a national forum before others can acknowledge it, or else be accused of violating his privacy, is ridiculous beyond belief.
The press, including many in the gay media, have been hounding Adam to "come out officially" even though it's been obvious to them and most of middle America for months. Reporters, journalists and interviewers all dance around the issue by using code words like "sexuality" instead of "gay". Then when Kara makes casual mention that she doesn't think he was ever IN [the closet], she gets grief for speaking out of turn. Why is that? The truth is, all the media really cares about is a nice neat quote and soundbite that they can splash across their headlines or trumpet as the lead story on the evening broadcast. Someone who has been living an openly gay life for years does not make for as compelling a story as someone who has JUST. COME. OUT. OF. THE. CLOSET.
Woofter schizophrenia
RJ I agree with so much of your argument and yet I agree with so much of Nukely's argument as well. Increasingly, Adam Lambert is becoming one of those cultural figures - gay or straight - who doesn't provide answers. Instead he just provokes questions. So we all have to inspect our own, personal, individual moral compasses to see where we stand in all of this.
Ultimately, I think my moral compass is made of tin. Or posibly something cheaper than tin. Hell, if he can come out publically on his own internet site and say he's gay and then he can persuade some magazine publisher to give him a vast amount of money for saying exactly the same thing he's already said... well, I admire that guy. He doesn't have to sleep with anyone, he doesn't have to blackmail anyone, all he has to do is stand there and take the pay cheque. You gotta admire someone whos's gonna be paid mega-bucks just for being himself. All he has to say is: 'yeah, I like sucking dick.' He doesn't even have to suck a dick to prove it.
I don't really give a damn whether Ryan or Kara have outed him before his 'big article' comes out in Rolling Stone. Frankly, if he hasn't got management who have signed and agreed a rock solid contract about how much he'll get paid irrespective of what other people say, then frankly the boy Lambert is a bit of an idiot and should change his management company immediately. But that's probably not the case.
When it comes down to it, anyone who can turn a buck just for being gay, well, more power to him.
good point...
"Your entire rant against Kara for "outing" Adam is ludicrous, considering you're penning all this on a website that has crowned him Gay Of The Week seven times and prominently designates him as "OUT" on the 2009 Hot 100 List."
^ so true, unless....maybe it's ok for only gays to out him? if that's the case, we all better stop hating on perez hilton for outing NPH and Lance Bass.
people here constantly talk like it's a fact that Adam is gay....some say "well, it's on friendster and the pictures! that says it all"
if everyone here is saying "he's gay, he is openly out" then once again.....what is the harm? WE ALL HAVE OUTED HIM.
It really reminds me of when a star is pregnant....person after person comes out saying it's true...the star even is noticeably pregnant....then a week or so later, they come out and say "yes i am pregnant" and everyone ends up being like "yeah, we figured that already by now....those large purses didnt hide it so well"
i'm gonna go with the "it's only okay for gay people to out gay people" theory.
Who's story?
R.J., You seem to believe that Adam's coming out story is yours, and that it is best told by DioGuardi. Shame on you.
The question is not. "is Adam gay?" Even though he has been out in every sense of the word except for the word, that still doesn't excuse DioGuardi and Seacrest.
What purpose did DioGuardi and Seacrest serve in light of the impending Rolling Stone article? None. Who did DioGuardi and Seacrest help? No one but them selves. In fact by stealing this little bit of his story from his mouth, they have actually hurt Adam.
Cute, but I doubt that Kara reads AE. It would be nice if any potenial employer did, seeing that she's shown how unprofessional she is when she striped her co-worker, Adam, of his dignity and traded his coming out as if it were a chit, a nugget of gossip she could use to gain fame. She saw an opportunity to get her name splashed in the press and she jumped at that chance; I doubt now that she has an ethical or honorable bone in her bikini clad body. What won't she do to get her name in the press?
The sound bite Kara was selling wasn't, "Adam is gay" the sound bite was, "Kara DioGuardi confirms that Adam is gay," She made sure of that because by the time Adam gets to tell his story in Rolling Stone, we will return to the world where it doesn't matter what the songwriter of turdy little dirges says or thinks about anything. As it should be.
By the way, how many covers of Rolling Stone has DioGuardi been on? None. It could be kinda sad when you look at it that way, because it points to her motive. And DioGuardi is now working with winner, Kris Allen, in the production of his Album for AI, so maybe she believes that stealing Adam's press will help promote her talent, Kris. In that case, I suppose you gotta give it to her.
As I have been.
I could not possibly
I could not possibly disagree more strongly. The analogy to the traditional job interview is not at all appropriate, for two reasons. First, Adam is indeed ALREADY OUT! I don't see any way around it, from his own online sites to the obvious way he's saying it without saying it (not to hide, but to flummox expectation), to the totally obvious innuendos ("I like the top"; the overtly "pink" elephant). Kara is in no way outing him. He's out, everyone knows it, and he knows that everyone knows it. Second, in a job interview you're often dealing with really conservative white men who like conformity. Adam's audience is not even remotely like that. The middle-aged conservative white men aren't going to buy his stuff, most of the southern evangelicals aren't going to buy his stuff. Kara said nothing that would in any way endanger his livelihood.
Adam is not saying it straight out because he's playing with expectations, refusing to conform, etc. (unless there's something to the speculation about a contractual obligation to Rolling Stone or something). But good grief, how out do you have to be before people can talk about you as being out? I'm philosophically opposed to outing someone against their will, but those are people who are hiding, who want to be "in". How can you out someone who is in no way hiding, who is in no way ashamed in any way of himself?
This is odd, since usually I'm trying to be the voice of reason on the other side of things like this, reining in over the top pronouncements, etc. But the way you've stated your position it comes across to me (though I can't believe you in any way meant it) that there's something wrong with being gay, that even though virtually everyone now knows he's gay, we dare not speak the word. Again, I'm passionately in favor of people making their own decisions for themselves, but that just isn't what we're dealing with here.
Your metaphor is a bit out there
You cannot Out someone who isn't Closeted
He's 27 and he probably never even thought anyone would question the fact that his a great big Mo (or as his brother called him "Glitter God from Plane Fierce") until he made it to the top 13 and folks starting acting like they'd lost their minds and didn't know what it means when boys say "I want to date men" or "women aren't my preference"
If Rolling Stone wants to pay Adam Lambert to state the obvious fact that he is openly gay, then let them. Good for him. He gets to be in Rolling Stone and maybe, just maybe they'll talk to him about his musical aspirations and past accomplishments.
And I agree, it would have been completely crazy for him to make some huge coming out statement right after Kris won because the freaking crazy media frenzy would have set upon him like a swarm of bees and that's all anyone would have talked about for 10 days straight and NO, it would not have been fair to Kris who should get to have his freaking moment in the sun.
It doesn't matter whether or not we think he OWED anything to Kris, it's obvious that people like Perez Hilton and even many men on this site can't talk about anything else but the fact that he's not wearing an "I'm Gay" tee-shirt to every interview.
He didn't start this speculation madness and I don't think he's obligated to make it stop or make it go away. All he did was audition for a freaking singing show and then sing his fabulous arse off for 40 episodes in one crazy sexy cool outfit after another.
I mean after the finals he KISSED KRIS on the side of his head so lovingly and "non straight guy like" that I can't believe any magazine at this point would think his being gay was a "story".
If we as gay folks don't start thinking differently about what it means to be gay and out and proud in this world and learn to support younger gays (even if they don't look like how we want them to look) we will do a disservice to them.
We ridicule characters like "Justin" and "Kurt" on television as stereotypical in the same week as the beautiful Adam Lambert is strutting his fabulous self all over the playground and a teen boy was voted Prom Queen (he choice NOT to run for Prom King and he was very clear that it's not because he wants to be a girl).
Gay guys here mock any gay man or teen that doesn't blend in. Not every gay wants to blend in. Not every dyke wants to blend in. Some queers want to fly our freak flag high and still get to be treated like equal citizens with equal rights because rights have nothing to do with fashion sense or manner of speech.
Adam Lambert has done nothing but be gracious and kind and humble and charming at every interview and with the fellow contestants and he had never once denied or tried to hide his very open sexuality and whether men here and elsewhere like it or not, he has become a role model.
If he comes out as Straight and Married with 4 kids, he will still be a role model for every kid who doesn't want to blend.
Even if you don't like his music, we should still celebrate his artistry and bravery and realize what an incredible role model he is for the real life "Justins", "Kurts" and other young gay men who just happen to not have popped out the shoot with the Paul Bunyon gene firmly implanted.
Whatever the Idol Machine has done does not take away from the fact that Adam Lambert is incredibly talented and brave and the whole idea that his sexuality was a "question" to be answered is straight homophobic contrivance that we as gays have helped to perpetuate.
Closeted gays don't say they are gay on Friendster (which was never taken over by AI and is like putting it on People for young folks) and Myspace and allow their brother to talk about all of their gay antics on his very popular website.
Closeted gays don't allow pictures of them macking on other boys to just float about the Internet and say they are proud of those pictures and not ashamed of who they are.
If crazy-assed Rolling Stone wants to pay him to say DUH!, good for him!
I say work that pole baby, just make sure you get that cash.
Good for Kara D. for not acting like Adam being gay was some dirty secret that couldn't be uttered rather than just as obvious as his being very tall and male.
"Heterosexuality is not normal, it's just common." (Dorothy Parker)I agree. It's not a "dirty
Adam's Mama Confirms Contract Regardins GAYOCITY Disclosures
Adam Lambert's Mother Talks Sex and Contracts
Today 1:12 PM PDT by Whitney English
[excerpt begins] Mum's the word for American Idol runner-up Adam Lambert's mother until he's ready to talk—and word is, he's finally ready.
"I would rather not answer until it comes out," Leila Lambert said in a phone interview with E! News regarding Adam's reported upcoming announcement to Rolling Stone that he is indeed gay.
But that's not the real shocker. Check out what she has to say about the behind-the-scenes antics of the Idol camp...
Leila says she also signed a contract with American Idol and is not allowed to discuss her son’s personal life anyway without their permission.
"We signed a contract with Idol and unless it has been set up by them, I'm not allowed to answer," says Leila. [excerpt ended]
Do people really think that Kara Dioguardi would have said that Adam was always out, never in, if he was closeted? She's not stupid and she doesn't seem to be mean-spirited and she didn't need to discuss Adam's sexuality to get headlines (particularly not this soon after the show)
I also don't believe that anyone connected with American Idol would be stupid enough or insensitive enough to have discussed Adam's sexuality so close after the competition without the consent/knowledge of Adam and AI.
Even if Kara D. didn't know what questions Barbara Walters (who makes my blood boil just on GP) was going to ask, given how backwards The View is about sexuality in general, she surely suspected the subject would come up and she could easily have said "No comment" if she'd thought it would harm Adam or herself in anyway to say what she said. I don't think she outed him because I never experienced him as closeted.
And all of the above should have been obvious to anyone who was paying attention to any of Adam's interviews from the beginning.
It's like we are so starved for out gay folks that we don't know what to do with one who isn't tortured and secretive about being gay and we also lack any compassion for any gay person in the media who doesn't do or say or act like what we want.
When you are as obviously gay as Adam Lambert (gay cabaret performances, kissing boys, gay nearly-naked cavorting at Burning Man) and you never deny being gay (which every celebrity who was actually closeted has) and you don't shy away from assumptions that you are gay, how are you not out?
If Adam Lambert is a "traitor" to gay folks then we as gay folks are some F'd up people.
Before, during and since the American Idol show, if you had never seen him before and you typed his name into Google, you could have found out he was unequivocably gay in 2 seconds.
There have been so many completely OUT previous gay American Idol contestants who after the show explained that they were not allowed to talk about being gay while they were contestants and under contract.
THAT should have been the story that Perez and Entertainment Weekly, et all should have been going after. Why we as a culture are first obssessed with folks coming out and then obssessed with talking about how gay they are even after they are out.
Maybe the producers didn't want Season 8 of American Idol to become the "WE HAVE A GAY IDOL" show which would have happened even if Adam had walked into the Audition and said "I'm Gay Adam Lambert and I would now like to sing this song for you." (and which happened anyway)
We as a culture don't know how to treat gay people in the media. We describe them as "openly gay Neil Patrick Harris" or "out and proud John Barrowman" as if that's their actual name.
Did Leila Lambert really have to come out and tell supposedly savvy journalists something that should have been so obvious given what we know about "reality" shows and the way gay folks are treated by the media?
Gay people should have been rallying around this young man and celebrating him just being himself and having a great talent. Like his music or not, he is talented and we should be as proud of him as we are of Neil Patrick Harris or any other young man who has the courage to be gay under the media spotlight.
Adam Lambert tried every way he possibly could to make it clear that he was NOT closeted and NOT ashamed and NOT hiding but could not say the words "Gay".
I always thought his "keep speculating" comment was about saying to folks, "Yes there is somthing to speculate about if you think I might be straight" because clearly if he was actually straight, there would be no need to speculate.
Are American audiences really not sophisticated enough to get that ? Didn't he sound like someone who was choosing his words carefully?
I don't think Adam Lambert's mother's statement is a surpriseand I think to call this man closeted is like magical thinking on crack!
I'm still waiting for other gay celebrities to show him some support because the second the article in Rolling Stone comes out (no matter what it actually says) he's going to get ripped to shreads by every gay publication in print and online for "getting paid to come out gay" as if the fact that magazines want to do so isn't the really crazy factor.
I'm praying that the article is just a really good interview during which he is open about his sexuality but his being gay isn't the focus.
Everyone here acts like "Oh, well if he'd just answered the question at the beginning, no one would have cared". That is crap and we all know it.
Every sentence written about him from week 1 to last week would have been about him being the first openly gay idol (just like every sentence written about him was about him being "the first possibly gay" idol") and not nearly as focused on his singing or anything else about him because that's how American media rolls.
If he'd been out the whole time, it wouldn't have stopped people from calling him self-hating names because he has the nerve to be gay AND wear makeup!
The whole thing just makes me sad because he has kept being voted Gay of the Week while being simultanously torn asunder here for not being "out enough"
How exactly does that work?
'I'm praying that the
'I'm praying that the article is just a really good interview during which he is open about his sexuality but his being gay isn't the focus.'
Me too, and I think we have a bigger chance of this actually being a good interview since it's Rolling Stone and not People magazine. And I really, really, really hope the word Duh is going to be used.
trying out this blogthing: http://vladivos.wordpress.com/
My Dream Rolling Stone Cover for Adam
Because the boys spend so much time together they often mirror each other's comments or reference each other's answers in interviews.
So I think Rolling Stone should have two covers:
Cover 1 - Kris on the cover
"Kris Allen - American Idol" and he's wearing a t-shirt that says "Adam Lambert is Gay"
Cover 2 - Adam on the cover
"Adam Lambert - American Idol Runner Up!" and he's wearing a t-shirt that says "What he said..."
Then the article inside just talks about Adam's musical history, his time spent on Idol, whatever he wants to say about the experience of being gay in the world and what his future musical endeavors are.
Rolling Stone has had really good coverage of American Idol overall and particulalry good stories about Adam.
Kris just made People and Us so hopefully it will just be a nice story that helps advance his career and not sensational
Heterosexuality is not normal, it's just common." (Dorothy Parker)
Yuck
I would hate to see Kris hog the cover with Adam, or share it in any way.
Why can't we let Adam just be Adam and be successful on his own and also be Gay on his own.
He doesn't need Kris to hold his hand, lets not worry about that!
Adam is SO much bigger than A.I. now