Yesterday night I watched a bit of this season’s Australia’s Next Top Model (A bunch of clips found here too). I’ve always had a morbid sense of curiousity towards the modelling industry, especially their behind-the-scenes. I like to catch American’s Next Top Model too, when that’s on. There’s something fascinating about their obsession with appearance and bitching at each other.

It’s almost surreal to see A GROWN WOMAN, make disgusted face while going “ugh, she’s got a muffin top!” while referring to a selected contestant who has a slight bulge around her waist because she was wearing tight-ass jeans. It’s eye-opening to hear critiques of contestants being something like, “you might be pretty enough to attract boys, but you’re a model and your target audience are women”. What do they mean by that? Do men and women see pretty girls that differently? And it’s alarming when girls as young as 16 (they lowered the age of entry this year) break down because of the weird (I daresay, arbitary, vague and confusing) standards of expectations placed on them.

Also, Tim and I heard the song Ridin’ and wow, how INANE are those lyrics? Just to take the chorus,

They see me rollin
They hatin
Patrolling they tryin to catch me ridin dirty

“They” obviously refer to the police. I think it’s reasonable to assume that “ridin’ dirty” refers to committing an offence in a car, or using a car to transport illegal material. So basically the whole song is about the protagonist who openly admits to having committed a crime, and complaining that the police are “hatin’” because they are trying to catch him. Oh yes, #$%# the Po-lice for doing their job and trying to catch criminals. Why can’t they stop their hatin’ and let people like the protagonist do they (criminal) thing (or should I say, thang?)? I admit the song is very catchy, but damn, talk about stupid lyrics! Weird Al’s White and Nerdy parody is so much cleverer.