but this woman's not all that. A LOT of people are reacting to exactly what the programmers wanted them to -- here's an unlikely looking contestant who is... well... ok. Not great. You expect her to totally suck, but she doesn't stoop to your lowered expectations. You therefore come away from the experience with a far better impression than you might. Then it goes viral, and, well, there you are. A year later if she's met the Queen and has a bit of cash in her pocket, she'll be lucky. I wouldn't dream of raining on her 15 minutes, but I suspect she'll never get past the freak show angle of the dowdy (not my word), never-been-kissed spinster (again, not mine) who can sing passably. The link below says it far better than I can.

http://www.wordmagazine.co.uk/content/singing-sucky-way-chapter-2-fear-and-lothian

For all the reasons MEW said - including the horror of my own cynicism and knee-jerk stereotyping. I guess I'll let myself off the hook, just a bit, since the programmers have admitted flat-out to manipulating us all into this very reaction.

That said: rock on, Susan!

... who doesn't equate beauty with talent?

Honestly, the two aren't even remotely correlated, except in a very, very fucked up beauty-worshiping culture. The world of female vocalists didn't used to be a softcore porn war - once upon a time, people could actually sing.

I think this piece manages, against all odds, to miss the point once again:

"Yet when Boyle sings, our identification transfers instantly to her. She's us."

No, Mary, you don't get to steal Boyle's talent because she's homely and ordinary-looking, in a way you'd never conceive of doing for a pornographic Britney Spears piece.

She's not us. She's better than us because of her talent, determination, and hard work.

The point is that we should justly celebrate that, just this once, the cute blonde didn't win just because she's a cute blonde. The point is that the culture of beauty masquerading as a culture of talent was never anything but a sham, and perhaps, with luck, this might result in a reconsideration of how we've integrated that sham into our own views on talent and who we choose as our entertainers.

Speaking of talent, determination, and hard work, just because those qualities are sorely lacking in your work, Mary, is no reason to try to latch onto Boyle's achievement.

Most of us are closer to Lindsay Lohan's talent level than Boyle's. Ditto her determination to improve her craft.

Put talent and hard work on a pedestal where it belongs. Put laziness, expediency, and cheapness where it belongs: down in the pit with its consumers.

"Watching the judges and the audience roll their eyes as this clearly nervous looking woman says she'd like to have a career like Elaine Paige's, we can't help but await a little William Hung-style horribleness."

Why??

Without hearing her, what kind of person would presume? That's what depresses me about it - the fact that people who should all know better have such low expectations and are then about to crap themselves with shock.

Speaking exclusively to the Mirror, Susan, 48, said last night:

They say that television makes you look fat and it certainly did. I looked like a garage. It was mortifying to see and a bit of a shock. I didn’t realise I could reduce people to tears and I hope it wasn’t because of that.

And there's the whole notion that life had passed this woman by. No doubt, the idea that she's never been kissed, much less had a boyfriend has played into it. It was practically how they introduced her. It was an amazing setup: she's a capital L - LOSER. But that plucky spirit and lack of self consciousness about her situation... in fact, her ease with which she wears it has to be part of the appeal.

Here we have a woman who didn't get enough oxygen at birth so she grew up with at least a slight mental retardation. Who knows what her parents were up to, but Susan has said that they encouraged her not to date. So she didn't.

She was the butt of a lot of jokes growing up and it seemed as though she was content to let the world move on - for all the fun stuff to happen on TV, or at least elsewhere and she'd just go on being Susan Boyle. You know, the frumpy lady who still lives in the same room she grew up in with a cat named Pebbles. She doesn't seem to have the need - which may be culturally American - to be somebody other than who she is. Even when who she is isn't anything you'd really want to be.

But, it just so happens that who she is is much more than who she thought she was (or at least who she was content to be). This wasn't just an awakening for a cynical (worldwide) audience. It's an awakening for her.

Sure, we get to feel good. But we also get to feel good because we know her world just changed for the better. You have to imagine she's gotten at least one kiss by now. (And knowing this crazy world, probably a handful of marriage proposals too.)

So Go Susan Go! You rock and now you and the rest of us knows that too. It couldn't have happened to a sweeter more humble soul.

One of the things that just kills me about her performance is that she didn't really seem to register the audience's standing ovation as anything special. She stood there being a good sport until they got to the voting. It was the three yeses that blew her away. Simply amazing!

The tears are still fresh from the first and second viewings. In this day and age where everything is predigested to a fare-thee-well, it is the truly genuine that blasts our hearts right open. I love her cheeky humor and her sense of self. We can only hope that her fame won't effect her affect.