by Tracy Holland

Created on: September 22, 2010   Last Updated: September 23, 2010

I do wonder about the  X Factor; why are we so sucked into it?  It doesn't change really year on year - 2010 is much like 2008 for content; the winners rarely do much before fading either to C or even D-listers or even into  total obscurity.  Let's face it, can any of us name the winner from 2006?  Or even 2008?  So what is that draws us in?  Why are we all so obsessed with it? Well, to be honest I am not in love with the show - I watch it because I am forced to by my husband and daughter who are addicts.  I'm not sure why I am immune, but I am grateful for it none the less.

I loathe the auditions the most; I think it's because I was bullied horrendously at school and this to me is little different.  A few excellent singers do not make up for the thousands of desperate weirdos who trot in front of the judges to be ridiculed and laughed at.  I think those of us who were *not* the 'popular kids' at school wince at the desperate auditionees that can't sing a note as we know what's going to happen when they stop making a noise like someone strangling a very sick cat. 

Simon Cowell particularly loves to humiliate; Louis Walsh is as bad as he openly laughs at them.  Only Cheryl Cole (or is it Tweedy now?) is the only who at least attempts to keep a straight face and be nice when the awful noise finally stops - and I take my fingers out of my ears.

I understand it can't be easy to continually be polite to people who are utterly deluded when they *say* they sound like Madonna, but actually more vocally resemble and Irish Banshee on speed.  Some hit the occasional good note, but not often and rarely in the right order; I often sit there wondering what they think when they see themselves on telly being so awful at their caterwauling that I, for one, am begging them to stop before the windows shatter and then being humiliated by Cowell and his cronies.  Do they grin, merely pleased they're on telly - so deluded in their 'talent'  that they don't see the truth?  Or do they squirm as we do; horrified at what happened?

But this is merely the tip of the iceberg; for if they *really* make a spectacle of themselves then the tabloids go scurrying off to see what dirt they can dig up about them.  The best might be they already have a recording contract, or they lied when they said they grew up in care (remember the mother who was a bit bemused to see her son saying that when he'd actually had

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