The Wiggles probably do not need the career leg-up, but they really could have learned a lot by being contestants on The Voice. The popular children’s group caused a big stir late last month when they announced an expanded line-up, focusing on increased race and gender diversity.
This sparked a fair bit of criticism, including from me, triggering a mini-culture wars debate. Those in The Wiggles corner seemed to think it was diversity itself that was being criticised, which was hardly the point, certainly in my case.
The issue was the pre-occupation with identity, the playing of identity politics – the virtue signalling. The Wiggles announced their additional members detailing their racial backgrounds – how demeaning. And then they made a point about their new non-human characters being non-binary – I mean did any kids ever care or know whether Big Bird or Humphrey B Bear were males or females?
The Wiggles are brilliant, and their global success is based not just on entertainment but also on encouraging good messages for children. But when you employ a new entertainer, you should do so based on their talents, not their racial background, and likewise ethnic descriptors in promotional material are irksome.
This troupe of performers could have been announced and everyone would have seen and experienced whatever racial, gender or other diversity was expanded. We do not need promotional spiels on diversity such as group founder Anthony Field’s announcement: “As society has evolved, we have embraced the need for diversity and inclusiveness and want children all over the world to see themselves reflected on the screen.”
It reminds me of that brilliant line from Margaret Thatcher: “Being powerful is like being a lady, if you have to tell people you are, you aren’t.” Or the old saying, “Don’t tell me you’re funny, make me laugh.” Perhaps we should invoke the Nike slogan: “Just do it.”
I guess The Wiggles have always been hung up on identity, identifying people by the colour of their skivvies. But seriously, the endless focus on identity, even for sanctimonious reasons or just to generate more publicity, is insidious.
It constantly draws us away from what should be our shared aspiration with Martin Luther King Jnr – to judge people not by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character. This is where The Voice comes in.
Locked down and lonely, I have dipped in to the latest series of this reality television talent show over the past few weeks. For a nation traumatised by warring premiers and overbearing rules, this program restores your faith in the fabric of our society.
Our cynical instincts might want to strip away some of the schmaltz, contrived drama and exploitation of personal stories. But we are still left with two undeniable realities: the program uncovers an awe-inspiring array of talent from an incredibly diverse variety of Australians.
The judges of the show include superb artists, generous in their encouragement to others, who come from a wide variety of ethnic and cultural backgrounds. Out to impress them have been stunningly, and sometimes surprisingly, talented performers from little girls to men pushing middle-age, from professional musicians to groundskeepers, from the vision-impaired to the visually resplendent and non-binary.
In this space I will not list the contestants, their ethnic and cultural backgrounds or other aspects of their identity because then I would be doing what The Wiggles did. Where Channel 7 and The Voice deserve credit is that they made nothing of this, either during those episodes of the show I saw or in their media releases and publicity.
For weeks now there has simply been a cavalcade of talented people from all walks of life, with cultural ties to all corners of the globe, fronting a panel of judges of similar ilk. The video biographies and on-air discussions made nothing of these identity aspects, they focused on the life stories and talent development – the content of the contestant’s character not the colour of their skin.
There was only one reference that I noticed, when the resplendent singer I mentioned, Seann Miley Moore, left the show he proudly claimed to have flown the flag for brown-skinned and queer people. Good for him.
But to me the beauty of the show has been the way, in contrast to The Wiggles, it has just showcased wonderful diversity without virtue-signalling or detracting from the real focus – the talent. The Voice did not talk about diversity, promote itself on the back of diversity or preach diversity; The Voice just did it.
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