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Media fills days of our lives with the bold and boring

The woman who wakes up next to me each morning believes I suffer from Talent Deficiency Syndrome (TDS), a shameful disease few admit to suffer from.

Cruder critics have accused me of worse things - an ol' washed-up fart who failed to cut it in the dense jungle that is show business to an angst-ridden armchair critic who is sleeping through an artistic revolution supposedly taking place in our country.

I'm not going to defend myself. I might be lacking in intellectual humility, but for the life of me, I'm not going to be the one to sit back and watch my country build a zillion artistic gods with feet of clay.

Okay, now you tell me. Since when did a young Afro-pop singer such as Kelly Khumalo with nooit a hit song to write home about, deserve the diva title?

That girl doesn't deserve to carry the make-up bag of the late Brenda Fassie, or Lebo Mathosa for that matter. And she should actually pay me to hear her sing.

In the real world, the diva thing is a gig for the likes of women including Miriam Makeba, Sibongile Khumalo and actress- cum-choreographer Nomsa Manaka, among others.

These are the people whose art transcends time and geography. Stage actors John Kani and Winston Ntshona are legends, another word often misused by the pop media.

And by the way, does every actor or actress in Generations,Muvhango, 7de Laanor Backstage deserve to be called a television star? Does anyone who spins records at a radio station and talk hogwash for three painful hours become a sudden celebrity? I don't think okes like John Berks, Tim Modise and John Robbie would agree. But there we are .

How many times have I awoken to screaming headlines: "Soccer Star Drug Bust", only to read about some mediocre footballer kicking leather for some unfashionable outfit in the sticks? Please.

This intense craving for putting ordinary folks on pedestals does not apply to darkies only. White South Africa is also in such a terrible short supply of heroes and heroines that they too elevate mediocrity to lofty heights.

Look how the white media attempted, for the umpteenth time, to create a home-grown celeb out of one pedestrian talent called James Small? I mean the boy was all brawn and no more. And by the way, which hole did he creep into?

When small-minded James made headlines for the wrong reasons, the media put him down like a diseased animal. He let everyone down when he bliksemed his then girlfriend and generally behaved badly for a man who was to be the next White Hope.

Now they have their claws hooked into Joost van der Westhuizen and his wife Amor. The media is trying its damnedest to turn this lukewarm couple into an African version of a Beckham- Posh brand. But you can see poor Joost doesn't enjoy the circus. You can see in his wooden posture, in his frozen smile that he does not enjoy this celebrity bull. The same cannot be said about his wife.

The charade goes on.

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