It is said that children are the future. If that’s the case, then we ought to prepare for a lot of Miley Cyrus, a lot of slime and a lot of zany antics because Nickelodeon’s Kids’ Choice Awards hit quite a milestone with this weekend’s production: it celebrated its 21st birthday. Unlike many of us, however, the program decided to elude the booze and go straight for a clean, yet still very sticky, kind of debauchery.
Instead, kids across the nation turned out in record numbers to vote – albeit just for their favorite movie, TV and music stars. The process is quite democratic as contest winners are determined solely on the kids’ votes. During the show, host Jack Black announced that the amount of votes cast had more than doubled that of the previous year, rising to 88 million from 40 million, which are actually both records in their own rights.
Whether our younger counterparts have been swept up in the romance of the coming presidential election or they just really love Hannah Montana, this is certainly a promising trend and one would hope they bring this kind of enthusiasm with them to the real polls when they grow up big and strong.
This year the program presented one of the sweetest, sobering and inspirational blimps to Cameron Diaz for the Wannabe award, given to the person the voting kids would most like to emulate. Diaz proved herself a worthy role model for the kiddies when encouraging and empowering them to do whatever they can to help protect the planet.
"You’re going to change the world. Every one of you kids is the future," Diaz said. "Everybody go out and make the world a better place."
She has come a long way since being the winner of the first Kids’ Choice Awards burping contest in 2001. It’s just natural that the kids would look up to her. She can speak to them in their own language.
Role modeling… that’s hot
For some reason or another, Paris Hilton continues to find her way into the limelight. This probably isn’t helping. For her latest publicity stunt, the heiress was allowed to not only act as a judge in the Miss Turkey beauty pageant but in entertainment as well. Hilton dazzled her audience with a performance that looked like an attempt at something like belly dancing, but was actually closer to your average smut.
Despite all the evidence to the contrary, the woman seems to really believe she is a worthy role model for the young ladies she was judging as well as others around the world.
In a suspicious display of virtuoso, Hilton insisted her judging criteria were the way "the girls carry themselves, what they look like, the way they dress and what they say" as well as "a good heart."
It might just be wishful thinking, but it seems that some actual substance and real-world values might be rubbing off on the queen of the tabloids. "But let’s not jump to any bold conclusions."
