Every month?

I've tried to make it a habit to post at least one entry every month. Guess that wasn't as successful. Recently I've been itching to write about a few things, like the 20th Anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Massacre, the fragile state of life (having had a classmate pass away suddenly in early June), and the Air France 447 crash.

But it's getting late and work awaits tomorrow. So sleep is needed.

The Susan Boyle Effect

If you haven't seen it yet, you should. As of the afternoon of April 16, the video of Susan Boyle's performance on Britain's Got Talent on YouTube has garnered over 12.3 million views, growing by the second. It's been five days since it happened.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY

Embedding on this video is disabled. The views just keep climbing. I have seen it now posted over and over again in my Facebook news feed and threads. 

But why?

Surely, she is an underdog. Crowds love cheering on the underdog, as a matter of psychology. But what's more, is that everyone doubted her upon seeing her walk onto the stage, and she overcame all expectations. Through listening to her, people overturned their own biases and judgments. People gave themselves a slap on the face.

Her confidence was striking. 47, unemployed, and living with her cat, she did not show a tinge of insecurity when revealing that she's never been married, or kissed. She gladly revealed her age and her aspirations, as if certain of the outcome.  Then, after her performance, she was ready to walk off the stage as if unaware of the deliberation process.

I wonder if the make-up laden girl who so prominently sneered at her can exuberate the same type of confidence when she returns to her clique of peers in Junior High.

But this entire phenomenon now begs a very important question. 

Susan Boyle won the heart of the world because she was allowed to sing. She was allowed the opportunity to perform and show her talent. 

In the real world, how many times is this opportunity denied to people? How many similar underdogs in society get denied a spot on the football team, misses out on a job offer, can't get into medical school, or get refused service, purely because of superficial judgments, and are never given the opportunity to try and prove themselves? 

There are millions more of Susan Boyle's out there, waiting to be discovered. The question is, will society let them be discovered, or will they continue to succumb under the veneer of superficiality that has always guided human judgment? 

Now that you've seen the video, your guess is as good as mine.

March Madness

March is a terrible time of the year.

In the Commerce Program here at Queen's, this is when all the professors pile up a bunch of assignments, quizzes, and presentations.

This is also when March Hiring for COMSOC positions occur.

I've been caught up in the middle of it all.

Last night I conducted interviews for SIFE for about eight hours for our executive next year. While the last interview concluded at 12:30, the deliberations easily took us to 3AM.

One of the most valuable parts of being on the other side of the interview process is that you get to really learn what goes on in the mind of the interviewer. What kind of things do you look for in a resume, for example? What stands out about the candidates that succeed, and what prompts failure? What goes on inside the room during deliberations?

Now off to do a history essay. It'll take a large chunk of the next two days.