The American singing competition show American Idol (2002–2016; 2018–present) has generated controversy over the years in numerous areas.
Many of the controversies have centered on the show's voting process and results, and in later seasons, gender bias against female contestants, as well as contestant comments. Another major source of controversy that has spanned multiple seasons has been the activities of contestants prior to competing on the show such as past recording contracts in contravention of the rules, and undisclosed criminal charges.
Voting controversies Voting has been the biggest source of controversy with American Idol becoming embroiled in numerous controversies in various seasons over the voting process and its results.
Season 1 autodialer power-voting Around 100 people using auto-dialing software and their home dial-up modems reportedly placed as many as 10,000 votes a night. However, FremantleMedia, which produces the show, contended that this represented a 'statistically insignificant' proportion of the overall voting, and Fox insisted that the system was fair. Nevertheless, concerns were raised about possible unfairness in the situation of a tight vote. One of the show's executive producers, Ken Warwick, later indicated that equipment was put in place afterwards to address this issue but it has not detected any such problem since its installation.
Season 2 finale vote Out of 24 million votes recorded following the second season finale, Ruben Studdard finished just 130,000 votes ahead of Clay Aiken. There was confusion over the winning margin as host Ryan Seacrest initially announced it as 13,000, later again 1,335, and then finally corrected by Fox as 130,000. There was much discussion in the communication industry about the phone system being overloaded, and that potentially more than 230 million calls were dropped just by AT&T and SBC (over 30% of the market), making the results statistically invalid.Siebel, Deborah S., American Idol Outrage: Your Vote Doesn't Count, Broadcastingandcable.com, 2004-05-17, Retrieved on 2007-03-03. The phone lines may have been running at capacity that made a near-tie inevitable, with the winner potentially decided by text-messaging which was unaffected by capacity problem.
In an interview prior to the start of the fifth season, executive producer Nigel Lythgoe revealed for the first time that Aiken had led the fan voting from the wild card week onward until the finale.Martin, Logan., "It's Going to be a Very Strong Season, I Think": An Interview with American Idol Producer Nigel Lythgoe , realitynewsonline.com, 2006-01-17, Retrieved on 2007-03-03.
Season 2 phone scam During the second season, a phone scam operation based in Salt Lake City, Utah was discovered, in which people were tricked into believing that viewers could vote for their favorites through an 800 number, rather than the 866 number used on the show.
Season 3 Jennifer Hudson's ouster At top seven, the three African American singers Fantasia Barrino, LaToya London, and Jennifer Hudson, dubbed the Three Divas, all unexpectedly landed at the bottom three. Jennifer Hudson was eliminated, prompting much discussion and criticism. Elton John, who was one of the mentors that season, called the results of the votes "incredibly racist"Elton John Says 'American Idol' Vote Is 'Racist', Reuters via Yahoo.com, 2004-04-28, Retrieved on March 2, 2007. (though Barrino went on to win the competition). Criticisms were also voiced about the voting system that resulted in survival of contestants such as John Stevens and Jasmine Trias over Jennifer Hudson and LaToya London, despite constant negative reviews from the judges on the former two. It was claimed that Jasmine Trias' fans were able to vote early and often outside of the 2-hour voting window, and a disproportionate number of votes came from Jasmine Trias' home state of Hawaii.
Season 4 voting numbers mix-up During the Top 11 performance show, three of the contestants had their numbers mixed up with the wrong numbers appearing on the screen, resulting in millions of votes being voided. Recordings of the performances were therefore reshown on the Wednesday show with new, live commentary from the three judges, and the audience revoted. The elimination night was moved to Thursday.
Season 5 Chris Daughtry's vote-off In the week finalist Chris Daughtry was voted off, some voters claimed that phone calls dialed for Daughtry during the first few minutes of voting were misrouted to Katharine McPhee's lines, and they heard her recorded message thanking them for voting.MSNBC staff, Some callers claim ‘Idol’ votes were misdirected, Today, 2006-05-12, Retrieved on 2007-03-03. Simon Cowell, one of the judges, predicted McPhee to leave over Daughtry before the final result was announced. Other voters claimed similar problems voting for other contestants, in some cases resulting in votes going to Daughtry that were intended for another contestant, Elliott Yamin., Dialidol.com forums, 2006-05-09, Retrieved on 2007-03-03.
Season 6 voting campaign for Sanjaya This season saw a concerted attempt to influence the outcome of the vote in American Idol, led most notably by Howard Stern and Vote for the Worst. Howard Stern encouraged his listeners to vote for Sanjaya Malakar who had become a phenomenon in the sixth season, and to take delight in possibly "ruining" Idol.
Season 6 Melinda Doolittle's vote-off Melinda Doolittle's departure stunned fans and critics alike. Simon Cowell admitted that the sixth season's crown should have rightfully gone to Melinda. Executive producer Nigel Lythgoe responded, noting that "[Idol producers] were so engrossed with the mentors and didn't really focus on the Melinda Doolittles of the show." Lythgoe also produces So You Think You Can Dance, and has noted that the dance program gives background information about its contestants, while American Idol focused more on its big-name celebrity mentors, such as Tony Bennett, Gwen Stefani, and Jennifer Lopez.
Season 8 phone numbers In the top thirteen in the eighth season, the expected phone number for finalist Alexis Grace, IDOLS-13, was not owned by American Idol, but by a company called Intimate Encounters, who used it as a sex line. Although host Ryan Seacrest made ample mention of the replacement phone number, IDOLS-36, some commentators feared that the phone number confusion could have led to Grace being inadvertently voted off the show. However, she was not voted off that week.
Season 8 finale vote: "Textgate" In May 2009, following allegations in the media of an American Idol texting scandal dubbed "Textgate", one of American Idol's corporate sponsors, AT&T, admitted providing free mobile phones and texting services for fans of Kris Allen (who won the competition) at parties organized on the night of the program's final episode. Company representatives also provided Allen's supporters with lessons in how to send "power texts" which send ten or more votes with the touch of a single button. Bobby Kierna, one of the 2,000 guests who attended just one of the events, told reporters that she had voted for Allen 10,840 times. AT&T denied attempting to "fix" the contest and apologized, saying that employees had been "caught up in their enthusiasm" and promised that they will in future "celebrate the competition, not individual contestants".
While speculations were rife over the reasons for Allen's win over Adam Lambert, in a statement, Fox said that an independent monitor was employed to oversee the voting process to ensure the competition results were "fair, accurate and verified."
Season 9 semifinals shock eliminations
Michael Slezak of EW stated, "So you’d think by season 9 — during the inconsequential semifinals, no less — it would be easy to brush off the bad judgment of speed-texting tweens, to process the way-too-early exits of Lilly Scott, Katelyn Epperly, and Alex Lambert (plus the sort-of-maybe-too-early ouster of Todrick Hall), and move on. So why do the ritual killings of the dreams of four indisputably flawed semifinalists feel like they’re part of something bigger, a shifting of the tectonic plates at the core of the Idol universe?"
Season 9 Siobhan Magnus' vote-off Siobhan Magnus's elimination caused a stir among the judges and fans of the show. The controversy grew when it was discovered that a phone number printed on Facebook was not a number to vote for Magnus, but to vote for Aaron Kelly.Siobhan Magnus wrong number led to vote off? Gather.com May 01, 2010 Some commentators speculated that the phone number mix-up may have led to Magnus's exit. An unsuccessful campaign to bring Magnus back into the show was started by her fans.
Gender and ethnic biases American Idol faced criticism for implications of gender and ethnic bias in its finalists; for five consecutive seasons—seven through eleven—the winner of American Idol was a guitar-playing, Caucasian male. The string of winners led to complaints by critics, who classified them as being a "white guy with guitar" (WGWG), and felt that the likely winner of the program had become too predictable due to the repeated victories by such performers.
The first five contestants eliminated from the finals in the tenth season were all female, which led some critics to believe that it was partly due to the demographic of the voters being skewed towards women who tended to vote for men.With Pia Toscano now gone, can American Idol do anything about its woman problem? Retrieved March 30, 2013Sorry, ladies. 'Idol's' just not that into you Female hopefuls keep getting the boot, while guys who aren't as good stick around Idol producer Ken Warwick said, "It's no secret that most reality shows are female driven, either by moms or by young girls. It does mean we're going to get a heftier amount of female votes and it's always bent towards the boys, obviously, we are very much aware that the voting can be skewed towards the boys." In response to the criticism, the producers considered tweaking the voting format for the following season to correct the bias. The last of these five girls to be eliminated was a presumed front-runner, Pia Toscano, and her elimination drew considerable criticisms, with various former Idol alums and celebrities such as Ashton Kutcher and Tom Hanks expressing shock and surprise.
Prior to the eleventh season finale, which saw the victory of the fifth "WGWG" winner Phillip Phillips, American Idol: The Untold Story author Richard Rushfield explained that the notions of attractiveness and personality of these contestants had influenced their victories, stating that "You have this alliance between young girls and grandmas and they see it, not necessarily as a contest to create a pop star competing on the contemporary radio, but as ... who's the nicest guy in a popularity contest," and going on to say that these tactics had "led to this dynasty of four, and possibly now five, consecutive, affable, very nice, good-looking white boys." Jessica Sanchez's loss in the eleventh season finale has been retrospectively cited by observers as one of the factors for the show's prolonged steep viewership decline following the said season on both of Idol'''s latter runs on Fox and ABC.
Season 12 Angie Miller vote-off Angie Miller's elimination drew considerable criticisms. Miller was considered a fan-favorite, often placing in the voting's top ranks and becoming the season's sole finalist to not land in the bottom group until her elimination in the Top 3. The elimination was described by journalists as "shocking" and "surprising".
Season 13 Malaya Watson vote-off