The Jedward Thing

Fortunately for me, I am one of those altruistic, non-judgemental, non-opinionated people who see other peoples spin on life as an interesting and enriching complement to ones own beliefs and values. Not.

So I’m trying to come to grips with living under the same roof as a pre-teen who is a Jedicated Jedwardian. Now, if you have not yet come across Jedward, let me explain in brief: identical twins who are famous for singing out of tune and acting and looking about 12 years old when they are, in fact, about to turn 19 next month. If I were to use one of my pre-teens favourite derogatory comments to describe them it would be ‘so gay’, but apparently they are neither so gay nor even gay, well at least not in the eyes of my pubescent daughter.

When they first appeared on X Factor, they cited one of their reasons for entering the competition was that they wanted to meet lots of girls who'd be their fans (they said it in between saying the word 'like' repeatedly), and indeed that has become a reality. I know all about their fans because I recently had the pleasure of seeing them in concert. Now not that I'd go to a Jedward concert or anything, of course it was all a big coincidence, I swear. I dropped my daughter outside the venue and even though she had long gone into the hall to do a bit of screaming and fainting, I decided to lurk around the place to get some fresh air, and would you believe it, I just happened to bump into a friend who worked as a roadie for the show. He insisted on pushing a few free tickets into my hand, and, well what could I do? Yes, that's right, I went to the gig on a fact finding mission to see what sort of people worship them other than my daughter, and true it was; Jedward have a huge female following, only thing is that most of them are aged between 8 and 11 with a gap up to the next bunch who, like myself, were the mammies.

But seriously, there’s something about them. They sing, dance and say stupid things, and you just can’t help laughing. It’s not even a mockery thing, but whenever I see them I can’t help having a giggle. Let's face it: they epitomize the Ireland that kids that age have grown up in. This is the new Irish teen. This is what happens when you give up piling turf into baskets on a donkeys back, it's what happens when we stop dancing at the crossroads and start living in a world of making SIMS characters. Because c'mon, if Jedward aren't avatars themselves, they've at least modeled themselves on avatars, after all, there are no real human beings who look anything like them.

But they redeemed themselves on stage. They sang an old Bay City Rollers number which reminded me of my own tartan past, so I did have to shut up when my daughter swore she’d always love them, because I remembered swearing similar about the Rollers once upon a time.Oh God, the Rollers, but then I ditched them for Gary Glitter and then Showaddy Waddy and David Cassidy and Donny Osmond and all of those people who are just proof that history does repeat itself. I went home humming the Rollers song, grinning and wondering what's going to replace Jedward next year. After all, it could be worse, they could have been triplets.