Mother Mary Rants

I am profoundly disappointed with the outcome of "Dancing With the Stars" last night!

It was bad enough that "Master P," a rap artist, survived to the fourth round of the competition. I would call "Master P" a clodhopper, but that would be an insult to clodhoppers everywhere. "Master P" did not respect the competition; where everyone else averaged 31 hours a week of practice time, "Master P" averaged less than five hours a week. "Master P" was churlish; his professional partner presented him with the gift of a pair of decent dancing shoes, and he spurned the gift, preferring his "lucky" sneakers, which looked to be the size and weight of ski boots. "Master P" could not, in my opinion, dance his way out of a paper bag. On a scale of one to 10, the professional judges gave him an average score of four, and I believe that to have been a "pity score"; if I had been a judge, his average score with me would have been 0.5 — out of pity. He was, after all, a last-minute replacement for a qualified participant.

Why did "Master P" survive so long in the competition, when infinitely better dancers did not? I believe it is because the producers made the mistake of giving audience votes equal weight with the scores of the professional judges. "Master P" is apparently a popular rap artist. (I wouldn't know; I prefer music.) And "Master P" is black.

Three people survived to the final night of the competition: Stacy Kiebler, Drew Lachey, and Jerry Rice. All three judges called Stacy Kiebler the best dancer they had seen in five seasons of "Dancing With the Stars." One judge said that if DWTS went on for fifty seasons, Stacy would remain the best dancer of all.

Stacy is beautiful, 5'11", and talented. Drew Lachey is almost as fine a dancer, and he is short and has no neck to speak of. I was prepared for him to win the competition, as he in fact did — everyone loves an underdog.

And then there is Jerry Rice, who apparently is some sort of former football player; I believe he was MVP at some Stupid-Bowl or other. Jerry Rice's dancing improved as the competition went along, but he ought to have lost to a better dancer at least four weeks ago. But Jerry Rice is black, and popular.

And here's what makes me so angry — Jerry Rice, whose scores averaged about 6.1, beat Stacy Kiebler, whose scores averaged about 9.5. Where is the justice in that?

If I could track down an e-mail address for Izzie Pick, supervising producer of DWTS, I would strongly suggest a change in the rules of scoring: Make the judges' votes cumulative, while the audience's remain per-show. I have not kept track of every score over the last two months, but I believe that Stacy's cumulative score would be approximately 284, Drew's would be approximately 278, and Jerry's would be approximately 224.

Another possibility would be to decrease the percentage allotted to audience voting. It is ridiculous that a churlish, superstitious oaf like "Master P" could have beaten out dancers of FAR higher caliber, merely because he is black. It is the height of injustice that the best competitor of at least 50 seasons of "DWTS" (if not of all time!) was beaten out by an over-the-hill football player, merely because he is black.