X Factor and the Cycle of Abuse of contestants
Over the last two decades reality TV shows were a staple of households all across the UK. Whether it was X Factor, Britain's Got Talent, I’m A Celebrity, Love Island or Big Brother- there was something for everyone, but we were ignorant or perhaps naive about what was happening behind the scenes.
No one came out and said conditions were bad, until they did. No one knew quite how bad things got, especially on the X Factor, where young people would sign up either to chase dreams of stardom or to get five minutes of fame from being on TV. Over the last decade we’ve had so many people come out about how they were treated on the X Factor, from Jedward, to Katie Waissel` to others who merely auditioned- but what actually happened to artists? What happened to those who reached the final stages and why did most X Factor finalists fade away when they were exceptionally talented? What happened to them post X Factor?
Many people have heard Katie Waissel speak out about the abuse of the contestants and personally, I spoke to her about One Direction and she told me they were scared. Scared of what, I probed and was informed that they were scared of not being allowed a career if they didn’t sign with certain teams (Syco and Modest!) post X Factor.
This makes sense and it also makes sense when we found out that there was a clause in each and every contract for the X Factor that states that contestants can’t talk badly about the show or about Simon Cowell himself. When asked what they feel about the X Factor now, most former contestants hit out with the ‘I’m grateful for the opportunity’, line and it shows that even now, they still can’t speak truthfully about the show they were part of.
Following on from that, contestants also sign away the rights to their images so when you see previous footage of former contestants, they aren’t paid or compensated for the use of their image or audition. In fact they have zero say over their auditions being used to promote X Factor or Simon Cowell. This has been said in many of Katie’s spaces and it is evident when they use throwbacks to the One Direction boys’ auditions to gain interest.
Further contestants were often manipulated to be shown in a bad light, or answers were moved around to make them seem arrogant or cocky and comments from the judges cut out to ensure that viewers that got a misleading picture. Contestants were also subject to abuse and they continued to air the ‘worst auditions’ to the general public ensuring that those who had participated and didn’t do well would continue to be ridiculed over and over again.
According to Katie the X Factor contracts could last up to twenty years with some clauses lasting for infinity. What this means is that some participants, especially, I’d assume the most successful participants, can never divulge the abuse that they experienced as part of this TV talent show.
Rebecca Ferguson, a finalist on the 2010 season of the X Factor, supports Katie’s claims and stated that contestants on the X Factor were mentally manipulated and abused and like I mentioned above, forced to sign with a certain management company or face being forced to leave the show.
This shows a sickening level of control and many of One Direction's former managers also worked on the X Factor showing that they weren’t free of the abuse that contestants experienced during the show when they had left the show. As the biggest boyband they were signed to Modest and their contracts were different to other finalists on the show.
One has to ask why? Why were these young men forced to sign contracts with cleanliness clauses? Harry Styles has stated his previous contract while under One Direction had clauses that controlled how he acted in public and further controlled what he could and couldn’t say. Harry also stated that signing his new contract, post One Direction made him feel free. These quotes are from his Better Homes and Gardens article that he did while promoting Harry’s House two years ago, whether he still felt free remains to be seen, but at least his later contract allowed him to feel proud instead of terror over consequences of slips in articles.
Another former contestant, Lucy Spraggan, left the show in week three of the finals because she was raped, yet it was covered up by the X Factor producers and sold to the public as if she was merely ill. She has since claimed that being on the show was akin to being in an abusive relationship since the show completely took over her life and took control of her story. Lucy, after being subjected to a severe sexual assault was asked by producers after being examined what she wanted to do since the next live show was the following day. Lucy felt she got little to no support and her mental health suffered as a result of both the assault and the lack of care afterwards.
Cher Lloyd has spoken out about how they exploited her and her talent. Jedward have also spoken about the abuse they suffered as a result of the show and Matt Cardle, 2010’s winner, stated that the show used people and that it was surprising there weren’t tragedies attached to contestants of the show. Other former contestants spoke up in the Offstage podcast by Chi Chi Izundu and spoke of how little care there was for contestants, during and after the show. They also spoke of how people were humiliated over and over again for entertainment, were forced to share rooms with strangers and how there were constant cameras.
Further contestants found private information was shared with the press team and then exploited in the media and the press office would dig into their past, trying to get bad stories from those in the past to share with the general public. They didn’t care who was hurt in the process and only cared about beating Strictly Come Dancing in the ratings war. Artists on the show also had no choice over what song was performed and were told if they weren’t happy the door was open because no one was forcing them to be on the show.
This is a type of manipulation and shows that the contestants were led to believe that being on the X Factor was the only route to them achieving their dreams. Further when they were offered legal advice, it wasn’t independent as many have been led to believe. It was three legal teams chosen by Syco/ Show Producers who told contestants to choose one of them to represent them. They were sat down and had a load of legal jargon thrown at them and told to pick one of the teams to represent them. Further they were then forced to sign a multitude of contracts to remain on the show; show contracts, touring contracts, recording contracts and management contracts with the acts not even understanding what rights they were signing away.
One Direction fans have often wondered how the boys ended up signed with Modest and this shows exactly why; they didn’t have a choice and were already signed to them before the shows even reached their peak. If, as was suggested in the leaked 2008 contract, the contractual agreement between One Direction and Modest Management does in fact last fourteen years then it should end at some point this year. It will be interesting to see if there are changes on the boys PR wise over the course of this year.
Jedward stated on Twitter that every contestant on the X Factor was a slave to the show and got paid zero while they made millions. They also stated that the mentors on the show only cared about their paychecks and not about the contestants they were supposed to be helping. This has also been reiterated by other former contestants since they were supposed to promote the show without being paid a penny. This promoting the show while not being paid was a way for Syco/ Fremantle and Simon Cowell to financially abuse contestants since they actually weren’t paid for their time on the X Factor, even though the producers made millions from them.
Another aspect of the financial abuse suffered by contestants was exposed by Mark Boardman. Mark is a freelance journalist and exposed that acts had a price for bookings, but while they companies booking them were charged a certain amount to have former X Factor contestants attend, the act would only get a small percentage of what was earned. Modest were exceptionally unhappy with this information being shared, but since it was true then there was not much they could do to get it taken down.
Stories from the X Factor to the press were shared from within the X Factor house by members of the production team who were staying there with the acts and were shared without any regard for the contestants mental health. This was a running theme through the show and the press spoken too often blame the general public for wanting the scandalous stories and gossip, but are they really to blame? If the only information on their favourite act is gossip then of course they would drink it in, and since social media was only just beginning to take off then it was definitely a common theme to feed contestants to the wolves to get column inches which is both immoral and incredibly damaging.
The contract that contestants signed, (according to the leaked one of 2008) stated that participants in the show could not speak badly about the show, its set up or about Simon Cowell. No derogatory, negative or critical comments and this was stated in the contract. So is it any wonder that many acts still can’t speak negatively, especially in later shows where the contracts are still in effect? According to the reports from 2008 the contracts were for 14 years, but we’ve heard from Katie that the contracts from 2010 were for 20 years.
Artists were also, according to this 2008 contract, forced to sign with Modest Management if they won and also sign with Syco Music where the label had the final say over album tracks. Artists were also only paid a tiny 15% of royalties for single and album sales and 7.5% for a headline tour. This shows how heavily weighted the contracts were to the benefit of labels because they recouped 85% of album sales and 92% of tour sales meaning that it isn’t any wonder that artists like Little Mix had to drive themselves around on their third tour, sleeping in a car because they couldn’t afford a tour bus. Further artists leaving the show would have to give Simon Cowell 5% of future earnings for up to a year.
The X Factor was a dream for many since it gained them exposure, but for others that dream became a living nightmare and it didn’t end when the show was over. They were signed to damaging contracts that potentially weren’t in their best interests, not allowed to speak negatively about the show, Simon Cowell or producers and most still can’t because of the mountains of NDAs involved. Further, there’s also potential for cases of Stockholm Syndrome to be in effect where singers feel that the show gave them their platform and that they should be eternally grateful to Simon Cowell, Fremantle and the X Factor for selecting them from anonymity and helping them to stardom. I covered Stockholm Syndrome in another article and will also put a link in this one.
One thing is for sure and that is X Factor contestants were abused, manipulated and forced to sign contracts with legal representation that had the best interests of the production company and not the clients in mind. These acts were exposed in the worst possible way and then left to sink or swim in an unforgiving industry that was homophobic, fat phobic, racist and abusive.
These producers and Simon Cowell, Sharon Osborne, Louis Walsh and Dani Minogue should all face criminal charges over the bullying, outing, sexual assault and more that contestants faced at their hands. It’s time they were held accountable for all they did to contestants and time the world opened their eyes to the plethora of abuse these contestants went through at the hands of this show.
Entertaining the masses is one thing, but consistent abuse of power and weighting contracts to their benefit, demoralising, fat shaming and exploitation should stop. The Youtube Channel should be shut down and contestants should be free to live their lives without their auditions be shared over and over without their consent and without them being compensated.
More than that though, the X Factor sold a dream to the public but behind closed doors it was nothing more than a smokescreen for abuse, exploitation and manipulation of contests. Isn’t it time Simon Cowell and those responsible were held accountable for that? You can be the judge, but to me and others, it’s high time Cowell and his compatriots faced the responsibility of their actions.
Behind The Curtains
Special thanks to Offstage Podcast, Mark Boardman, Katie Waisell, Rebecca Ferguson, Matt Cardle and Jedward for exposing the abuses suffered.
https://www.exposing-abuse-corruption-and-the-music-industry.com/1638578_stockholm-syndrome
Further thank you to my amazing editor and my friends for helping with research.
https://news.sky.com/story/rebecca-ferguson-a-former-x-factor-contestant-calls-for-investigation-into-reality-tv-12898758
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-66190895#:~:text=Former%20X%20Factor%20contestant%20Lucy,as%20reported%20at%20the%20time.
https://www.bhg.com/better-homes-and-garden-magazine/harry-styles/
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/brand/m001vtth
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