Difference between revisions of "Men's Conference (Vote for the Girls USA)"

Revision as of 04:43, 1 March 2016

The American web site Vote for the Girls has, since its 2010 launch, employed a number of villains, known as male moderators, competing against the main female moderators.

History

From April 2010 until May 2013, the female moderators on Vote for the Girls competed against arch-rival Vote for the Worst. Usually, the female moderators compete to get all the male contestants eliminated before the females, much in the same tradition as the later incarnations. As is the case with the Ava Zinn-era of Vote for the Worst, the male moderators were not referred to specifically by a nickname.

Since Vote for the Worst's debut, most of the VFTW picks have been male contestants. In the Dave Della Terza era then competing with VFTG, the site had six American Idol wins with Carrie Underwood, Taylor Hicks, Kris Allen, Lee DeWyze, Scotty McCrerry, and Phillip Phillips, the latter of the three defeated Ava Zinn's final picks of Crystal Bowersox, Lauren Alaina, and Jessica Sanchez, respectively.

During the ninth season of American Idol, Tim Urban broke the record for Vote for the Worst's longest-running American Idol pick ever, as well as tying for longest pick ever with Jaydee Bixby of Canadian Idol Season 3. He remained their pick for nine weeks: from the top 24 to the top seven. He was eliminated in 7th—the same week as Sanjaya Malakar in Season 6. Michael Lynche was originally selected for Top 5 week, but after the performances, the website switched to Casey James, marking the first time the website had changed its mind on which contestant to vote for based on performance alone. VFTW chose Lee DeWyze for the finale, and he won defeating Vote for the Girls pick Crystal Bowersox. This supported VFTW's theory that a female will never win the show again. According to bloggers at VFTW, the seasons have resulted in "3, white, male, brunette, soft-rockers" winners in a row in addition to Della Terza's first victory.

One thing that was in Zinn's favor over Della Terza though was season seven of So You Think You Can Dance, Vote for the Girls' first make-up competition following Crystal Bowersox's defeat, Ava Zinn took time off to mourn the death of her wife, Angie, and a sexual assault in Indianapolis. VFTG chose eventual winner Lauren Froderman.

Season ten of American Idol became a turning point for the Zinn-Della Terza rivalry due to Zinn's support of candidates Pia Toscano and Della Terza's support of Paul McDonald. Zinn, Everman, and Robyn Hurd campaigned heavily to vote out the male contestants. After Toscano's controversially were voted out of the competition, Vote for the Girls selected Haley Reinhart and Lauren Alaina as their picks to make the finale. Alaina went on to last 8 more weeks in the competition (that has since been tied with Jessica Meuse and surpassed by Jena Asciutto), becoming a cultural phenomenon while gaining momentum along the way with support from local news personalities, such as Karly Ryder and Patrice Rafferty.^[1] Zinn recalls the 'Vote for Lauren and Haley' campaign as her "most memorable Vote for the Girls candidates ever" and helped make Vote for the Girls a household name.

Della Terza was successful during seasons ten and eleven of American Idol, supporting the 4th and 5th "white guys with a guitar," Scotty McCreery and Phillip Phillips. Meanwhile Zinn was successful during seasons eight, nine, and ten of So You Think You Can Dance, supporting winners Melanie Moore, Eliana Girard, and Amy Yakima.

Despite having almost always accompanying Ava Zinn and Holly Everman on VFTG promotions, Robyn Hurd spent most of 2011 sidelined by varicose veins and pulmonary embolism diagnosed in late April 2011 after her wedding with Hillary Matthewson in Iowa City, Iowa; she was forced to host and moderate VFTG while Zinn and Everman took the summer of 2011 during the SYTYCD 8 competition while Zinn had a busy schedule with her American Idol season 11 audition in Pittsburgh, the Mississinewa High School Class of 2001 Reunion, ongoing issues with her children moving away from Marion, Indiana, returning to her hometown of Van Buren for the town's Popcorn Festival (which began the same night of the So You Think You Can Dance 8 finale) and Holly Everman was also dealing with the death of her brother and subsequent alcoholism following Toscano's elimination; Robyn was the only VFTG moderator for the SYTYCD make-up competition with the site supporting of eventual SYTYCD 8 winner Melanie Moore and runner-up Sasha Mallory. For Robyn Hurd, the situation was agonizing.

Season eleven of American Idol saw the site gain major momentum as Ava Zinn announced on April 18, 2011 she was herself auditioning as a contestant (it is interesting to note that this was Zinn's only chance due to Zinn being 28 years of age and is currently the only Vote for the Girls moderator to ever achieve that feat). Vote for the Girls supported Jessica Sanchez during the time that Ava Zinn favorite Erika Van Pelt was eliminated,^[2] as well as Skylar Laine when more popular Hollie Cavanagh was eliminated.^[3]

In January 2013, Vote for the Worst's creator, Dave Della Terza, announced that the site would be shutting down, but not before covering one final season of American Idol. The shutdown was planned for June 2013, though it was not specified whether the site would simply be discontinuing all updates and left behind as an archive, or whether it would disappear entirely.^[4] The last VFTW pick was Kree Harrison. Vote for the Worst was unsuccessful during season twelve as Lazaro Arbos was the last male VFTW pick until the top 6 which saw an all-female top 5 and finale (while at the same time, Vote for the Girls achieved the first Idol victory after three years); this was the same all-female finale in the very first VFTW season, when they selected Janelle Arthur.

Since Della Terza's version of Vote for the Worst ended and the Ava Zinn version, Vote for the Worst picks have only been male contestants, which are never revealed until the end of the competition. Zinn's version banned gay males (as M2F picks), lesbian females (as F2M picks), and most notably transgender females, as Vote for the Girls and Zinn's version of Vote for the Worst picks are evident when the Ava Zinn version began. Since the impementation of "flex picks" in 2014, in addition to the female contestants

After Vote for the Worst closed in 2013, there were only two male moderators for the Ava Zinn-version of Vote for the Worst – Lawrence Hederick and Leonard Lai. Clark Jones joined Hederick and Lai in 2014 after previously appearing periodically as a substitute male moderator. Fans of VFTG have speculated Della Terza was the first male moderator.

As of 2015, Lawrence Hederick, Leonard Lai, and Dave Della Terza are currently the only male moderators to have declared victories over the female moderators since the launch of Vote for the Girls.

The site currently has has five permanent male moderators: Archibald Coolranch, Clark Jones, Lawrence Hederick, Luka Runecraft, and Glenn Swaringen. Each episode typically features two or three male moderators. Occasionally only one male moderator is present when appearing alongside a guest personality from a program either airing on a NoSirGifts-owned station, produced by Aeverine Zinn Holdings, or distributed by NoSirGifts, or taped at NoSirGifts Fantasy Television Studios.

The men are now referred as "the VFTG The Male Moderator Panel " when making public appearances with the main female moderators. As part of the change, starting in December 2014, the site's male moderators are now listed in VFTG's credit roll. Beginning with the 2015–16 season, the male moderators wear microphones so they can be heard when they are talking with Zinn or another female moderator. On some episodes only two male moderators are featured, usually with Holly Everman or Kellie Rock serving as a third male moderator .

Starting in 2015, the male moderators added additional roles. Their roles expanded on the show's website, including male moderator interviews to participating in their own "reality" web series, Male Moderator Search, where they served as judges (in 2012 and 2014). In a 2016 episode, the male moderators, five male television news personalities at NoSirGifts flagship station and CBS affiliate WTOR along with Stephen Christian will participate in an episode theme on April Fool's Day in which the male moderators swapped roles with the main moderator panelists.

List of male moderators

Guest male moderators

Since Vote for the Worst's shut down in 2013, news presenters have appeared during specific segments (especially with themed segments around the subject) on many episodes to promote prizes related to their profession.

In 2014, appeared on the April Fool's Day episodes, reprising her role as Mimi Bobeck from The Drew Carey Show. In 2009, she appeared as a model and in 2010, she acted as the executive producer with the show's models trading places with three male staffers.

Occasionally, there is a crossover with other shows airing on, owned or distributed by NoSirGifts Fantasy Television Stations and/or produced Aeverine Zinn Holdings featuring actors of those shows modeling prizes. These crossovers have often included the Ava Zinn-owned INNewsCenter and AvaZinn.com (Zinn's web site). Danni McClannahan (then-husband of Leonard Lai and current significant other of Lanise White), Stephani Alvaraz (the daughter of VFTG moderator Kymberly Alvaraz), Zinn's daughters (Samantha, Tiffani, Ashli, and Tabitha Zinn), Rachael Passalt (the then-son of Julia Passalt known as Raymond), Johnathan Steele (brother of Michelle Steele) frequently crosses over as a guest moderator , especially when a skit necessitates and when needed. Passalt and Steele's use as a crossover moderator resulted in the show standardizing the use of a male moderator.

If a moderator reward for a VFTG Victoy is a trip to a locale in the United States, the prize may be presented on the large screen in the back of Studio 47 with Holly Everman usually turning over the prize announcement to a news personality from the local NoSirGifts owned station. This practice began in 2015 as the show typically leads in to the local weekend news broadcast since this program is distributed from NoSirGifts.

References