# Frenchie Davis kicked off American Idol **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 12, 2003, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499 "2003-02-12T02:42:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Greywolf73](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d9b06d/32.png) [@Greywolf73](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greywolf73)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2003, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/41 "2003-02-12T20:43:33Z")
WOW. Now THAT was fast: [http://www.savefrenchie.com/](http://www.savefrenchie.com/) 2,788 signatures already on the petition. With this kind of following–she doesn’t even need American Idol. Fox can kiss her ass. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Shayna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shayna/32/17976_2.png) [@Shayna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shayna)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2003, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/42 "2003-02-12T20:45:01Z")
Who cares what strippers get paid or what specific acts they perform? So perhaps **Stoid** overstated the “primary source of money for the majority of strippers”. That’s not the point here. The point is, how and why is it different for a cute little white chick to strip to (at least) bare breasts, jiggle them in the general direction of men’s faces, bump and grind her body rhythmically, most likely rubbing herself in a suggestive fashion and a large black woman who strips to bare breasts, simulates what _appears_ to be suggestive touching of herself and has still shots taken for men to oogle at? Why is the person who did the former allowed to continue as a contestant on a Pop Idol show and the latter kicked off? There’s a possibility that Frenchie Davis is no longer being allowed to compete on AI due to previous recording contracts or other rules violations having nothing to do with her posing. If that turns out to be the case, I’ll reconsider my stance here. However, what we know right now is that it’s being reported that (at least partially) the reason she’s no longer a contestant is because Fox found out about her previous stint posing topless for an adult website. And I think that’s hypocritical. And wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Rubicon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/58f4c7/32.png) [@Rubicon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rubicon)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2003, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/43 "2003-02-12T21:00:27Z")
Hey Shana: > [@](#): > > ## quote: > > Originally posted by Rubicon > > ## is it possible that she was doing something so sleazy that she even made Fox uncomfortable? Seems a bit early to vent on Fox before we know exactly what she did > > 1. Scroll Up > 2. Read Post Immediately Above Yours > 3. Click Link For Verification I did. It was an unconfirmed speculation on The Smoking Gun, which I hardly consider proof of “exactly what she did”. She may be relatively “innocent” here, but Fox could be too. However, I find it odd that the initial reaction on this board, normally the home of logic, was an unbalanced bashing of Fox before anyone knew what she actually did–which we STILL don’t know. ---
**Author:** ![Tangent](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tangent/32/3098_2.png) [@Tangent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tangent)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2003, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/44 "2003-02-12T21:28:23Z")
This is the first I’ve heard about Nicki from the first season having been a stripper. Does anyone have a cite for this? Everyone here seems to be taking it for granted that she was (to the point of mentioning it in a protest letter to FOX), so maybe I just missed out when that news came out. ---
**Author:** ![Beadalin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3be4f8/32.png) [@Beadalin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beadalin)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2003, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/45 "2003-02-12T21:36:14Z")
Man, the Idol message boards are flooded with posts about this. I hope they’ll pay some attention, but I sincerely doubt it will make any real difference. ---
**Author:** ![Shayna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shayna/32/17976_2.png) [@Shayna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shayna)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2003, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/46 "2003-02-12T21:50:29Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Tangent \* > \*\*This is the first I’ve heard about Nicki from the first season having been a stripper. Does anyone have a cite for this? Everyone here seems to be taking it for granted that she was (to the point of mentioning it in a protest letter to FOX), so maybe I just missed out when that news came out. \*\* From [http://www.forevernikki.iwarp.com/custom2.html](http://www.forevernikki.iwarp.com/custom2.html) > [@](#): > > American Idol… > > Nikki McKibbin > > Interview By Chauncé Hayden > > \ > > The big tabloid story on you is that you used to work as a stripper. Do you have any regrets about that brief career choice? > > No, no way. Maybe people look at me in a bad way because of that. But if they do, then they’re not seeing me or who I am as a person. They’re seeing what I did for a job. What they need to see is who I am and the reason why I did that job. > > Just for the record, why did you work as a stripper? > > Because I was having a real hard time finding a job, and I had just gotten my own place with my son and I just couldn’t afford for us to live. So I did what I had to do and I’m not ashamed of it and I don’t regret it at all. ---
**Author:** ![Tangent](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tangent/32/3098_2.png) [@Tangent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tangent)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2003, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/47 "2003-02-12T21:57:22Z")
Thanks, **Shayna**! I always liked Nicki (cause she was a little different from the others), and this doesn’t make me think any less of her, but it is indeed a double-standard on the part of FOX–assuming they knew about it before the first season was over. ---
**Author:** ![Batsinma\_Belfry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ea5d25/32.png) [@Batsinma\_Belfry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Batsinma_Belfry)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2003, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/48 "2003-02-12T22:34:42Z")
From the USA TODAY article: > [@](#): > > \*But co-producer 19 Entertainment, which signs Idol winners to recording contracts, says it will “endeavor to do all in its power to help Frenchie further her music career.” \* She’ll probably be more successful now than if she had won American Idol. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2003, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/49 "2003-02-13T00:51:54Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Greywolf73 \* > \*\*WOW. Now THAT was fast: [http://www.savefrenchie.com/](http://www.savefrenchie.com/) > 2,788 signatures already on the petition. > With this kind of following–she doesn’t even need American Idol. Fox can kiss her ass. 🙂 \*\* In the 45 hours since you posted this the number more than tripled. In the 15 seconds after I posted my signature, 14 more people signed up. Write them! Send E-mails! Send faxes! ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2003, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/50 "2003-02-13T00:53:58Z")
4.5 hours, that is. ---
**Author:** ![Shayna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shayna/32/17976_2.png) [@Shayna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shayna)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2003, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/51 "2003-02-13T00:55:02Z")
I’m at work on the West Coast so it hasn’t aired here yet, and I’m going straight from the office to the Citizen’s Police Academy that **Spiny Norman** and I are attending so I’ll miss it entirely, but I’ve read elsewhere on the web that both Entertainment Tonight and Access Hollywood are reporting that Frenchie told the Producers at Fox back in _November_ that she’d posed for pictures on an Adult website. Can someone who’s seen either of these shows, or who will see them later, please confirm this for me? If this is true, why on _earth_ is it now, all of a sudden an issue, but it wasn’t when she disclosed it before the show even began _airing_?! Why bother to let her get this far in the competition, only to pull her out in the middle of it? ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2003, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/52 "2003-02-13T01:00:27Z")
C;mon Shayna, you know why, we’ve been saying it all along: because she was emerging as the star, with an excellent shot at actually winning. And they couldn’t stand that. It’s one thing to give the fat girl a shot, show you’re being fair. But to let her WIN? ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2003, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/53 "2003-02-13T01:05:57Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by hillbilly queen \* > > She’ll probably be more successful now than if she had won American Idol. \*\* Yep - if the pix come out in public. Vanessa Williams would be just another ex-Miss America without hers, right? Still sucks, though. What she is said to have done is a mainstream activity nowadays. It would be nice to know what other skeletons are in the others’ closets. Save Frenchie! ---
**Author:** ![Shayna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shayna/32/17976_2.png) [@Shayna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shayna)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2003, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/54 "2003-02-13T01:13:41Z")
According to [this article](http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,11274,00.html) from E! Online… > [@](#): > > An impromptu online petition has also been launched to bring the zaftig singer back into the spotlight. > > But fans’ efforts are in vain, said a source close to the production, who told E! Online, “There’s an enormous difference between working as a topless dancer and a stripper and someone who’s posing on website geared to men’s fantasies toward underage girls.” That’s such crap. The website, from what I can tell, doesn’t use minors and doesn’t puport to – it merely uses the term “teenage”. Teenage /= **Under** age! Yeah, sure, we could get into a whole other debate about that, but the bottom line is this… the woman was legally an adult when she posed. There was and is nothing illegal about posing for semi-nude pictures. And she disclosed this to the Producers before the show even began airing. This whole thing just disgusts me. ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2003, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/55 "2003-02-13T01:52:38Z")
When I called the American Idol production offices, the gal I spoke with was very nice and used the following phrase: “We’re trying to get Frenchie back…” I didn’t seize on her words at the time, but I cling to them as hope. I wonder where the woman herself is right now, if she’s fully aware of the tremendous support she’s got, and if she’s playing it right. I’ll bet she’s got lots of people offering to manage her and speak for her at the point. It’s hard to imagine any of last year’s contestants getting this kind of support and affection \* before they’d even sung in the semifinals! \* I hope whoever is whispering in her ear right now doesn’t get her to sign anything with them, because that will automatically prevent her from being reinstated. As much as people like her, I think her best shot at this point is to get back on the show and kick everybody’s ass. ---
**Author:** ![kung\_fu\_lola](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f4b2a3/32.png) [@kung\_fu\_lola](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kung_fu_lola)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2003, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/56 "2003-02-13T01:56:29Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by annieclaus \* > \*\*Then why do they dress all the female contestants like hookers? \*\* Refer to earlier point in post: “Sex makes money. Money = good.” ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2003, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/57 "2003-02-13T02:11:49Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Stoid \* > \*\*C;mon Shayna, you know why, we’ve been saying it all along: because she was emerging as the star, with an excellent shot at actually winning. And they couldn’t stand that. > > It’s one thing to give the fat girl a shot, show you’re being fair. But to let her WIN? \*\* Uh, no, YOU’VE been saying it all along. “You” != “We”. Did you not watch the show tonight? The winners were, to put it bluntly, fat. Why would they dump Frenchie and not Ruben Studdard, who’s got a shot at winning and is the size of a mobile home? This is a prudishness issue, and I’d bet dollars to your dimes that it’s the sponsors who applied to pressure to have her banned. ---
**Author:** ![Apos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/838e76/32.png) [@Apos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apos)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2003, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/58 "2003-02-13T02:16:41Z")
—Because everyone knows, sex = dirty and sexless = clean.— Sick thing is, the whole “clean” thing is as much as sexual fetish as anything else. The goal IS “clean” girls dressed like hookers. Actual hookers need not apply. ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2003, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/59 "2003-02-13T02:21:09Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by RickJay \* > \*\*Uh, no, YOU’VE been saying it all along. “You” != “We”. > Did you not watch the show tonight? . \*\* Uh, no, because I’m in California and it’s 6:19 pm. Thank you. Very much. Not. Ever heard of spoiler boxes? Time zones other than your own? (And “we” includes the many other people who have been saying the same thing all over the net, if not here. I’m far from being alone in this. Frenchie was far and away the star, and she hadn’t even sung yet. Very likely she’d win. Not so true with everyone else.) ---
**Author:** ![Slacker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6bbea6/32.png) [@Slacker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slacker)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2003, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499/60 "2003-02-13T02:47:46Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Stoid \* > \*\*C;mon Shayna, you know why, we’ve been saying it all along: because she was emerging as the star, with an excellent shot at actually winning. And they couldn’t stand that. > > It’s one thing to give the fat girl a shot, show you’re being fair. But to let her WIN? \*\* So what nefarious plan is about to befall our other two larger contestants? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/frenchie-davis-kicked-off-american-idol/154499.md?page=4)