For those of you who don't know, the extremely successful show, "American Idol," is on its final season, and so far, this season hasn't been much different from the previous 14 ones. There are still the extremely talented auditions, the not-so-talented-but-think-they're talented auditions and the just plain weird ones. I'm not a huge fan of the show, but the other day I came across a video of one audition. This audition, featuring Jordan and Alex Sasser, a husband and wife from Raleigh, North Carolina, started off interesting because it's not often that you see a married couple auditioning for the same season. To make matters even more intriguing, the couple elected to audition in the room together, along with their baby girl, Westlund. And that's when the audition took a bad, possibly even sexist, turn.

After watching this audition I was left feeling a little confused and slightly irritated. I wasn't bothered by who was chosen to move on to Hollywood; Jordan was, in my opinion, clearly the better singer, although Alex did have a nice voice. What really bothered me was the comment the judges made about the family after Alex's audition. When the family first walked in, the judges were clearly enamored with the trio, and they seemed grateful to the couple for breaking away from the traditional one person in the room audition; after Alex's audition, though, the judges quickly changed their tune. As Harry Connick, Jr. said, Jordan and Westlund's presence during Alex's audition became "highly distracting."

For some reason, however, the family quickly lost their distracting quality when Jordan began his audition. In fact, the presence of Alex and baby Westlund may have made Jordan's audition even better because both J. Lo and Keith Urban mentioned how much they enjoyed the family's obvious connection while Jordan sang. I guess this "light," as Urban described it, was only visible when the husband performed.

I suppose the way Jordan and his daughter were swaying, or dancing as his wife said, to Alex's rendition of Bruno Mars' "Count on Me" could have been considered slightly distracting, but should a veteran "American Idol" judge like Connick really be distracted by simple swaying? If he's capable of judging contestants when they perform in front of a studio audience, why can't he ignore some slight movement when watching one woman's small audition in front of five people? Is it because, in some way, he was doubting Alex's dedication to singing because she had a family? Was he wondering if she would really be willing to sacrifice time with her daughter and husband in order to pursue a career in music?

Such doubts come as no surprise in today's time. We live in a world where traditional male and female gender roles are still viewed as the ideal. With the LGBTQ movement and the emergence of the idea of gender being a more fluid concept, the traditional gender roles have faded, but only slightly. It is still not uncommon to see a woman berated for choosing to pursue a career instead of staying at home with her children and cooking homemade meals that will be waiting on the table when her husband walks through the door after a long day at the office. Conversely, a man is expected to maintain a successful career despite his wife and children, and no one doubts his dedication to his job even though he has kids.

There are many who will disagree with my opinion, and I respect that; I don't expect everyone to be receptive to an idea that attempts to point out sexist biases that often go unnoticed. But before you jump on your "stop-making-everything-about-sexism" horse, stop and think about how you would respond if your friend, daughter or sister walked out of an audition with her husband where the judges had told her that her family was distracting while telling her husband that his family was beautiful. Would you not be the least bit curious as to how something could change from distracting to beautiful in mere minutes? I know I would be.