Clay Aiken – A Caring and Intelligent Man

Despite having a devoted following of fans, Clay Aiken has run into his fair share of critics and haters. But building up a thick skin is something Aiken did long before fame, and on April 19, 2005, Clay revealed his experiences with bullying and shared his advice with some young people.

The Dr. Phil Show was broken into three segments. In the first segment, the audience was introduced to a 14 year old young lady who was being harassed via the internet. She had been bullied to the point that she was being home schooled. Unfortunately, the bullying had not stopped as many of the students still wrote about her. She had gotten hate emails from across the country.

The second segment was an interview with a parent whose 13 year old daughter bullied so much that she killed herself. The mother reported that the school would not do anything about the bullies.

A 12 year old boy who was a victim of physical bullying was the start of the third segment. Dr. Phil and his son, Jay, talked to the young man about the importance of self-esteem. This is the segment that featured Clay. Dr. Phil’s introduction of Clay was very complimentary. He called Clay a megastar and extremely talented.

After a short film about Clay’s rise to stardom, Clay came onto the stage. The first thing that Dr. Phil showed the audience was Clay’s book, “Learning To Sing.” Dr. Phil said of the book, “it is amazing, incredibly insightful and informing.”

Clay talked to the TV-show host about how being bullied isn’t the end of the world. “It was a really tough time,” he confessed to Dr. Phil. “Middle school’s really tough – I think everybody has trouble with middle school. It’s about finding out who you are and being happy with who you are and being comfortable with who you are, because everybody in middle school is confused.”

Clay did have an opportunity to talk to the two young people who had been highlighted on the show. He talked about how important it is to accept what is important in themselves and to understand that what people say about you is not important. Clay also told the young people how brave they were for being able to talk about this on national television. He suggested that the kids who are doing good things need to stick together because they then can be more powerful that the groups of people who are doing bad things.

At the end of the show, Dr. Phil gave a great plug for Clay’s book and everyone in the audience received a copy of it. Dr. Phil did tell the audience that Clay really only wanted to talk to the kids and didn’t care if his book was even mentioned.

This was an excellent show and Clay was shown as a caring, intelligent man who, although picked on in his early life, was able to find out who he was and developed into a person who was comfortable and happy with whom he became.

The following is a video of some of the highlights of this episode of Dr. Phil.

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9 thoughts on “Clay Aiken – A Caring and Intelligent Man

  1. That was such a great show. It makes me sad to think of the bullying kids have to deal with. Clay has been there and is active is speaking against it now. He truly does care and wants to make a difference.

  2. It's hard to believe this show was 6 years ago…Loved watching the video again. Clay is such a great role model to all kids. He lived it, and wanted to share with the kids that it will get better. I would love for Dr. Phil to have Clay on his show again, and just talk about so many issues, that Clay has dealth with his whole life, and is still dealing with. The bullying never stops, but the more we stand up to it…the better….

  3. What a gift Clay is. Thank you so much for this video and the reminder of this important time. Clay is just the sweetest thing to watch on this to the point I'm in tears.

  4. It was such a joy to watch this again. I have it on tape some where…will have to go and watch the whole episode again. He was so young there…and so helpful to those two kids. If I remember correctly, they showed him back stage at the end of the show talking to them again. I would love for Dr. Phil to have him on his show again. I watch Dr. Phil every day..and he has a lot of shows about bullying.

  5. I was teased in school so I really appreciate all Clay has done and continues to do to help prevent bullying.

    • I was the person that had the big target on their back. I do believe that the bullying has influenced me throughout my life. It took a long time for me to come out of my protective shell!!

  6. What a gift that Clay has given to kids who are being bullied. He was able to learn to stand tall and believe in himself. And I believe he was able to use that knowledge later when the "haters" started in on him after AI2. Today he stands even taller and loves who he is, as we do.

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