Feb 29 2008
Ask Yourself THIS…
I don’t know how many people are honest enough to take this challenge:
For every second you’ve ever spent wasting your time worrying about “problems” of some “celebrity”–or worse yet, celebrity wannabe such as anyone who’s ever appeared on a “reality show”–how much time have you spent worrying about real problems of people you actually know? Better yet, have you tried to help people close to you, even if it means simply listening to them? By the way, just listening to someone non-judgmentally and compassionately is probably the best help you could ever offer most people.
Most of those idiots who hang around outside court rooms, jails, hospitals, etc., pledging their love, support and allegiance to some narcissistic, spoiled, self-centered, clueless, vapid “celebrity” criminal would give up their beating heart to one of these mannequins–who would charge them for the saliva they would spit at them to get them out of their way–sooner than they would give up an hour of their time to a friend or family member in need. (Wow, that was an intense run-on sentence…)
I hope my blog doesn’t attract such sycophants (look it up and feel free to use it in your next conversation). But the truth is, many if not most North Americans these days seem to know and care more about the lives, triumphs and “hardships” of fictional characters and “reality stars” than they do of real people in their lives.
Why do you think _____ Idol, Survivor, etc. are such hits? I’ll have more to say about the psychology of watching such programs in a later blog. But now I have to go watch Arrested Development…
Celebrities are the new mythological gods, this obsession with the quasi-divine runs long in our history as a society. we are supposed to aspire to be like them; their riches provide an incentive for us to drag ourselves out of bed each morning and face the boss, in hopes of one day owning the rat-like dog that costs more than my house. I was once star-crazy too; as a child I was obsessed with Michael Jackson… I won’t add any more…
You know, your mention of MJ brings up a weird fact that’s interested me: If MJ were anyone else, my natural inclination upon hearing of the first accusations against him re. pedophilia would have been disgust and repulsion, together with compassion for the victim. Yet in MJ’s case, a part of me was hoping that the charges would have proved to be false. I would not have felt this way about any other celebrity, only MJ.
I guess it relates to some desire to hold onto some image of him as an icon of child-like innocence. If his innocence is tarnished, it somehow says something about innocence in general. I know it’s not rational, but that’s the only way I can explain it, since I truly would not feel the same way about any other “idol” I grew up with as a kid. Weird…