September 11, 2006

Celebrity

The United States of America is a land of people all trying to know or be celebrities. Think about how easy we've made it in this country to be a celebrity: you can run and jump out in front of a bus at 99 mph and post a video clip of it to YouTube.com and suddenly, you're famous (assuming that Andy Warhol was right - "In the future, everyone will be world-famous for fifteen minutes.").

We have people in this country famous for singing...badly! There are American Idol rejects that are famous because of how horribly they sing or how funny they look. And the bad singer or funny looker? They're fine with it. Just ask William Hung. Hung knows he's no Sinatra, but he's made a killing off of his "Inspiration" CD that sold out in record stores after his Idol "debut."

I have no problem with celebrity. Truth is, I'd love to someday be recognized for the work I do (I think most of us would). My main problem is with how celebrities are idolized more than the actual work they do is. Don't believe me? Take a trip into any supermarket in North America (or any news stand in Western Europe will do fine). Count the magazine covers that feature none other than the personal life, death, and breakup stories of our favorite Western celebs Brad, Angelina, Jen, Jessica, Nick, Katie, Tom. And I'm not talking about the traditionally-known tabloids either; I'm talking about "legitimate news sources" like People, UsWeekly, and Good Housekeeping. Okay, maybe not Good Housekeeping. But you get my point.

Now, lest you call me Hypocrite, I will acknowledge that I do in fact have Zach Braff on my MySpace Top 16 and no, I don't personally know Zach. Everyone is allowed to have one celebrity on their MySpace Top 4/8/12/16. These are my rules, okay?

See? I admit I'm a typical American. And nothing wows Americans more than the power of celebrity. Oprah knows the power of celebrity. She knows that if she believes in something, all she has to do is mention it on her show and every housewife in America will believe in it, too - which means, of course, that we men are doomed to wallow alone in our principles.

Religious people are notorious for relying on the power of celebrity as well. Not that there's anything wrong with celebrities who are religious. But, think about it: when The Passion of the Christ was released, many Christians all over America unofficially hailed Mel Gibson as their "spokesperson." Gibson was one of them and was their celeb of choice. Then, what does Gibson do? He goes and does something that's not in line with the teaching of Jesus. After receiving a DUI and mouthing off horribly offensive religious slurs, many of those Christians were devastated. Many conservative Christians have long soaked up every word from other religious "spokespersons" like Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson, and when they made statements that were deeply offensive, those Christians felt they had been alienated from their own spokespeople.

Remember the whole Tom Cruise fiasco last year? Tom was idolized by every woman in America and when he lashed out at a woman dealing with a real issue (Brooke Shields), women (my wife included) were appalled and even heartbroken.

I also realize there are many other avenues I could go with this thing. It's done in politics all the time as well, but for the sake of not boring you, my dear 5 readers, I will close with this thought:

We all enjoy the prominence of celebrity. But we should make sure we don't put celebrities up on a pedestal that makes them "infallible." They might just do something fallible and shock us to our very core. I'm preaching to myself here, too, lest Mr. Braff should go and hold up a liquor store or something and I'm left going, "It couldn't be! He's in my Top 16! I'm all alone in my principles!"

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21:00 Posted in Celebrities, Movies, and TV | Permalink | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0) | Email this | Tags: celebrities, celebrity, Zach Braff, MySpace, Mel Gibson, Pat Robertson, William Hung