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Tell them to leave Britney Spears alone already!
Tournesol
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Just today, I saw a headline about Britney being committed again and thought "let's see what mud they're slinging at the poor girl now". Apparently her mother had called the police, affraid that she might kill herself. While saving a life is as important as an assignment ever is, the police overacted, inavoidably attracting media attention. First they sent 4 cars and a helicopter, then a van and two undercover cars, then 15 motorcycles! Do anybody think that such an excessive display helped her one bit?
This is just the last of several cases where she's had her problems put under a huge spotlight for the world to see. Is it any wonder that she's messed up when her every mistake or personal tragedy is treated as breaking news with sympathy and respect rarely present?
Britney Spears is a singer. If you do a story about her, do one about her (crappy IMO but that's beside the point) music. Her private life is just that: private.
Do you know anybody employed in the media, tabloid or otherwise? Then let them know how horrible you think this feeding frenzy is.
This is just the last of several cases where she's had her problems put under a huge spotlight for the world to see. Is it any wonder that she's messed up when her every mistake or personal tragedy is treated as breaking news with sympathy and respect rarely present?
Britney Spears is a singer. If you do a story about her, do one about her (crappy IMO but that's beside the point) music. Her private life is just that: private.
Do you know anybody employed in the media, tabloid or otherwise? Then let them know how horrible you think this feeding frenzy is.
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This is true. There is a price to be paid for fame.
However, I will never admit to the mode of thinking that there's nothing wrong with papparazzi following your every fucking move, or having every event of your life broadcast on National Television.
I mean, honestly. I hate this for two reasons; One, it's extremely rude and I'm sure excessive press and the pressure of hollywood don't do wonders for a human psyche. Two... aren't we still in Iraq? Any news on Bin Laden? Any report on what Bush is going to pull next before he leaves office? Is it really necessary for Brittney Spears, Micheal Richards, Mel Gibson, and other celebrities who fucked up, to take precedence over actual news?
I pine for a time when news is news, and not mindless gossip with no bearing on serious world events.
I walked into the commons room one day and, according to FOX, to which the tele was tuned, it was "BREAKING NEWS" that she decided to shave her head.
Less serious though, our celebrities are our royalty. They pay for the fame with attention. Be it good or bad. Personally if i was being followed around id just have people stalk my stalkers, and put their dirty laundry on billboards.
Or hey, just ignore it. Frankly half the problem is their attention whoring. Work your ass off to get all eyes on you, then cry when they start pointing out the stupid crap you do.
There's lots of bad shit going around Hollywood. Hell, someone recently dug up an old anecdote from Jason Lee a few years back where he recalled being offered coke by Heath Ledger, and now it's suddenly relevant. But even most people who decide to do destructive things to themselves have the propriety and common sense to keep it private. Concordantly, that way, things like Ledger's death come as a complete shock to the mainstream despite the fact that anyone that knew him personally saw it coming.
Britney, for lack of a lazier term, is a train wreck. And as train wrecks go, it's one of the best kinds. Most people just try to retain their dignity and put the wheels back on the right track. But with Britney, not only is she driving a train wreck, but the train is on fire, it's lost all its cars, the crew has jumped off, the train has derailed, it's now hitting cars on the highway, and the conductor just keeps telling people, "I'm fine, y'all."
Britney's biggest crime (other than, you know, her actual crimes) is her complete and uncontrollable lack of self-awareness. But now that she's an adult with adult responsibilities, it's been extrapolated to the point where she's actually a danger to herself and others, simply because she honestly doesn't have the good sense to know good from bad, right from wrong. She's the personification of the mythological fourth tier of Freudian psyche: the Super Id.
And in a world run by rules and laws, responsibilities and repercussions, the Super Id that is unable to satisfy itself will eventually destroy itself.
There's a difference between basking in attention and having people follow you everywhere you go. These celebrities get paid alot of money to sing or make movies, not be hounded with every move they make.
It seems that the paparazzi are more likely to doggedly hound someone who is a total imbecile and relatively unworthy of the riches they've gained selling soulless music/movies/television.
Ergo, that's why you see Britney, Lindsey, and Jessica Simpson on every front page instead of, say, Elvis Costello or Don Cheadle.
Also Don Cheadle and Elvis Costello don't look good in skimpy outfits. Actually I take that back about Don.
The paparazzi is a symptom, not the disease.
They certainly aren't blameless, but neither are the celebrities who court the conduit when it suits them nor the public who consume this irrelevance masquerading as news.
In all seriousness, I have less respect for the paparazzi who is doing negative stuff for personal gain than a celebrity who is mostly doing positive public work (entertainment) for personal gain. I do blame the public for being idiots, though, and providing the mouth easily fed by all this bullshit, this culture.
But that ignores the celebrities who court media attention when they want something. Like publicity for their upcoming album/movie or $1.5Mill for exclusive photo rights of their wedding. Neither of which they would bother doing if the public weren't so cockhungry for celebrity gossip. Of course, the paparazzi play an unpleasant and unforgivable role but all three groups are at the very least equally to blame. The paparazzi are certainly the most passive of the three though, they only do it because the celebrities willingly give to them and because the public so eagerly demands the stuff, even if on the surface it looks like it's the paparazzi who are the ones running around chasing down the photographs and digging around for the dirt. The paparazzi is an ancillary phenomenon which simply wouldn't exist without the mainstream and voluntary celebrity/media/consumer three-way circle-jerk.
It doesn't excuse them for their behavior at all, it's just ridiculous to lay the blame solely at their feet. You don't enjoy a runny nose, but you don't blame it for feeling ill.
Uhm, no, I think I specifically stated that celebrities do this "for personal gain." I don't think I'm ignoring that at all. Entertainment has positive societal benefits. I think our system of celebrity is flawed, but fundamentally the idea of "entertainment," which celebrity is one element of, is a positive thing.
So, in my opinion, paparazzis contribute very little positive. They are, in general, very slimy, gross people. Even the people they provide entertainment to know this and resent them while they eat up the shit they peddle. Be that as it may, they directly damage. Celebrity doesn't, at least not directly. Perhaps by existing they do, and perhaps the public's "need" for gossip indirectly does as well, but paparazzis are worthy of my full scorn for directly going and making people miserable.
Although yes, I wish the paparazzi would just fucking stop because apart from anything else having valuable news-time chocked up with the minutiae of these worthless peoples' lives is irksome.
I think you are conflating "paparazzi" and "media." Paparazzi may be a part of the media, but the media is larger than just the paparazzi.
So to sum up: Celebrities using the media-in-general to promote? A-ok. Paparazzis invading every nook and cranny they can fit their camera in? A-not-ok. At least in my book.
I mean if a bunch of my friends surrounded a car and refused to move wouldn't we get arrested or something?
No, I think I was making a distinction. The paparazzi is a tool of the media. And yeah, I find the whole sordid deal pretty reprehensible as well, I just don't think that anyone involved in it has the moral highground. Only those not involved can claim any moral superiority in the matter and it's our opinion that the whole bunch of them should just die. We're going to need the extra space what with all this global warming.
The paparazzi and celebrities are both providing entertainment for personal gain. You just don't happen to enjoy the entertainment paparazzi provide.
We need to make a stand now before the next reality show is Celebrity Suicide.
edit: wait, nevermind, let it happen
I covered this in a later post. Go ahead and read that one and get back to me.
I guess that's it.
Though it's handy that Frankie follows that shit on trivia night.
Critical Failures - Havenhold Campaign • August St. Cloud (Human Ranger)
Seriously, these people wouldn't be surrounded by cameras if they were fucking normal. Jack Nicholson takes his millions and buys a big house with a roofed-in everything, writes fuck you cameramen on top of it, and hires security to keep them away, until they just "get the idea". Maybe if Brad and Angelina didn't collect foreign kids like beanie babies and go around the world doing weird shit, or maybe if lindsey lohan didn't do blow and suck dick in the bathroom of an applebees then the cameras wouldn't follow her around all day.
WHO IS DRIVING? BRITNEY IS DRIVING! OMG, HOW CAN THIS BE?! *THUD*
Bingo.
Also their are certain night clubs you know the paparazzi stalk, and certain areas they camp out at.
Plenty of a-list actors/singers do not have this problem, because they don't go to those places and act like idiots.
The reason this counter-argument is flawed is that celebrities intentionally seek out the publicity. They want to be photographed pissing their pants in the alley behind the Bongo Club because it increases their ratings.
take a pic
profit
she increases tabloid sales, her doing stuff employs paparazzi, she's pretty valuable to gawker and defamer and tmz and whatnot. if pictures of her doing shit didn't increase sales then she probably wouldn't be featured so heavily. if headlines saying "bin laden still at large" or "us military still in iraq" actually sold newspapers or increased traffic to media outliet sites then that would be featured. although some paparazzi step over the line, you shouldn't blame them that a big portion of the public care more about the doings of celebrities then american foreign policy.
I know you were being farsical, but this might not be too far off. They think she might off herself or do something very self-destructive and they want to be right there when it happens.
I think she needs to sell-off her houses, cars, and assets in holly-wood, stash it all in CDs, and go to bumfuck Montana for a few years to detox and get her head straight.
Margaret Thatcher
Call that "going off the rails," Britney? Check out Amy Winehouse - that's how to do it properly.
If you're going to implode, do it large.
Heath Ledger comment aside, I really wasn't kidding. I think the media is cashing in on a new trend of celebrity suicide because the payoff is a lot better with minimal effort and I think they're driving spears to it. She's already fucked up, but when they throw themselves in front of her car, say she ran over their feet, and then call the cops and report her fleeing the scene of an accident, when she's already fucked in the head, they're just icing the cake.
The media is going to kill her, just like they killed Anna Nicole. Heath died this year, so that will be 2. They can run two deaths for six months a piece and really not have to do shit else the rest of the year except start working on their next target.