Last week as I was attempting to fall asleep after ignoring all of my homework, I started thinking about celebrity culture. Earlier in the day, a few of my friends and I were swapping embarrassing and crazy stories. I mentioned that I had once kissed a celebrity’s son (whose identity shall remain nameless), and everyone freaked out.
Having lived in Los Angeles, I’ve grown accustomed to celebrity culture. Don’t get me wrong, I still freaked out when I saw Patrick Dempsey at LAX, but after seeing Shaq and Reese Witherspoon several times at my high school, I started to realize something. I’m sorry if I sound like a magazine, but they’re just like us.If you start to think about it, celebrity culture is absurd. Over break I drove down to Hollywood Boulevard and looked at the stars. To me, it was fascinating that in our culture, we take the time to drill plaques into the ground to literally idolize people who act in films.
Moreover, our society falsifies the concept of celebrities. When I was younger I watched The Hills and truly believed that I knew Lauren Conrad and Brody Jenner based on a fake script for a reality television show. I watched interviews with my favorite musicians and felt as though I truly knew them because I read in Teen Bop Magazine that Joe Jonas liked Captain Crunch cereal.I remember growing up and realizing that Zoey 101 was canceled because the main actress got pregnant. I saw magazine headlines showing Lindsay Lohan drunk and in an orange jumpsuit. I saw Vanessa Ann Hudgen’s leaked nude pictures spread like wildfire on the Internet. And we all know where we were when we heard that Britney Spears shaved her head.
At the time, I scoffed. I thought, these are not role models. These are bad kids that grew up poorly, and I’m going to be better.
And then I got to high school and then to college. I kid you not, my second month of college I shaved your head. I’ve done a number of other things that I probably would’ve regretted, especially if I were in the public eye. That got me thinking that maybe the problem isn’t these celebrities, it’s the way in which our society works.What would happen if we didn’t have all the headlines with gossip about Brangelina or the Kardashians? What would happen if we stopped worshipping the ground that celebrities walked upon, and instead we were grateful for the art and entertainment that they contribute to society? Perhaps our morality wouldn’t be so skewed to bite the heads off of celebrities who are just trying to live their lives?
All I’m saying is that our society raises certain people to unreasonable statuses. You can see it at Kenyon. Maybe it’s a human tendency, but we all tend to celebritize/idolize people. You see someone perform in a play or an accapella group, or you notice that they have some other leadership position around campus, and then you see them in the servery, and then everywhere on campus. Your roommate knows a friend of a person in their singing group that knows a piece of gossip. Suddenly you feel as though you know this random person, and regard them with almost a celebrity status.But again, they are just like us. So are celebrities. Perhaps if we didn’t put pressure on actresses and musicians to live up to these idolized statuses we’d have less celebrities shaving their heads, abusing drugs, and leaking inappropriate photos. Personally I think it starts with knocking down the pedestal and realizing the negative consequences of celebrity culture.
You can’t judge a book by its cover. You can’t judge a celebrity by their magazine interview or by the script they read on a reality show. You can’t judge a person based on the gossip you hear about them in Peirce. Does this still mean I’ll freak out when I run into Jonah Hill back home? Probably.
Image Credit: Feature, 1, 2, 3, 4