Celebrities and their Right to Privacy

Let's face it--many celebrities didn't think they were going to be as big as they are. Most of them start off on Broadway, or singing in nightclubs. They do what they love and they end up big because of it. However, with the fame and fortune comes lots of drama--no pun intended. It's amazing to see videos on YouTube of Paris Hilton in Prague with thousands of photographers following her in an attempt to get a picture to sell to tabloids for possibly hundreds of thousands of dollars. Following celebrities in their every breath is now a profession, and, to me, it's pretty sickening. Is it the celebrities' fault? When you sign up to be famous, are you selling your soul to the devil?

Most of us can't get enough of the Baby Bump Watch, which is basically everyone trying to get to a celebrity to determine if she is really pregnant, after much speculation. At the same time we look foward to the nasty divorces and embarrassing sex tapes. This is a term the German call schadenfreude. Its rough English translation is "pleasure from misfortune". It basically means that we, as human beings, relish in seeing these seemingly perfect figures go through rough patches. It makes us realize that the "beautiful people" can have ugly situations in their lives, too, and, like us, they're not perfect. It's basically the media's job to get us this information, and to be the first to do it. Many paparazzi and reporters will stop at nothing to get a story. They are paid to follow celebrities around to get a good story first. These people see dollar signs in their eyes and don't realize that these celebrities are people too.

How much privacy does a celebrity deserve? Does a celebrity deserve privacy at all? The happenings of a celebrity are on a want-to-know basis, unless an actor has gone completely nuts and is killing everyone in Hollywood. Other than that, nobody really needs to know who Lindsay Lohan was making out with the other night, or the latest Britney Spears meltdown. We just eat it up because it's like a train wreck--you can't stop looking.

I am one of those people who couldn't care less about the latest happenings of celebrities. I don't watch E! News or the Daily Ten because none of it has anything to do with me. I don't find things like this to be entertaining, but more annoying, especially when I see a headline that says "Coming up--what Jessica Alba got for her baby shower!". I'm like, "Who cares? I didn't get anything." I also feel sorry for celebrities. It must be very difficult to have to dip and dodge the media every time they get out of a vehicle. And what about celebrities who have families? The paparazzi can pose a danger to innocent children. But these people don't care.

At the same token, there are some people I call "pesudo-celebs". They are famous for basically being famous. They don't mind the media attention and feed off of it because it's pretty much all the exposure they can get. In a way, the media and pseudo-celebs feed off of each other, and couldn't survive without the other. Also, many A-listers have scandals break out coincidentally at the same time an album or movie drops. Some people speculate that the star did this as a "publicity stunt", because, in Hollywood, all publicity is good publicity. The scandal may compel people to watch the movie and buy the album, which is good for the celebrity. So, in a way, do the tabloids and celebrities need each other? Absolutely. As much as we hate it, one could not survive without the other.

Brittney Clark
PS: Sorry about the screenname. I post a blog elsewhere so I guess it made me keep that name.