My previous post is the closest I would come to offering an apology - the strange interest in knowing what the heck was going on in that apartment building with so many youths, two days in a row.
I walked by that building every day or every other day when I would walk in to the village to the pharmacy to put pictures in for development or to the bakery for a couple fresh scones. I had a reason to walk by that building, and think about what I had witnessed on a couple occasions going on in front of the building.
I did not have any right to know what the children were doing with 48 condoms among the five children - that is not my prerogative to know, or to be made aware. I would not know the difference if any of the youths had been the son of a city councillor or the mayor (if the town had such a thing).
We, the public, DO NOT have a right to be part of the lives of other people, regardless of how famous or infamous they may be. We do not have that right. They can stand on a wall at midnight, naked, singing Irish drinking tunes, and we do not have a right to know or be part of, regardless of their actions. Only when their actions violate the law, and even in that case, at that moment, there should be the same sort of protections for celebrities as for non-celebrities.
What is ironic is that many who develop the gossip sites would, if we dug through their closets, have many unfulfilled dreams, they live out through the gossip world - to make them feel better, to tear others down, to expose ... that if my life is so screwed up, I will show how every ones life is equally shitty. I feel worthless and only through association with a dysfunctional celebrity do I feel more worthy. I can call it anything I want, I can say I am doing it to show the good and bad, to point out some defect or some positive trait - whatever the reason, the excuse is the same - leave them alone. By tearing apart a celebrity, by reporting on their coming and going from some apartment or home at 2 am, the gossip writer tries to make a connection for him/herself into the world of fame. It is a desire to be famous that drives and animates quite a few gossip hounds. An unfortunate desire driven by a deep emptiness.
I went through a phase where I had an interest. That interest died in 1997 and I have, with few exceptions, managed to not intrude into their lives, not buy the crap on the shelves that placed celebrity and bystanders at risk to get the photos. I grew up and realized that their lives are no better, no more functional, no more interesting than 'our' lives. They have more money, nothing more. They can afford the wall and moat I want, but it doesn't make them feel better - in fact, their isolation plays into the need to appear in public and be seen, to give them a sense of being alive and still viable.
Yet why do we do it - why do people have the insatiable desire for gossip? We have such uninteresting lives we need to fill them with something of interest. We feel better about ourselves when we see celebrities cheating, in accidents, drunk, in psych wards, in rehab, on the beach surfing, or otherwise behaving oddly.
They are like policemen, nurses, doctors - they perform a service for us (entertainment) and we should let them return to their lives, free from the ever present photographer or Enquirer. It is not our right.
Their privacy, that elusive sense of security so many clamor for, celebrities want theirs back - to have a modicum of privacy. We, the average Joe and Jane, demand our privacy. Then show respect and give it to them. Who the fuck cares what they do or to whom, when, where, or how. Leave them alone, and if we do, we may learn that we have something more in addition to our privacy - we have respect.
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