Hripsime Tovmasyan Professor Warwick English 155 2 October 2006 The Pop Culture Icons of America The average American day is filled with celebrity gossip. The watchful eyes of fans never seem to blink when it comes to gleaming information about their much loved celebrities. In America, it is not all that difficult to learn something new about any given celebrity on a daily basis. All one has to do is pick up a magazine, turn on the television, or strike up a conversation with anybody. The lucky few who make the big times in Hollywood – the movie stars and the musical and comical performers – are the most well paid and closely watched people in our society. “More money is paid for a picture of [Angelina] Jolie sitting on a balcony in Zimbabwe or [Britney] Spears dropping a child than most earn in lifetimes . . . Long gone are the days of celebrity-worthy politicians, of people like Martin Luther King and Gloria Steinem gracing the covers of magazines. Now, unless you’re hot, have a few action movies under your belt, and a few tumultuous, public marriages to boot, your charity means nothing” (Lavery 2). For the everyday American, it is so easy and fun to sit around gossiping about celebrities. Norman Solomon concedes that “there’s nothing wrong with keeping track of events in the lives of celebrities”, but goes on to argue that celebrity-watching is no longer an occasional diversion – it acts as a perpetual distraction (Solomon 1). We are a star-obsessed nation and love peeking into the lives of celebrities; knowing little tidbits about them. Celebrity magazines are hard-pressed to stay on the shelf for long. GoodNews writer and a regional pastor of Ghana, Melvin Rhodes stated that he knew he was back in America after a trip to Africa when he turned on the news: It wasn’t news of Darfur where radical Islamists daily massacre people while their government turns a blind eye. It wasn’t news of the AIDS epidemic which has affected Africa more than any other continent. It wasn’t news from the Congo were a civil war has left more dead than in Europe during WWI. It wasn’t news from Zimbabwe which now has the highest rate of inflation in the world and the lowest life expectancy. But the news was highlighting a country close to Zimbabwe – Namibia, where Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie had decided their first child should be born! That was the big news! The news that most viewers had been waiting for. (Rhodes 1) When Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie did their first photo shoot with their newborn, Shiloh, or when Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes finally released photos of baby Suri, the magazines that they were in spread like wildfire. Everyone had to have them. Also, and more significantly, tabloid journalists find it hard not to give celebrities and their families nicknames. For example, before the Jolie-Pitt baby was born, the four members of that family were known as BAMZ, which is an acronym for Brad, Angelina, Maddox, Zahara, and the Cruise baby is affectionately called TomKat. It’s hard to believe that we will ever get enough of celeb icons. According to Rhodes, one in ten Americans is obsessed to the point of being almost psychotic, willing to stalk their favorite celebrity. Celebrities seem to be everywhere. As said by Dr. Phillip Drake, of Paisley University, in Scotland, “Celebrity watching is a long-standing human fascination . . . The creation of 24-hour news coverage and the internet means there are more places for celebrities to be seen by their public” (Cassidy 1). Solomon adds, “Anyone who shops at a supermarket ends up in ‘celebrity alley’ – a checkout lane that’s lined with magazines fixated on the famous. In America,celebrities take up a lot of space . . . on newsstands, coffee tables and TV screens, and in our minds” and that most news programs often resemble “tabloid TV” (Solomon 1). In fact, in his article, Rhodes went on to say that there are more celebrity magazines than news magazines. Also, there are television stations that are completely devoted to all celebrities, all the time. The majority of air time for shows like E! News and VH1 provide information on what celebrities have worn, said, and done. They also discuss superlatives such as sexiest bodies, outrageous moments, and dumbest quotes. This obsession that we have reveals our habit of how we deal with obstacles and grievances. When it comes to overcoming everyday complications and complaints, we put off finding solutions by picking up and skimming through a magazine. Our problems seem to be of little consequence when we read about another celebrity divorce or mishap. As a result, having your personal life delved into has become an expected side effect of being a modern idol. Even the smallest of celebrity facts can be dug up and passed around like a bowl of chips. Although we may eventually come across the answer to a personal problem, finding out about the most recent failure of a certain celebrity along the way can add a spring to our step. In short, forgetting about our worries for a couple of hours a day by visiting the lives of celebrities acts as a getaway and has turned Americans into celebrity-crazed fans. Being a witness to the problems of others who we hold in high regard has become a sort of release – a way to let go of our troubles, if only for a little while, and is the American way of dealing with life’s little quirks and displeasures.Works Cited Cassidy, Sarah. “Celebrity Obsession is Turning Nasty, Academics Warn.” LookSmart,Ltd. 12 Sep. 2005. The (London) Independent. 5 Oct. 2006. <http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_20050912/ai_n15366763> Lavery, Sarah. “Celebrity Obsession Out of Control.” The Sidelines. 21 Sep. 2006. 5 Oct. 2006 <http://www.mtsusidelines.com/home/index.cfm?event=displayArticlePrinterFriendly&uSt. . .> Rhodes, Melvin. “Why Are Americans So Obsessed with Celebrities?” This Week’s News. 2006. United Church of God, an International Association. 6 Oct. 2006. <http://www.ucg.org/commentary/celebrities.htm> Solomon, Norman. “Hidden Costs of America’s Celebrity Obsession.” AlterNet: The Mix is the Message. 26 Apr. 2000. 7 Oct. 2006.