Celebrity Meltdowns as News

For the past couple of weeks it would seem that our media has been focused on two story lines that are critical to the survival of Life As We Know It:  This would be Anna Nicole Smith and Britney Spears.

Since both stories are tawdry and sad, we have to start somewhere.  I’m going to use bosoms as a tie breaker.  Hey, it’s just as valid as any other metric the media seems to use these days. 

Let us start with the one with bigger tits:  Anna Nicole Smith.

Minor celeb marries 900 year old rich guy.  Rich guy dies, leaving disputed will and a gazillion dollars to trophy wife.  Trophy wife fights in court against other family members for share of huge estate.  Has daughter.  Her son dies in unusual circumstances.  She dies in slightly odd circumstances.  Infant daughter might inherit somewhere around $400 million.  Lawyers fight like furies over who gets what and who is the father of the infant daughter.

Now, on to the one with the more modest sweater puffs:  Britney Spears.  Pop-tart marries greasy dweeb and breeds.  Breaks up marriage after finding out grease dweeb would boff a garden snake, if he could get it to hold its’ mouth open long enough.  Pop-tart loses underwear in evening with Paris Hilton.  Pop-tart finds revolving door at rehab.  Pop-tart shaves head and gets a tattoo while beating up a soccer-mom van with an umbrella and finds rehab again for an hour and a half. 

According to a CNN story fragment I saw, these two stories have garnered more lines and minutes of coverage than just about anything in the past month.  We should be asking why this is, but we both know the answer.  Humans are vicious little animals and we love to watch crash and burn acts. 

The Anna Nicole Smith ‘story’ is nothing more than a bunch of greed-heads looking to be made guardian of an infant that might inherit $400 million dollars.  Based on the number of penises that are lawyered up, I might as well get into it. 

So, I’ll claim paternity too.  I’m the father, after all we share the same last name.  As long as I can find a lawyer willing to work with a dick, who lives next to two nuts, around the corner from an asshole.  Any takers in that most-noble legal profession?  If we win, you get nothing, as you’re going to be working for the "good of the infant child".  Fully pro-bono.  Any takers at all?  I thought not. 

As for the Pop-Tart, Britney Spears, well, we’ll start with the particular hell she has lived in since the age of 11.  Mouseketeer.  Manufactured talent and media-made image.  Grew up in a celebrity bubble.  Found out that the price for fame is loss of your entire identity as a human being.  Does not actually exist, unless media is paying attention.  With any luck will be worth more after she dies, just like Buddy Holly and Elvis. 

Waiting for lawyers to claim that K-FedEx is not the father of her kids but some obscure blogger in Canada is really the daddy, therefore he should be granted custody and oh, $12 million a year in support. 

Truly, both ‘stories’ are very sad.  I dislike watching anyone have a meltdown, but even more so, when the media covers what should be a very private trip through hell with no guarantee you’ll make it.  The Anna Nicole Smith thing is nothing more than greed trampling over graves.  

At the end of the day, in the fullness of time, to quote Sir Humphrey Appleby, we’ll see that we are getting the media we deserve.  Shallow, sensationalistic, voyeuristic and brain-dead. 

The next time we wake up, we’ll find that China owns half the world, India owns the other half and North America has ceased to exist as anything except a theme park cum reality-series broadcast to the rest of the world.  How about "Survivor – Baltimore" as a name?

A suggestion?  If your local news outlet has coverage of Anna Nicole Smith or Britney Spears, merely treat it the same way as you would in-depth coverage of economic policy in the Czech Republic:  A jaw-cracking yawn and a quick dash for the remote.  Media understand audience numbers:  Don’t be a number.