Stuffed Shirts and Pompous Windbags

There’s a nasty-looking little Chinese restaurant in the East Village with a handwritten sign in the window—a dirty window, too—that says ‘our chef is very famous in London.’ But not in New York, or anywhere else outside of London.”

Great line, and great concept from Claire Messud's The Emperor's Children. It's one I'm coming to relate to more as the weeks go on. I've observed that certain members of human society thrive on sharing with me ad nauseum the details of their accomplishments a few years back as if its somehow relevant to me or my casual aquaintance with them. Sorry dearie, if you don't have a curriculum vitae, your experience with 1994 is probably not overly interesting or worth basking in your own reflected glory over. You could go make a CV and I'd be happier to read it since it would take less time than hearing about it from you over and over and over. Please get over yourself, or better yet go do something besides hoping we will all be impressed by your achievements that stopped rather abruptly fifteen or so years ago.

You certainly don't care to hear about what I was doing in the nineties, but I'd like to tell you if I thought it would spark you to retire to a hole somewhere and leave me out of the boring details. It's something like the way women decorate their homes with wedding pictures and dried flowers until they are mostly replaced with baby pictures, and those are eventually mostly changed out for graduation pictures and pictures of grandkids. Only your wedding flowers have shed their petals all over the floor and you have yet to vacuum them up!

While you prattle on about how wonderful you were back then, and we sit there smiling and nodding and squirming inwardly at your boasting we sometimes wonder what your reaction would be if we took the competitive bait. We weren't sitting around waiting for you to show up back then, we were busy. I know I was. One particularly event filled year for you was the year I spent taking 21 credits, working full-time and a second job to boot. I was competing for a pageant title, perfecting my interview skills, and working out for a couple of hours a day. Oh yeah, I also had a boyfriend turned murderous sadistic stalker to hide from in the midst of my highly predictable and punctual schedule. In that same sememster, I aced my instrumental performance juries, and turned out some of my best creative work to date. That was also the year I was recognized by Up With People for my extensive volunteeer work in libraries and schools. I'm sure you never heard me mention that though, I've been somewhat engaged since then with other things.

In the real world, no one really puts Eagle Scout on their resume, they've done something better by now, and it certainly isn't dinner conversation unless its with your own little Scouter. But wait...I know, your chef was famous in 1994.

Continuing on a Theme

Hollywood is a place where they'll pay you a thousand dollars for a kiss and fifty cents for your soul.

~Marilyn Monroe

Social Prostitution

Social Prostitution is the name I've coined for the sociological phenomena in which people sell themselves by doing whatever they are encouraged in exchange for money, fame, or attention. The most obvious culprits are professional athletes and celebrities but chances are there are some relatively well-evolved social prostitutes right in your own neighborhood-think office politics, the parents who promote their child's disability for sympathy and respect, and the gal down the street who is happy to help in an emergency--as long as everyone in town knows about it and praises her for it.

Celebrities don't just act dysfunctional, we actually encourage them to be dysfunctional and we reward them duly. The most obvious and tragic recent media example is Anna Nicole Smith, whom we have rewarded handsomely for the entertainment her life has become.

She is reinforced not for fulfilling societies values, or encouraging us to better ourselves, but for being a prime entertainment source. In the end, she lost everything, her volition was lost to drugs and addictions, the life of her son, and eventually her own life as well. Her family and friends mourn while the media and legal system debate over her estate and the parentage of her daughter. We as a society are the ones who continue to be entertained by her personal tragedy; the fame and money we award her certainly leave her empty and used, even in death.

What will bother people about this viewpoint is the idea that as a society we encourage people to create and then publicize their dysfunction. The fact is, we do, and what does that say about us? We put a premium on dysfunction and there are plenty of people willing to step up to the plate. How much of Anna Nicole's life outcome was chosen and how much did we create for her? For a person who doesn't sing, dance, act, or compete in sports, there is a premium on popularity. If your name isn't being googled and you aren't in the tabloids you may fail to exist. Without your fame, you may lose your money, and you will lose your prestige and your stream of attractive and possibly powerful suitors. Keep yourself attractive to the media and you will be compensated for as long as people enjoy watching you. The game becomes a question of how to keep the attention on yourself. Certainly the tabloids won't go away when they serve such a vital purpose to those they exploit; tabloids may very well be resented by celebrities for the fact that what they expose is the social prostitution itself.

When society pays your paycheck, and there is a premium on deviance you have choices-you can step up to the plate, you can get a new job, or you can just wait and see which auditions come your way when you aren't in the top 20 internet searches. Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton, and Kobe Bryant all caught on very quickly and jumped on board.

We reward celebrities and athletes who lie, steal, molest children, rape, and even murder with more attention and legal excuses instead of consequences. We even compensate those who lose or gain a few pounds. We punish those who refuse to play by concocting false accusations and suspicions-"she's not above the game, she's actually a closet lesbian, her marriage is in trouble and she's addicted to painkillers..."

Being an entertainer is more than a job, its a life and even when you aren't on the court or the silver screen you will entertain us. Don't worry, you will be rewarded for your hollow and coarse life with a seat on the A-list and better chances for the next multi-million dollar contract.