Hollywood has been plagued by the paparazzi for years. The tabloid industry has become a very profitable way to make money. A snapshot of a celebrity can rake in enough money to pay for one year of school, provided the celebrity is being exposed as a slut, nudist, anorexic, or a bad mother.
They stalk their prey like hungry hyenas around a lion’s leftovers. Working on tip-offs from hostesses and bag boys, they show up to bombard the VIPs with flash photography and intrusive questioning. They turn this assault into profit by selling the still-lives from other’s lives to the Enquirer or any of the other trash forms of journalism.
But I cannot get angry at the photographer for trying to do a job that makes good money. I cannot blame someone for trying to make ends meat. Everyone needs to eat.
I can blame the people who buy these damned papers. Those who think that how Britney Spears raises her kid is more important than who is running for president.
The person sitting on their couch waiting to hear the latest gossip about Amy Winehouse’s alcoholism, or the latest sneak peek into Paris Hilton’s sexual life is the reason for such low IQ levels in America.
It is the people who pump their money into this soulless, money-hungry pig of a business that gives these writers and photographers the motivation to ditch their dreams of changing the world to worship the almighty dollar in all of its diminishing glory.
Who cares, really? How can one be so invested in the lives of complete strangers? None of us know these people.
Do we care who the girl at the supermarket is sleeping with? Do we bug gas station attendants with 20 thousand personal questions?
Is anyone rushing to take pictures of their waitress as she walks into work? Then why do we care about someone we saw on TV or in a movie? They are just doing a job.
In the future, when people wonder why America failed, they will say it was because people were more concerned with the lives of others rather than taking care of themselves.
We have infinite resources at our fingertips and we use this great power to follow other people’s lives.
Even Facebook.com has caught onto the fact that Americans are gossip hungry, and put in that news feed of our personal lives.
So, next time someone dies in a car wreck caused by the paparazzi, don’t forget to hang your head and feel like a murderer. Our thirst for scandalous rumors causes these paparazzi to try to make their buck.
When one feels bad because a million pictures are being snapped at Brangelina’s baby, turn the channel. Don’t give support by leaving it on E! while you complain to your friends, “That baby is going to end up in therapy.”
Instead, ignore it. If we all do that, there will be no demand for the paparazzi’s photography, and then everyone can live their own lives.