South Park once did an episode on Britney Spears and how closely the media covers her. At one point their intrusiveness in her divorce and separation of her kids causes her to blow the top part of her head off with a shotgun. She somehow manages to survive the blast and recovers, continuing her life as a celebrity and going to her concerts. Despite the fact that most of her skull is missing and the only sounds she can make are gurgling noises, the only thing that the news reports on is how she's dressed.
Does it matter if Steve Jobs has cancer? Does it matter if Tiger Woods is doing well? Just this month, there are massive protests spanning the United States, Russia, the Middle East, and Libya is in a state of civil war. Yet, somehow, they manage to squeeze in entire segments on cable news about Lindsey Lohan having to go to jail for stealing a necklace she easily could have purchased.
It makes me want to blame cable news for dumbing down society, but I know that's not the problem. The amount of time spent talking about celebrities is more or less equivalent to how much people want to hear about it. Cable is designed to entertain the lowest common denominator. People are stupid, and are much more interested in hearing about rich people than fights over civil liberty in Wisconsin, or anywhere else in the world. It has to be an envy thing in their psych - "Even though I'm fat, stupid, and miserable, these great names with millions of dollars and beautiful bodies still find reason to suffer." Can you feel the schadenfreude?
