I was reading a “top 50 reasons why you should be proud of living in New York City” and one of them had something to do with rubbing shoulders with famous people. First, I don’t live in New York City, and second, I’ve never understood the fascination with celebrities people have. I can understand liking someone because that person is a talented musician, actor, or whatever, but why care anything about their personal life? If Angelina Jolie is dating someone, who cares? It’s not like she’s going to be dating me, or anyone I know anytime soon, so why should I care? Why does anyone care?
I’ve always wondered about this focus people have on the lives of famous people. In the last decade or so, we’ve actually moved from a fascination with celebrities to a ridiculous amount of attention on non-celebrities who want to be celebrities and have become celebrities as a result. That, in itself, borders on complete insanity.
The fact is, the few times that I’ve actually hobnobbed with actual celebrities, I’ve discovered I really didn’t like them. Or they were so normal that they weren’t really all that much of celebrities to me. Yet, there is an entire industry that is fueled on this obsession with famous people.
I really don’t understand it.