Peter writes ...
Jade Goody arrived as the Queen of the Unexpected Celebrities i.e. that sub-cult that rise through exposure on reality TV itself, rather than any other perceived talent. "I am the 45th most infulential (sic) person in the world," she was able to boast. Perhaps it was this new ego, and its likely shakiness, that fuelled her bullying of Shilpa Shetty. It was without grace. It was base. It was low.
But she wasn't the only bully, was she? There was Jo O'Meara, Danielle Lloyd and the Dickensian-monickered Jack Tweed. And then again, there was Endemol, Channel 4 and the team of University-educated programme makers and psychologists.
The horrendously boring show 'Big Brother' is centrally woven around a process of the construction of celebrity. Its livelier twin, 'Celebrity Big Brother' is concerned with the deconstruction of celebrity. Having made Jade Goody, here was the University-folks chance to unmake her. And then, on cue, Jade arrived with her family in tow, her urchin mother Jackiey being the first to be evicted. It was cleverly and cruelly handled by the show's producers; seeing that Jade had a maternal role in relation to her mother, they deprived her of this suddenly by evicting Jackiey, without goodbyes, without opportunity for the daughter to assess her unsteady mother's readiness for the outside world. Jade ended up crumpled and crying in the diary room.
Jade Goody arrived as Queen , to be waited on by the other celebrities, and she left begging for forgiveness. Along the way, bayed by the hyenas of mass media, the Prime Minister and Prime Minister-in-waiting found themselves ensnared in the fate of a few, well-paid people locked in a house.
I don't believe that any University-ethics committee would ever give permission for the psychological experiment that is Big Brother. But the fact that the "contestants" are well-paid, and that they do choose to enter, makes it all right. Doesn't it?
Does it?
If this is mass-media, then what have we to fear from campfire media?
6 comments:
These are timely and influential words Peter.
Can I be so bold? I don’t do celebrity. I don’t talk them up. I don’t talk them down. I don’t know them so how should I be so bold. We are at the mercy of mass media filters. Big Brother plays this card along with their media partners.
But, I am shaken, everyday by the concept of celebrity on the high street. The country has a disease – Jade Goody typifies it (moving away from statement above!). It somehow suggests that loud, brash behaviour is okay. If you want to get on in the world this is how to do it. I don’t blame folk in any great way for this; it is simply a side effect of our love affair with celebrity. We aspire to wear the same clothes as them, drive the same car, and even date the same top 100 FHM model or Hollywood’s next ubermale. The nation is frustrated. Mad even. For it is almost impossible to get all those things.
This recently hit a low, for me, when I read of a school teacher who would always ask her young class members one question - What would you like to be when you grow up? After 20 years of teaching the responses were rich and varied, but over the last five years the responses had been noticeably different. “I want to be famous” is now often echoed in reply. This is not so bad. We need great actors, politicians, comedians etc (all the same?), but what was so startling was the lack of subsequent noun. You no longer hear “I want to be a famous footballer” or “I want to be a famous actress”; simply “I want to be famous”.
Yet, as your writing suggests, this could be the implosion (much like Abromovich’s Chelsea) that moves us in a new direction. The butterfly that flaps its wings on one continent and causes a hurricane on another. This is an idea put forward by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J.Dubner in ‘Freakonomics’. I am only five pages into this book, but it seems that Levitt and Dubner look for alternative answers to trends in our economy.
There is certainly an air of this about the media. Is it time for a new era? Maybe so… well, until Beckham lands in Hollywood that is.
Great thoughts, MC. Yes, I think, perhaps, what we are witnessing is an implosion, with several forces contesting our celebrity culture. Some of this is good and some is bad, but I think this is the final, long chapter in the 20th century version of celebrity.
In the 21st Century, things will be different and part of the reason for that will be social computing.
Will we still celebrate things? Yes. Will we still elevate people? Yes. But celebrity will be less the instrument of the media and other corporations. They will be less able to dictate who rises and falls. That will, maybe, make it, somehow, "better". It may put the focus back on the art (or sport or whatever) rather than the consequence.
As for Beckham ... Well, a long and generall warm thesis could follow. But I believe him to be the end of a line and that is to say enough for now.
Peter
On the subject of footie, you may also enjoy:
http://www.bryanappleyard.com/blog/2006/10/worst-football-team-in-world.php
In reference to the comment above, I recently fell upon the following book published in 1954.
Seduction of the Innocent by Dr. Fredric Wertham - “The influence of comic books on today’s youth”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seduction_of_the_Innocent
Wertham alleges that the popular media was responsible for juvenile delinquency that was on the rise across America at the time.
I am wondering if anything was learnt was from Wertham’s accusations and the subsequent court case, or indeed whether there is anything to learn. Every generation rebels against the former, and the media is often central to this. The next generation have now turned to Web 2.0 – YouTube, Flickr, Facebook, MySpace etc. The next will migrate to something far more rebellious. What that is, I only wish I knew? I’d be a very rich man if I did.
I am mute against your genius, K_Hill
Following Peter's notes on the 21st century, I have to say I'm rather less optimistic about the future.
A great divide is opening up between those that despise and those that adore the cult of celebrity as epitomised by "Big Brother" and the equally tawdry "I'm a celebrity [when I] get out of here".
Just as the good side of globalisation is creating social networks that ignore geography and dive deeper into the long tail, so does the dark side of ubiquitous banality seems be tightening its grip on the head of the curve.
It seems to me that class has as much to do with which position one takes as age. Whilst the older feed their hunger for mindless gossip through glossy sub-£ magazines, so the younger technophiles propogate their own commentry online.
The blog is an online watercooler, and the aptitude to use it doesn't necessarily mean everyone has something worthwhile to say. For some, it just allows a deeper discussion of the same numbing mass media they've allows enjoyed.
Whilst it's comforting to know that the previously silent majority feel the same, I suspect the lowest common denominator will continue to find worshippers regardless.
My whole disaffection and despair is crystalised by an article on the Big Brother finale I browsed whilst waiting for my laptop to sync and shutdown at work. The Star feeds its readership the results of the final vote, as follows:
63% Shilpa
37% Jermaine
16% Dirk
5.3% Ian
3.3% Danielle
3.2% Jack
An admirable total of 127.8%. Journalists it seems, like celebrities, aren't what they should be.
Frankly, I don't know Matt. You are making me think and, as I say, I don't know the answers (if there are answers).
I wonder if we are only at the dawn of an understanding of the impact of the media on society and the individual.
Even in my most optimistic mood, I would say that new technology will banish banality. For we are all banal sometime! I've been thinking some pretty porridgey thoughts myself this evening.
But, the power of the mass-media has been to claim our subservience to its content. This infiltrates all aspects of public debate. Phrases like 'public concern' are used without scrutiny. Are the public really concerned about X, or it just that X is of concern to the media? Even on Radio 4, public interest is 'assumed' in topics or in people, simply because the said topics or people are on the front-pages. It doesn't necessarily follow because, by definition, there is no opt-out.
If a campfire media is to arise, maybe we will have hues and flavours more varied than our mass-media chooses to service.
Maybe.
I don't actually know.
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