Anybody Else Tired of Celebrity Worship?

As a military wife, I can not stand when people use the scarifies of soldiers as a comparison. A human life is a human life. I find it sad when any one dies at a young age because it is a complete waste.

YES! YES! YES! and did I mention YES! Scrolling through the news headlines is enough to make me scream sometimes. First you have the story about the debt ceiling, and immediately following, as though equally (or more) important, "Guess what so-and-so wore to an exclusive Hollywood event with her new boyfriend one day after divorcing her previous actor/singer/athlete husband? And wasn't her hair cute/frumpy/wild/unexpected?" And sandwiched between stories of various wars and the bombing/shooting in Norway, we're somehow supposed to care about the size or cost of some celebrity's home or engagement ring. My question is: do the American people REALLY care about this stuff, so the media feeds the worship or does the media WANT the American people to worship so they continually shovel this garbage?

I can clearly see that I'm in the minority here, but Amy Winehouse wasn't worshipped by anyone from what I can see. The reason why her death is huge 'news' is because she was an amazing artist & will never create another thing. Yes, she was an addict. No, she didn't get the help she should/could have. In my mind, that does not make the loss any less sad. She was young & she was talented. Very talented. And now she's gone.

She cannot, nor should she ever be, compared to a military member, cop, fireman, etc. who is killed in the line of duty, and to the best of my knowledge, she hadn't been compared. Until your post, that is. End of story.

I can appreciate what you are trying to say. But,. I dont see any form of celebrity worship with the Amy Winehouse, Charlie Sheen, Lindsay Lohan stories. It's more like gawkers at a train wreck. That's just human nature, sick as it is. I think of Celebrity worship as obsessing over the Royal Wedding and North American Tour - Guilty! But that doesn't affect my patriotism or what I do to show support to our Troops, to Teachers, to volunteer, to do good. It's just a little distraction to take me out of my dreary day. And it is sad when a young life ends tragically. She may be a rode-hard, put up wet singer, but she is also somebodys daughter. Its not MORE tragic than anyone elses daughter going down that rocky path, but it is AS sad.

I certainly hear you....but your attitude about a death from a chronic, untreated fatal disease is harsh. Seems like people have less trouble fawning over and remembering people who die from "less offensive" illnesses sometimes. A death is a death and a loss is a loss. This O. may not affect you, personally, but it affects someone, somewhere.
Addicts that use are all potential recovering addicts. Don't judge them. Do you praise the change, when people do? Because people do change. She never got to that point in her illness.

I agree with pretty much everything you said.

I just want to point out, however, that one of the replies stated that sports figures don't contribute jobs. Um, I wish that were true so I could rag on them too (I do find so many to be distasteful,) but it just is not factual. The professional sports in our nation contribute hundreds of thousands of jobs--everyone in the stadium/arena: the beer vendors, the back office staff, the referees, the cheerleaders, the trainers, coaches, chiropractors, the licensed apparel industry...lots of jobs are created by athletes and we have the choice whether to buy a ticket or not. When we buy a ticket we are showing that we value their talents and we help contribute to the professional sports industry.

In my opinion you DO NOT sound callous and uncaring....

I'm sick of hearing about Brittany Spears, Paris Hilton, Kim Kardashian, sports stars who think they are above the law.......when they start talking about them - I turn the channel...I'm not going to give them credit..

I don't buy People magazine or any of the other tabloids to fuel the fires of this...I don't care if Brand and Angelina get married....i don't care what celeb has cellulite! (GASP!!!)

I do like that Brad Pitt is actively trying to help rebuild New Orleans...I do like to see celebrities put their money where their mouth is a contribute money to worthwhile causes....I just wish they'd do more here in the United States than they do in Cuba, Haiti, etc....

I thank our soldiers every day....I've got three friends deployed there right now....

Wow! You do sound really callous and uncaring. You have made a huge leap to assume that people who view or feel the loss of Amy's life as not caring about our troops. Makes no sense whatsoever.
I really hope no one any of you care about is ever tormented with addiction because, with that attitude, you all wouldn't be very helpful or supportive. Then again perhaps you'd see things differently if it were your daughter or sister or anyone you love. Even if it's a celebrity, it's sad when people lose their lives. The same way you are sick of hearing/reading about Amy I am sick of reading heartless posts and comments from people saying such horrible things like this about how her death isn't a big deal. Her life was not worth any less than anyone else's just because she had a drug problem. No matter what she was someone's daughter, (possibly a sister) a friend, and so on. She may not have died in a shooting or bombing (like in Norway), but her death was still tragic. It was tragic because she didn't have the strength to fight it or overcome it. I see this as an opportunity to dialogue about addictions (whether they be drugs, eating, gambling or shopping addictions) and how detrimental they are. This is the time for people to intervene on behalf of their loved one who may be addicted. It also an opportunity to educate others (especially children) as well as LEARN (more) about the destructiveness of addiction. It's not as cut and dry/black and white as you're making it out to be.

Any death is a tragic loss. Most celebreties are not role models and why they continue to be placed on a pedestal is beyond me. There is nothing glorious about broken relationships, insecurites, drugs, drinking etc...It is sad.

Since I don't turn the tv or radio on much, I read about it on a news site and then had to look up who she was.
If you turn off enough of the electric stuff, these people become less famous because you never hear about them.
It's always sad when someone young dies, more so when they threw their life away in one way or another, but that's the way of the world.
It's not the first time it's happened and it won't be the last time.

It's to distract us from the very real possibility that our economy is about to implode.

JMO.

I so agree. Well said!

as I've said before, do not feed the media monster.

Yeah it's annoying. The funny thing is though, just yesterday, standing in line with my husband at the grocery store, I saw her picture on the front page of a newspaper from far away and said, "Gee, I'm surprised she's still alive." DUH! I found out the next day and felt kind of callous for having said that. LOL!

"Shocked" and "sudden loss" are not the words that come to mind when I heard of Amy Winehouse's death ,like so many of her close friends have been saying. Tragic, yes, shocked... no. But, I think it will possibly help bring awareness to young people with addictions.

http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/​ 43866337?gt1=43001

People glorify tragedy. Perhaps had the media glorified her talent, instead of bashing her all the time, she would of been a little more salvageable.

Cute children who are abducted or who have cancer get way more media and fund raising than ethnic or not so cute children. It's the way of the beast to celebrate tragic beauty.

I have always found it disturbing that some people worship others. But I also am saddened by any tragic, untimely death.

i'm with you, don't understand any celebrity 'worshipping', it has become so ridiculous in our society

YES.

I read the other day that Big Ben (Steelers QB) has a $100 MILLION contract! Our economy is in shambles and we have enough money to spend on someone that doesn't create and jobs or hold any responsibility whatsoever outside of throwing and catching a football??

People will criticize CEOs and try and incite class warfare when these people are highly educated and hold the responsibility for hundreds - sometimes thousands - of families' wellbeing. Could YOU handle it? I certainly couldn't, and I'm fine with someone earning a high wage to do so.

It is very telling that the things we spend the most money on are things that are for our collective entertainment. Not our education, not our health, not our country - entertainment.

Why doesn't anyone cry foul over the fact that even the last string player on a baseball team can be signed for 7M when the "everyman" is struggling to make ends meet?

Messed up.