> As for the love of celebrities -- is it any different than the resurgent
positive
> feelings toward Stalin in Russia? Maybe human beings like to have
> leaders/celebrities to look up to. Maybe our tendency to want alpha
> females/males is part of who we are, and the way we express it now is
> through the creation of celebrities.
>
Thanks for taking my question seriously. A few observations:
I have no problem understanding aesthetic qualities of sports - indeed, your comment that sporting events are un-choreographed dance performances is a good one. What I do not understand is why that un-choreographed performance must be executed by a celebrity figure to excite many people. There are many excellent ball players who nonetheless remain obscure and unnoticed.
Many years ago I watched an improvised performance of a comedy skit by two black guys on the Venice Beach in LA. Their acting and sense of humor were absolutely superb - far superior to the crap dished out by TV networks. Yet they were just two street performers operating right on the doorsteps of the Hollywood cultural empire and thus unnoticed by anyone but a few passer -bys.
Your suggestion that celebrity cult is a sublimed desire to submit to an alpha figure is also a good one, but if true, we still need to understand why there is such a wide spread need to submit to an alpha figure.
My question, therefore, is that why do we need to see a celebrity to appreciate qualities that go unnoticed in ordinary people? Why do we need that official recognition that goes with celebrity status to enjoy simple pleasures of life, like good music, good book, or good performance? This is a good question to ask on this list because it may offer some interesting insights how hierarchies are constantly re-produced even by people who profess their staunch commitment to egalitarianism and meritocracy.
This is an important question to answer for those whose vision of good life involves fishing in the morning and writing poetry in the evening. When the revolution finally comes, everyone will have time to write poetry, all right. But why bother to write it at all, if only that written by a handful celebrity figures will ever be noticed, let alone enjoyed?
Wojtek