Thursday, June 14, 2012

Starstruck- Discussion Question

I am choosing to respond to question 6 of this week's discussion. This question refers to the changes that have occurred to society's belief on what fame is and how it is achieved. It references a quote by historian, Leo Braudy, which states that fame was once related to honor and achievement, but now it is separated from both so far that it has become its own category. In terms of Hollywood celebrities I agree with Braudy. Other celebrities, however, such as Tim Tebow I feel disprove this statement. I may be a little biased on Tebow being a Gator and all but seriously, this guy deserves every bit of fame he has earned. He has achieved things in football that no one else has and done it in the most honorable of ways. When related to Hollywood celebs, Braudy is one hundred percent correct. Take Snooki for example. She has become stupid famous by being a hot mess all the time. She is famous because she is entertaining to watch. Going back to my response post, this is the way she markets herself and it works. People love to hear about Snooki's pregnancy and what crazy stuff she is doing and how hard she parties or doesn't party. I think Braudy makes a good point, a majority of our celebraties and famous individuals have in no way gained this status based on their honorable deeds and hard earned achievement. There are exceptions and the media does love a good samaritan story, but those stories are rarely front page and never last for more than a week.

1 comment:

  1. I actually had the exact same thought when I read that quote. True, for the many "celebrities" in the Hollywood scene, their fame is in no way related to achievement in their field or any kind of honor, (You mentioned Snooki already; she's basically the perfect example). But I immediately thought about how that is not necessarily true for all celebrities, and sports celebrities--even though we all know how much I LOVE sports--was one of my first thoughts. To a certain degree, they do have ridiculous amounts of fame that may not be on par with their achievement, but people like Tim Tebow, and going further in the past, Michael Jordan, etc. to me all deserve their fame and got it by being very good at what they do as well as having good character, (so "honor" in a sense). And as you said, there are certainly exceptions even within Hollywood. Some of the more uber famous people have typically had their fame surpass their achievement, but there are some people, like Morgan Freeman, Michael Caine, Johnny Depp, who I feel are extremely talented and deserving of their fame, even if at times it seems a bit ridiculous.

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