Post pulled from June 2007

I've been feeling this way recently and instead of writing a new piece showing my wrath, I thought I'd just repost my thoughts from over a year ago...

Everyone who knows me knows that I love pop culture/news. I spend a good chunk of my day checking my favorite news sites for updates on anything from politics, local news or Britney's new haircut. Slate.com, CNN and The Onion are probably up there in my top favorites, and in that order too. I also like to buy US Weekly or People magazine every once in a while (to be brutally honest, I would probably buy them more often but I don't have $3 to just throw around like that).

Anyway, I logged onto my work computer this morning and immediately tuned into the news. Overall, the two top news stories that really stuck out were the G8 Summit in Germany and Paris Hilton's early release from prison. And I had full intentions on reading up about both stories. I first read the news about the G8 meeting and shook my head, as usual, at President Bush and his remarks. Then I spent a minute or two admiring Angela Merkel and the fact that of the group of people who represent the world's richest countries, she stood in the middle, in a lime green shirt as the only woman president of the group. Impressive. I may not be in total agreement with her politics, but I admire her as a woman. Actually scratch that, I admire her as a person.

When I was finished reading news about the meeting in Germany I started reading about Paris Hilton and her early release from prison for "medical reasons." I became so curious with this breaking news and wanted to research more about the medical problems; what they are, if they are real, and what she will be doing during her new sentence: house arrest. I spent about 15 minute doodling around online finding information about this subject. Then I caught myself. What am I doing? Why did Angela Merkel get one minute of my time and Paris Hilton get fifteen minutes of my time? Why do I care about Paris Hilton and her problems with the law? Why does the world care about Paris Hilton, Britney Spears or Lindsay Lohan? I worry about our culture, or more importantly myself. Most girls my age could easily give you an update on Paris, Britney or Lindsay. Even if they don't read the news, they probably know whats going on from reading headlines at the supermarket. Our obsession with famous people is damaging to the stars, but I am not so worried about this because they knew what they were getting into when they signed up. When I make millions of dollars for just showing up to parties, the paparazzi can follow me around all day long. What I am bothered about is the fact that I spent one minute reading about Angela Merkel and fifteen minutes reading about Paris Hilton. Most girls my age probably don't even know who Angela Merkel is! And I only know because I am obsessed with Germany! Something has to change in our culture. We need to be more concerned with the arts in our communities, politics that so strongly affect us or famous people who are doing good things for good reasons. We don't get a newsflash everytime someone donates a lot of money to a charity. We hear a lot about Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt and we know that they are doing good things (maybe), but we never hear the details. The media brushes over the details of their charity and focuses on their marriage, her eating problems and drama revolving around adoption.

But am I hoping for a world that will never exist? Or even worse, am I denouncing a world that I will miss if it is gone? YES! Life couldn't possibly be serious all the time or we would go crazy! In this ideal world I would truly miss People magazine or gossip columns with pictures of the stars. So what is the solution here? Maybe we can just expand our minds and spend a little time reading about people who are making differences or about world news that affects our daily lives. Then we can spend all the time in the world googling for pictures of Britney and her shaved head.