You cannot have your cake and eat it too”, scientists say

Paparazzi vs Celebrities: When the Stalking is Actually All Right

Todd Daniels

In the modern battle between celebrities and the relentless paparazzi, do famous people really have the right to complain about invasion of privacy?

Despite having with them what sometimes resembles a symbiotic relationship, celebrities normally abhor the presence of the paparazzi. With their lenses always ready and eager to catch the slightest of slip-ups, the swarm of paparazzi make their living off the embarrassment and misery of famous people. As a result, for all their status and money, celebrities often find themselves forced to either stay out of sight and abstain from simple everyday tasks, or risk seeing unflattering photos of their faces on the next cover of Us Weekly – which might very well pass a reason to preemptively strike anyone with a camera on a Sunday morning.

Now, a more cynical person could probably say that he brought that up on himself – you know, with the serial cheating and everything – but, then again, I doubt anyone would look much like a saint under such intense scrutiny (or with that kind of fame and money, for that matter).

The ethical boundaries of professional celebrity stalking

In any case, all the bad blood between famous people and the tabloids is of little practical consequence. Thanks to that whole “freedom of the press” thing, the paparazzi are allowed to shoot as many embarrassing pictures and videos as they can, as long as they are able to find their targets in public spaces. So, apart from channeling Sean Penn and breaking a few cameras – which would only give the enemy even more ammo, by the way – there is not much a celebrity can do to avoid being part of this circus.

So, at least from an ethical standpoint, it is obvious that the plain letter of the law does not make this type of industry tolerable. As the cliché goes, celebrities are people too, and one would have to be really insensitive to ignore that such harassment causes real pain – and also really shallow to condone it in the name of cheap entertainment. That being said, perhaps the moral limit we are looking for is probably much closer to our reality than most celebrities would care to admit.

You cannot have your cake and eat it too”, scientists say

The main argument athletes, movie stars and musicians use to defend their privacy is that the public nature of their profession should not be construed as a forfeiture of their right to privacy – which is actually a very reasonable point. Of all the verbal jabs thrown back and forth in this fight, this might be the one which resonates deepest with me. Most of us like to keep our personal and professional lives separated, so it seems inherently unfair that these people should be deprived of their right to do the same on account of their line of work (and no, “they are rich, they can take it” is not nearly as sound an argument).

However, while I agree that just by shooting a movie, recording an album or playing a sport professionally a person should not be forced to open his personal life to the entire world, most celebrities do try to turn that public exposure into something else. Aware of the allure they exert on the average Joes and Janes everywhere, famous people look to profit from their image and start endorsing products that usually have nothing to do with the reason they became famous in the first place. For instance, George Clooney lately has been trying to push us his Espresso machine, Beyoncé is out trying to talk you into some shampoo and Peyton Manning is, well, selling anything and everything.

The reason why these people get to do commercials to begin with is that companies like Nestlé, L’Oréal and MasterCard hope that the consumer will feel a personal connection with them and buy their product by association. We know it; the companies know it; the celebrities know it. Unfortunately, that is also the fuel

Going back to Tiger Woods, when he appears on my TV trying to sell me razorblades and videogames, he is also giving me green light to be interested in his life. Those things are not about Golf (well, maybe the videogame, a little bit); they are not about using the same clubs if I want to replicate his scorecard. EA Sports and Gillette were betting on Tiger’s personal appeal and, ultimately, trying to make me like him, not his game, to boost their sales – as was Tiger, when he cashed his check. So, when he crashes his car and has his many affairs turned public, he cannot claim that it is nobody else’s business, not when he stirred my curiosity first trying to make a quick buck. And he certainly cannot complain when the paparazzi, picking up on that public interest, decide to make some money of their own.

So, in the end, I guess I’m siding with the gossip magazines and their indefatigable hordes of paparazzi on this one. As long as celebrities keep crossing the line too, it’s a fair game.

Дата добавления: 2015-10-31