Penetrating observation on the nature of fame

[billyworld99]

The compulsion first to elevate an individual to almost godlike status and then destroy the idol is as old as human history. Joy in the injury, downfall or death of a celebrity is born of envy. Fame, for its own sake as a symbol of wealth, power and love, has become the most desirable human attainment. Mass envy now dominates the relationship between a star and the public. The media, speaking for the public, refuse to acknowledge that fame is the emperor's new clothes, a nothing of their own imagining. Instead, having created this significant nothing, they enviously vilify the recipient of it. Envy is a destructive instinct, focused on possessions, and it does not stop at mere longing. The ultimate conclusion of envious impulses is to destroy the owner of the desired object or quality. At its most extreme, envy of the famous is manifested in assassination, and the most common trigger of homicidal envy is rejection.

Famous American literary author Truman Capote's observation: ``People simply cannot endure success over a long period of time. It has to be destroyed."

It is time we got a grip on this primitive urge. Famous people fill a public need. They are mythical figures, cast in their roles specifically to rehearse the dramas of change and conflict in the culture that chooses them. When the nature of those conflicts changes, the idol becomes redundant and vulnerable to the huge envy their status has inspired.


---- extracted from article by Celia Brayfield, who is the author of `Glitter: The Truth About Fame', published by Chatto & Windus. The Spectator , 1994.

 

[xthunderx2]

hmmmmm?

 

[144000]

yes...there's a point to that. add to that, envy is owned by one or more who are insecure.

if people believe in evolving, then they have to get to the point where they can rejoice over someone else's fame, no matter how great the fame, how long the fame, and how regularly positive the accolades. although it shouldn't have to be mentioned, but for the unfortunate nature of the vain feeling of the need for self preservation(signaling a discrediting of the value of one's own self), the greatest avenue to one's own success, is the ability to rejoice, unceasingly, over someone else's success, no matter what your own status is. and an even greater key to one's own success, is the willingness, to help another towards success, without expecting anything in return, and doing both without envy; further enriching the human experience, and the value of humanity. i'm paraphrasing from a billboard i saw on a wall, in a large successful hotel, in which, i used to work.