Why Do We Care?

What's going on, good people? It's good to be back and I'm glad you could join me. I'm feeling good about the NFL being back. Glad the lockout got worked out before any games were missed or worse.

Enough small talk. Let's get into the topic.

I've never been one to pay to much attention to the private lives of celebrities. I basically see what any other passer by sees while standing in the line at the grocery store. I hear what gets announced on television while I'm watching shows I like to watch. I know there's a lot of stuff out there about different people and you can get all in the business of celebrities. The question is why do we even care? Are our lives that uninteresting that we have to spend time reading and entertaining ourselves with other people's lives?

It's safe to say that women, compared to men, pay much more attention to celebrity life than men. I'm not trying to generalize, but as a writer, people watching and listening is what I do. I hear women having conversations about celebrities and what's going on with them way more than I do men. But men do it too!

The media obviously drives this whole celebrity life industry. We watch, read, and listen to what they put out. But if there was no demand for it, then they probably wouldn't do it. For some reason it's interesting to us to know who's sleeping with, dating, marrying, divorcing, cheating on who. Is it because our lives are so "normal" that we are bored to the point of nosiness? Is it because we wish we could live the lives of the people we pay attention to on television? Is it because we simply don't make an effort to fill our lives up with things that make our own lives interesting?

It's an interesting commentary to say that we downplay the potential of our own lives and fill the voids we leave with the smoke and mirrors of celebrities and their lives. We forget that they are just people like ourselves. Many of them wish they could just sit back and live their lives without everybody being in their business. With all the different kinds of media outlets it's very easy to get wrapped up into the lives of celebrities. Should we find a better way to entertain ourselves?

Thanks for joining me once again. Until next time, keep it 100.