But we are animals after all and have a strong need to belong to a group. Luckily there’s a solution to this. The communities and families have been replaced by the celebrities! They make us feel the safe sense of belonging! They are all ours to share!
In the good old days we used to peek from behind the net curtains to see what the neighbours were up to. Nowadays we peek into the media. Oh, how we yearn to know what the prime minister likes to cook for his beauty or with whom a TV-presenter went on holiday. The celebrities have become the family we all share. We love to hate them and simply can’t live without them. But unlike with family we can choose them. We can elect whom we want and whom we don’t want as our nearest and dearest. Ah – such freedom!
Kimi Räikkönen is the village boy done well. We are all happy for his successes as long as he doesn’t forget his humble roots. Susan Kuronen (does anybody remember her?) has become the equivalent to the outrageous aunt who dances on the tables at the family weddings and snogs anyone she can lay her hands on. The Idols contestants are those cute kids who perform at the county hall and we admire in them the innocence and courage we once all had. We also have Britney, the wild girl of the town. She was such a nice girl but don’t know what’s happened to her lately. And hasn’t Victoria lost an awful lot of weight? I don’t think all is well between her and David, oh no…
A couple of summers ago I decided not to read any yellow press ever again. All went really well at first. I felt pure and elevated above all things common and base. But soon I was to notice that I could not take part in an idle chit chat as I was not up to scratch with my media gossip. So I’ve resorted to taking an occasional look at the mags when at the hairdressers and I read the headlines spread out in the windows of every shop.
But now I’ve taken a step even further though. I’m entertaining the idea of moving to the country and returning back to the small community of my childhood. As I gaze into the eyes of my beloved underneath an apple tree outside of the farmhouse we could one day live in, I’m quite sure I could be happy to view the world through my net curtains and gossiping and being gossiped about in the market square. I’d happily leave the Britneys and Susans to the city dwellers with freedom and individuality. I’d be content at being blissfully ignorant. Or would I?