From “Who Wore it Best?” to baby bumps, engagement rings, and divorces, celebrities are watched under a microscope for their every move.
Whether they are famous for their latest hit movie, being an Olympic athlete, wearing a million-dollar bra in the Victoria’s Secret fashion show, or even just a rich father, the average Joe is fascinated by watching the lives of others. But why?
Fernando Andacht is a communications professor at the University of Ottawa who has studied the public’s view of iconic celebrities. He said it is based in history and that media helps create these icons.
“Far from being a wholly new cultural or social phenomenon, what we witness today is the development by other means of a basic human tendency, namely, the worship of powerful iconic signs,” he said.
People’s interest in these icons dates back 20 centuries to a time when holy men were worshipped for being self-sacrificing. Their sacrifices were made in public places and can be
seen as an equivalent of today’s media exposure, according to Andacht.
These holy men became “powerful icons not unlike the actors and ordinary people who sacrifice their intimacy and accept over-exposure to become famous, even if it’s only for a short while in the case of reality TV’s short-lived celebrities,” Andacht said.
Joanna Szyszkowicz is an undergraduate student at Carleton University and said she agrees with Andacht that media has a role in this phenomena.
“Media makes celebrities. The more media exposure they get, the more famous they are and I guess to a certain degree it controls who becomes a celebrity and who doesn’t.” Szyszkowicz said.
The fourth season premiere of Keeping Up with the Kardashians had 4.1 million viewers, according to TVbythenumbers.com.
“They kind of reflect perfection and wealth and stardom and all that stuff that people dream to be,” Carleton student Samah Saci said on why she believes people watch Keeping Up with the Kardashians.
The interest in reality television started with Endemol’s Big Brother in 1999, according to Andacht, and from 2001 to 2002, 22.4 per cent of primetime television’s audience was watching reality shows.
Almost 10 years later, from 2010 to 2011, reality television has an audience viewership of 56.4 per cent of the 187 million primetime television viewers, according to The Nielsen Company.
As more people go from television to the Internet, celebrity culture is moving in the same direction, according to Andacht.
“Internet, as the main successor of television, affords people new ways in which fandom may grow at an exponential rate,” Andacht said.
While reality television may be a modern idea, people have always been attracted to the lives of the powerful and famous.
So even if ratings are dropping for the latest season of American Idol or The Real House Wives of Beverly Hills, people will always keep their eyes and ears open for the latest gossip in Hollywood.
