Sunday, 19 August 2007

'Troubled': The new 'Easy Street'

Sadly for those of us who are considered well-adjusted, today's celebrity culture is all-consuming. Every magazine on the shelves has pictures of the latest celebrity goings-on; who's seeing who; who's split up; who's been robbed at gunpoint and had their antique watch collection stolen. If you are ill enough to consider this of interest, your average Londis is something of a utopia. Good for you.

You can literally sit in a house for 6 weeks, get evicted then become a celebrity - it's that easy. They recently changed the exam you need to pass to become a celeb. You no longer need any discernible talent or personality. Being pretty helps, but you essentially just need to know which avenues to turn down and you're a shoo-in for premieres, parties and more spit roasts than Aunt Bessie.

Having stumbled upon one of these monoworded 'celeb' magazines the other day, I found myself leafing through the car-crash filled pages agog. Can anyone actually care this much? Does it matter how much weight she's put on? So what if she did carry her minature dog in a handbag? I don't consider myself out of touch, but this caper left me feeling cold inside.

Naturally, it got worse.

I got to an 'article' about Amy Winehouse, which was essentially a few snaps of her running for a train (front-page stuff again), and the tagline was 'Troubled star weight worry'. Er, excuse me? 'Troubled'? - what the hell does 'troubled' mean? Back in my day, a troubled person was one who had suffered immeasurable pain or tragedy in their life. Maybe they had a cruel medical condition, or had lost several family members in a pedalo accident. Either way, they were generally put-upon people who were dealt a bad hand.

Not exactly a blueprint for Ms. Winehouse's antics is it? She's a famous singer, undoubtedly wadded, with a husband and a penchant for high-class narcotics. She openly drinks and smokes, takes drugs and has lost some weight. Hardly the very definition of a troubled soul now, is it? There'll be those who crow that being famous has taken its toll and she's doing it as a cry for help. Sadly for them, that's bollocks. Nobody is making her stay in the limelight. Nobody is forcing her to attend star-filled parties and snort coke and chug cases of Jack Daniels. All her choice I'm afraid, which makes it all the more galling when she doesn't turn up for gigs claiming she's a perfectionist. Twat more like. If she stayed off the sauce and charlie the night before a gig she might have a half a chance of turning up.

The latest is she's suffering from 'acute exhaustion'. We don't know how lucky we are having 9-5 jobs, getting up at the crack of dawn 5 and 6 days a week and worrying about paying our ever-increasing mortgages. We could be trapped in a world of drink, drugs and debauchery like old Wino. Count your lucky stars..

Special mention must also go to Lindsay Lohan, who's immature and reckless behaviour somehow makes her a victim. If she was some down-and-out with no job pegging it through the streets of California whilst pissed, I doubt she'd be afforded the same level of understanding from the arse-kissing media who stay on her good side to keep the stories coming in. Knobhead.

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