Celebrity conundrum

Celebrities wield undue power over the society. In an era where visual imagery has captivated the world and attention spans are fleeting, celebrities are able to dominate the discourse and effortlessly distract countries and continents.

The traditional celebrity:

These celebrities gain fame typically through popular fields that make them famous. Celebrities have risen to become heads of nations. They are able to do so by tapping in to the strength of their name recognition and harnessing it further by making outlandish claims and sometimes downright lies. Fully knowing that their words only last a “viral” cycle, they are able to get the message across whether right or wrong and simply move on to the next hot topic. They have mastered the art of click-bait and are using it to the hilt. While their claim to celebrity status often stems from a field such as cinema or sports, they catapult in to politics with a gargantuan advantage over their rivals. As a part and parcel of the society, celebrities have every right to do so. But it becomes detrimental when they themselves get carried away by their capacity to influence opinion and steer the society in to an unhealthy quagmire. They often make no heartful attempt to understand the complexity of the society we live in yet rush to pass judgements on sensitive topics. With great power comes great irresponsibility. This seems to happen quite frequently in today’s fast-paced technocratic world.

Political Celebrity:

Another aspect of celebrity complex is the knack with which some politicians are able to become celebrities by appealing to the crass and base instincts of people. That is a much more dangerous trend. While claiming to be modern, technologically inclined people across all ages are falling prey to empty rhetoric that is spewed by these larger than life men and women. They use gimmickry and tomfoolery to propagate half-baked truths and myths as scientific truisms. With the wide reach that their bully pulpit provides, they conveniently hoist an alternative history. These celebrities are masters at painting fact as fiction and vice versa. Technology has come to serve their purposes so well with seamless integration of “Whatsapp university” in to their core agenda of propaganda. They also tend to be sartorial trendsetters with ever changing fashion sense and ability to keep up with trending designs. Some go a step ahead in donning monogrammed suits all the while claiming to be mendicants. In spite of such blatant and vulgar display of arrogance, nothing sticks to these Teflon celebrities with ever increasing fanfare and undying servitude from their followers that abound in the millions.

Tech-Celebrities:

As the eminent economist Yanis Varoufakis explains in his book, we now live in an era of techno-feudalism that is past capitalism. Our modern day tech feudalists are celebrities in their own realm because wealth and power is worshipped. Even though they are adept at amassing billions, they display poverty of thought and moral bankruptcy in standing up to atrocities. They are no less than gods in human form with their every move celebrated in awe by their devotees. They pay lip-service to every new progressive mass movement while doing nothing to change basic power structures. As powerful governments throttle free speech and maim brave journalists that are locked up in solitary confinement for years, our celebrities do not bat an eye lid keeping their steadfast focus on mundane and inconsequential banalities of everyday life morphed as great revelations. They use philanthropy as a ruse for the most non-controversial issues while effectively insulating themselves from doing anything substantial that can change the lives of billions. Global behemoth companies owned, aided and abetted by celebrities pilfer the resources from the “wretched of the earth” (as eloquently stated by Frantz Fanon) while they claim to be green warriors, animal lovers and responsible citizens. They lecture the society while failing to look themselves in the mirror and realize that they are perpetrators of the same ills that they claim the society suffers from.

A celebration of mediocrity:

Most celebrities that extend their tentacles into politics and public discourse tend to be mediocre not only in their intellect but perhaps also in their own fields. As they say, empty vessels make more noise. We have seen this time and again. One cannot forget the theatrics of droves of celebrities banging pots and pans in public to ward off the corona virus during the height of the pandemic at the behest of a supreme leader while millions were rendered homeless due to a stringent and inhumane lockdown. Similarly, celebrity after celebrity will pour in empty words of remorse on social media platforms to condemn isolated acts of sensational violence but will maintain deafening silence on genocides and pogroms. They will express outrage over common themes such as corruption and even don the role of crusaders against such ills but will maintain strategic calm over issues such as casteism, religious intolerance and racism. The truly gifted and talented celebrities are far and few in between and possess the decency to maintain decorum. Some even take up genuine causes at the expense of their careers but they are far outnumbered by the “mainstream” celebrities. The authentic celebrities that are trying to make a real difference are also silenced by the techno-feudalistic powers that be.

While there is no seeming way out of this celebrity conundrum that today’s society is trapped in, the only ray of hope seems to lie within the problem itself. The same trivial attention span of the world has the power to jolt these celebrities out of their fame as the next wave of new icons and mascots take their place. One can only hope that the new crop possesses better sense. In the long arc of human history, this too shall be a passing phase that will one day be memorialized as an era of celebrity circus but alas living through it is certainly painful and carries a real human toll.

G Naveen has been writing articles pertaining to politics with emphasis on social Justice for more than 20 years on various platforms. He is a physician by profession. Email: [email protected]