Fame - I'm Going To Live Forever....

In the 60's, when Andy Warhol made his interesting prediction - that in the future we would all be famous for 15 minutes - we had, as a society, begun throwing off the perceived shackles of the post war culture and belief systems.

It was a time of, "if it feels good - do it" "let it all hang out" and "if you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with". Traditional moral and religious restraints were cast to one side in a tidal wave of post-modern thinking about, who we were, what we should be allowed to do, with whom we should be allowed to do it and the very nature of truth and belief.

Paradoxically, the desire for someone or something greater than ourselves remained. With the intelligentsia, and certain sections of the established church, declaring that, 'God is dead', a vacuum formed. As the orthodox Judaeo-Christian religious foundation to our society was dug up and carried away by the barrow load, a rainfall of different beliefs and ideologies soon flooded into the empty diggings; New Age mysticism, rights of the individual, freedom of expression without responsibility, sexual freedom with no thought for tomorrow, feminism, freedom of abortion, consumerism and much more.

However, the need to worship something 'higher' is built into the human spirit, and over the decades following the 60's this need would begin to find its fulfilment in the worship of the 'famous', the 'celebrity'.

Of course, famous people, those who achieved greatness, were born great, or had greatness thrust upon them, have always been among us. National Leaders, Soldiers, Politicians, Royalty, Rogues, Desperados, Adventurers, Villains, Film Stars, Sports Stars, Musicians, Footballers etc., made obvious candidates. Usually these people were high profile, maybe rich and powerful, often able to manipulate the publicity machine, or have it manipulated for them, to reach the dizzy heights of fame.

So we find, just a few years into the 21st Century, a curious situation. In the general clamouring to find objects to satisfy our need to worship, almost anyone will do in this devotion to the cult of celebrity, and the sensation hungry media, especially television has become the new evangelist. G.K. Chesterton observed, 'When people stop believing in God, they don't believe in nothing, they believe in anything'.

Fueled by the ever growing pressure of ratings, TV has created its very own Frankenstein's Monster; the TV Celebrity. Now, given a modicum of media coverage, anyone can be 'famous'. Gardeners, airport security officers, topless models, murders, footballers, prostitutes, driving test failures, bus drivers. Most, if not all, quite ordinary people doing whatever they choose to do, who have been sucked into the TV machine and transmitted to millions. What is even more remarkable is that those millions, generally, deem the fact that they have seen these people on TV and enough to bestow on them the accolade of, 'celebrity'.

And so the wheel begins turning with a horrible momentum. Because they are now personalities, they appear on TV and the other media at even greater regularity. This reinforces their status, and soon their opinions on the state of the world is sought, and they appear on chat shows, the news, and in previously serious debate programmes, thus building their pedestals ever higher. We are invited to share their lives through magazines and the Internet. Vicariously, we go to their weddings, sit in their bedrooms, watch the birth of the babies, know the perfume they use, the toothpaste in their bathrooms and almost every other intimate detail of their lives.

Thus the cult of celebrity bestows on its worshippers the ultimate accolade - intimacy. We 'know' these people, we have become part of their social circle; we are now rubbing shoulders with the famous by association. And there lies the power of the cult of personality. We want to worship, and we want to feel something in return; to feel good, to feel blessed, to feel the hand of some god on our heads, and in feeling that we are satisfied.

As devoted worshippers and disciples of Celebrities, we want not only to know them, but we want to be like them. So the purveyors of fame eagerly sell us the trappings of fame. We buy the products they use, holiday in the countries they holiday in, buy the clothes they wear (or at least expensive, but inferior copies), adopt their hair-styles, believe what they believe. As we do this the circle is complete. Their fame increases and our devotion becomes evermore intense; well for 15 minutes anyway.

Fame, though, is a transient beast. No human can maintain the life required to receive adoring worship for great periods of time. For one thing, we are all mortal and disappear in the fullness of years. After all, there will always be another along in a minute; someone else whose teeth shine brighter, whose hair is glossier, whose breasts are larger, who can kick a ball harder, who can sing more sweetly. Someone who is younger.

So what happens to the post-famous, the now un-famous? Perhaps they may appear on TV shows where they can debase themselves, like sacrifices before the braying crowd, in the hope of rekindling past glories in the hope that somebody out there still loves them. They may retire to a rich and idle empty life in a tax haven abroad, or perhaps they'll become PR Managers and run agencies for the next phenomenon who comes along.

And what of the devotee? What of those who have lain prostrate at the foot of the alter? They'll flit from one personality to another, like moths to flames, ever seeking but never finding a true outlet for their inner selves; their empty inner selves.

....Baby remember my name.......Please!