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February 12

Famous people, starlets and miscellaneous

Hello, Refdeskers! I have a question regarding popular culture. Well, it's more of a general wondering... ment than a question: why do everyday folks interest themselves for lives of starlets, celebrities and such? How come they read tabloids? Ideas will be welcome. Maybe this question'd fit much better over at the humanities desk, but I'm trying here first. Thanks and have a nice day! --Ouro (blah blah) 13:58, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Simple gossip. Nothing special. -- kainaw ™ 14:28, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Additionally some of it appears to be schadenfreude. It may be that the person is jealous of Actress X for being consider stunning/beautiful and it makes them feel a little inadequate so when the gossip-rags show a photo of celeb X looking anything but stunning (say without make-up/with wind-swept hair) they think "geez maybe i'm not so ugly if even they can look like that." Also there's the same idea with the 'hum-drum' life - that is the life of many celebrities can seem (from a media perspective) like it is exciting and varied with parties and jet-set lifestyle etc. It's a chance for some people to escape their reality and read about something that is so different to theirs. 194.221.133.226 (talk) 15:12, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Escapism covers this rather nicely. It's that your own life sucks so bad, it helps to have a distraction from it... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 16:00, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Also, some people picture themselves as one or more celebrities. Say somebody came from their home town and made it big, they might think "that could be me !". This can sometimes become an obsession, like in the case of Mark David Chapman, who shot John Lennon. StuRat (talk) 16:05, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sometimes interested in the private lives of sports players as it could have a bearing on how they play.It's a well know fact that the length of a pitcher's whiskers have a direct influence on how many strikes he can throw.hotclaws 18:11, 14 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The media have role to play here - albeit a reprehensible one. Whenever that woman whose name I refuse to utter picks her nose, the media report it. She came to Australia recently, reportedly to do some shopping. That's all, just going shopping. Is that news? Hardly. It's not as if we're so totally bereft of visits from international celebrities that any visitation by any "star", for any purpose, is automatically newsworthy. But her presence here was breathlessly reported in newspapers, TV, radio, you name it - presumably on the basis that some people are interested in her doings and would want to know about this. (Just exactly why they're interested in her is a mystery that nobody's ever explained. They don't publish most of my letters to editors, which are for written for public enlightenment, so there's obviously a double standard operating here.) Now, I see that that woman is featuring in a locally-made TV show, which was obviously the primary reason for her presence here. (The media weren't aware of that at the time, so what does that say about their journalism?) Unfortunately, what little credibility that TV program may have is reduced to zero by her inclusion in it, and the TV station's promotion of her as part of it. End of rant. -- JackofOz (talk) 01:13, 15 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

All answers (and rants, JackofOz) are appreciated. I don't really follow any news or TV in these matters, so it's mostly uncharted waters for me. --Ouro (blah blah) 07:04, 16 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Possible Twilight Zone or similar show episode

A friend of mine remembers seeing an episode of the twilight zone or maybe it was a similar series. The episode was about a woman who had a swordfish medallion or necklace and it kept growing until it was very large. Can anyone remember a specific show based on this vague recollection? Thanks! -- 12.181.197.100 (talk) 20:37, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]