Media Makes and Breaks Stars

¶ … Media Makes and Breaks Stars

The entertainment industry's public fan base has created an entertainment media monster that is today less concerned with talent than it is about building images that it can then destroy with sensationalism and innuendo. The approach to reporting on the entertainment industry today is not about analyzing acting or music ability or performance, but is instead an approach about creating celebrity for the purposes of destroying celebrities in a way that is destructive to the celebrity's professional and personal life. The entertainment media enjoys an unprecedented control over entertainers: actors, actresses, musicians, and even people who have no real talent or contribution to the industry other than to provide glimpses into the lives of the wealthy for purposes of shocking the public with bad behavior, excessive indulgences, and sexual promiscuity. One need not even have a particular talent, because the entertainment media's goal is build up public interest in any way it can for purposes of destroying the image in a very public way. The media accomplishes this with clever use of photographic images that are often misleading insinuations of the entertainer's behavior or performance that are in synch with the media's goal of building the performing up only to destroy once that performer is at the height of the public's attention. It is a cut-throat process that is not just damaging to the celebrity, but to young people today as it not only degrades the celebrity, but degrades social values and cause young people to become as much a product of media manipulations as the celebrities themselves.

Take, for example, the case of Brittany Spears. Young, blonde, beautiful, and talented enough to create a huge world-wide fan base in her music, from her earliest days Mickey Mouse Club Musketeer, the media followed Spears, emphasizing her every virginal look and word, creating an image of her as an innocent. The photograph below shows Spears with Brittany Spears doll likeness: innocent, clean cut, and an apparent role model for young children.

Online at http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&q=images+of+brittany+spears+clean+cut&um=1&ie=UTF-8&ei=VUEcS_jUHsyztgfFppiZBg&sa=X&oi=image_result_group&ct=title&resnum=1&ved=0CBYQsAQwAA.

As Spears grew older, began dating another celebrity, Justin Timberlake, the media began to exploit Spears' emerging womanhood and sexuality. ". . . Spears quickly transitioned from a popular virgin into an even more popular Madonna imitator (Shapiro 2005 55)." The images below, found online, show how the media transitioned Spears from virginal, to a sexual young woman, to a hedonistic vamp, and, ultimately, a disturbed young mother.

Online at http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&um=1&q=images+of+brittany+spears+clean+cut&sa=N&start=126&ndsp=18

Spears, who inarguably amassed a fortune, became the target of exploitation of the media, who presented her as being so deranged, that she lost custody of her two young children, and was court ordered to the supervision of her father, who continues to have complete control over her assets. To say that Spears was exploited or hounded by the press is understatement. It is perhaps more accurate to say she was manufactured by the press and advertising industries. While Spears no doubt had problems, the extent and depth of her problems were compounded by the press and advertising media that capitalized on every possible invasion of privacy and whatever normalcy in life she attempted to pursue. Something that many of do, going to Starbucks for coffee each day, became an image of a caffeine addict who was putting her children at risk because she chose to drive herself to the coffee shop. Surrounded by hundreds of paparazzi whenever she ventured beyond the security of her gated home, perhaps she was jeopardizing the safety of her children who also became targets of incessant and seemingly deranged paparazzi. Never before has the media played such an integral role in destroying the life of a celebrity. The very public demise of singer Whitney Houston did not cause Houston to lose her children or, nor was she forced into the care a parent and her assets court ordered under the control of the parent. Today, Spears is rebuilding her public image and career in an effort to regain control of her life, her assets, and to get her children back whose custody was awarded to her ex-husband, whom Spears pays spousal support and child support to.

Spears established a media precedent, and we see a pattern emerging as the young singing star Miley Cyrus transitions from adolescent to a young woman. The photos below, found online, show the transition of Cyrus from virginal, to sexual, to hedonistic.