I found this amazing story today on Breitbart.com about a Serbian flight attendant who survived a plane crash in 1972 when a bomb ripped the plane in half leaving 22-year-old Vesna Vulovic trapped inside the tail cone, plummeting toward earth from 33,000 feet. Like many people who survive falls from ridiculously high heights, she landed on a steep embankment, in the mountains. Now, some thirty years later, she is a prominent political figure in her native Serbia. She was an ardent opponent of Milosevic when he was in power and now she is at the forefront of the movement to bring Serbia into the E.U.
I guess my point is that for whatever reason, we don’t ever seem to have stories like this in the U.S. Most of the people who achieve celebrity status here for a heroic act are forgotten in as little time as it took for the ephemeral event that made them heroes took to happen. This woman in Serbia who fell from the sky and survived was a big deal for a long time. I am probably not making any sense here, or presenting any kind of cogent argument or even observation. But there was something in this story that was just so un-American to me. Blah blah blah.
Actually, wait. You know what? It might be that this woman being famous bothered me because I watched Briteny Spears blow her head off on South Park last night and it was a pretty damned good indictment of how fucked up our celebrity culture has become. If you can, try and watch the full episode. For now, you can watch it here in several parts.
5 Comments
Agreed. Americans and Brits have macabre interests, and there is no doubt we love being active participants in the demise of others.
Last weeks episode wasn’t that great but this episode was another brilliant commentary on American culture by Trey Parker and Matt Stone. I thought a great point was the parallel between old day ritual sacrifice and our more TV friendly version of sacrifice. It is upsetting that because we can invade peoples lives with telephoto lenses, stalking tactics, etc, that we allow it to happen. If I follow a girl home three times in a row, I will have a phone call from the cops on the fourth day, you stalk a girl for years, and have a camera, it is not only legal, but gainful employment. This will never end until crotch shot photos stop being worth $100,000.
Well put Anthony. Either they legalize stalking for everyone, which, I can’t say I disagree with. Or, they protect these poor celebutantes from the frenzy. Except if we are going to sacrifice celebrities, I say Paris Hilton goes first.
In a market driven society, what sells goes. It’s depressing, because what you end up with is a better mirror than any news-based poll. What you see is what we want. Which is what we are?
Jose,
I agree with your supply and demand supposition. But, I hope at some point the inherently compassionate side of human nature kicks in and we say enough of this garbage.
I often find myself ashamed of the Schedenfreude that I feel when I read the celebrity-falls-from-grace headlines in the gossip rags.
I have had enough.
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