Op-Ed Rough Draft

Do we really realize who is on the TV telling us to buy useless beauty products, fitness programs, and crappy colognes and perfumes? Do we realize whose voices are being echoed through the ears of our children, telling them what to do and what not to do with their lives? Or do we simply soak it in like a sponge with a brain. Who exactly is it that I’m talking about you ask? Why our neon gods, of course, those we hail as our celebrities.
We see our family and friends every day gawking at celebrities and their deeds. But what’s the big deal if we talk about celebrities? So what if we’re a little envious of their lives and riches? It’s not like it can eventually grow into a serious and ever increasing obsessive – addictive disorder, right? Wrong, it’s called Celebrity Worship Syndrome, and it seems to be affecting more and more of us every day and which, if left unchecked, can lead us down dangerous paths, perhaps even to stalking and violence. Lisa France, a CNN columnist writes about celebrity worship and cites Psychologist James Houran on its potential dangers.
“[Celebrity worship] starts off with very benign forms, but it gradually takes on more dysfunctional behaviors.” Says Houran after the study on celebrity worship, “That’s good news and bad news. That means the stalkers probably don’t start off that way.”
However the bad news means only one thing, there is a potential stalker in all of us. But why are we so drawn to celebrities? What makes them so addicting, and makes us so submissive to their will? Well Carlin Flora from “Psychology Today” provides us with a few psychological clues. It would seem that our brains are naturally hardwired to be drawn more to faces and people who are culturally considered “attractive” rather than what would be culturally considered “unattractive.” And that over time those faces can become to our brain, at least at a subconscious level, almost like good friends or family, causing us to view them as such.
“Politico” correspondent Lisa Lerer points us to one of the most recent and already widely known examples of this psychological behavior, and that is the “Obamamania” surrounding our current president Barack Obama. His entrancing rhetoric of hope and change grasped millions of voters during the election campaign, and Lerer notes that even people already considered celebrities such as; Halley Berry and George Clooney were found to be flocking to the then senator for guidance as he raced to win his seat in the oval office. However, some have taken Obamamania to its edge, whether it’s commemorative plates, coins, pseudo soviet propaganda in his honor, or a recent Nobel Prize nomination and win after less than a year in office, and even less accomplished. The celebrity worship surrounding President Obama has left the border of disturbing and has crossed over into down right scary.
Celebrity worship it’s a two way street, we the people all have the potential to become the next John Hinckley. But perhaps even more frightening is the power we give to celebrities. We are the ones who let their influences penetrate the lives of our children’s generations, and though not all celebrity influence is bad, enough of it is.