Ok now in theory, I should try my hand at religion before moving straight to the whatever else.
However its the whatever I'm concerned with today. Recently, as I opened a browser on my computer and it pulled up Yahoo's home page, and among the clickables including "7 Desserts You Can Eat Without Guilt," and "The Top Ten Ways to Guarantee a Divorce," was an article discussing the goings on in the celebrity world, entitled "Miley and Christian's Scandals."
The article splintered into to sub-articles one went on to discuss Miley Cyrus' feud with some other little 14/15 year old Disney-bred mini-diva, while Christian Bales' half discussed the recent domestic dispute he was involved in after he hit and roughed up his sister and mother after they spoke badly about his wife. Thats right the people at Yahoo seemed to find it fitting to put these two topics under an equal heading with a nice little side-by-side of Cyrus' and Bales' faces.
Is this what a word like "Scandal" has come to mean in America? Monica Lewinski? now that was a scandal." Watergate? Scandal! However a cop calling Lindsay Lohan gay? not a scandal, kind of funny but not necessarily a Scandal.
A "Scandal" might involve a certain level of deformation of Character, but how many celebrities do you hear about in those kinds of articles do you think of as those with Character. You know those of good moral fiber, the fine upstanding men and women of film and screen. You probably can't name many because they stay out of the lime light. Most of the ones you can name have some history of this or are just starting down that road.
My concern is this, why are we as a people so obsessed with the goings on of people's lives merely because they are performers? what makes them so different? I mean most of what you hear about isn't too dissimilar to what happens on hundreds of High School Campuses all the time. Two people are dating they break up, and the (now) ex-gf immediately dislikes the new one.
I think an even bigger concern is why do even those smaller... lets call them feuds... concern any of us enough to purchase any number of magazines dedicated to such gossip, or tune into any number of TV shows, (or heck) even entire channels designed around discussing the petty, nonsensical irritants of other peoples lives?
I don't just mean in school, or at work, but even in the church we can't help but discuss the business of others, even the outcome of their business couldn't have less of an affect on us. I mean whose business is it when a couple is getting divorced? That couple's, and their family. Whose business is it when a man loses his job and has to ask the church for help until he's back on his feet? His and the ministers of that Church.
So why are we as a society compelled to get in other's Kool-aid? why do we care what any of these entertainers do in their off-time, after all, with very few exceptions, it has no affect on us.
I can't say for my own part that I have never partaken in the inane chatter that occurs, but with one exception all preachers, teachers, and speakers, no matter how true their sermon, is not above succumbing to the evils they so passionately speak against.
I think the best explanation comes from the movie Mean Girls, a film whose casting proves my previous point. When a book trashing all the girls in school is revealed it alleges that a teacher might have been peddling drugs to students (which we, the audience, know to be a falsehood), and the primary male character, Aaron, says that, "That book was written buy a bunch of girls who make up rumors because they're bored with their own lame lives."
That last part is the crucial piece, its because we're bored with our lives. We know all the details (as best we can) of our own lives there's nothing new or interesting about our lives so we seek out the facts of others lives, usually the negatives.
Even knowing this flaw, there is no definite way to stop it. My suggestion? consider that the life you are living no matter how mundane it may seem is part of a masterpiece The Lord is creating, and he has chosen you to help him co-author it.
I think remembering that will help us all
-matt
