Why do celebrities exist?

Question

What is a celebrity? I don't understand the idea behind being famous. Everyone is a regular person, yet people find it interesting to see what celebrities are wearing and doing (even if it is a picture of them taking out the trash). Why do certain professions only get you to so-called "celebrity status?"

Answer 1

There is no one answer.  If we didn't spend so much time (or any time) watching TV and reading magazines and playing on the web there wouldn't be the type of celebrity culture we now wallow in.  It's really very pitiful that we spend our money and time keeping people who do nothing more than pretend to be other people or sing a silly song rich and famous.  It's really analagous to being back in high school.  You have the popular kids, then the rest of the people who just exist and wish they were popular.  We just take that same mindset and replicate it 1000 times higher and make the popular ones wealthy beyond comprehension.  For what?  Pretending to be somebody else in what is really just a play recorded on film? 

Just think about how much better the world would be if we didn't pay pretenders or musicians billions of dollars each year, and instead invested that money in education, science, health care, world hunger, etc.  It's a gross misplacement of money...for what?  So we can watch Brittney shave her head or Michael Jackson play with monkeys or Oprah act like the queen of the world?  Please...