Recently, CBC Radio 1's Jian Ghomeshi discussed whether or not he thought he should seek an interview with Charlie Sheen for his radio show, Q. While I'll let you listen to his podcast to know what decision he came to, it made me think about, and question our relationship with celebrity hollywood gossip. No need to get into the media storm surrounding Sheen and his bizarre behaviours of late, but isn't it sad that the man is more popular and more sought out for an interview or talk show spot since his most recent trip down destructive lane? What's even more sad is that this attention comes in the form of poking fun at what could be a serious mental health problem. Meanwhile, your average Joe experiencing his first psychotic break has to jump through flaming hoops and over wait list hurdles in order to be seen, heard and taken seriously.
We laugh at celebrity bad behaviour and yet in the same breath scoff at what's being said and done. For people whose job it is to entertain (i.e., get our attention) our initial 'laughing at' is all the attention they need to keep going despite the tone we end up taking. Their behaviour is not ours to judge if it's our attention that maintains it. The funny thing about attention as a reinforcer for behaviour is that most people don't differentiate between positive and negative attention; they'll take what they can get! In Hollywood, this concept is more often coined, "any press is good press". I think the same holds true for any of us: any attention is good attention. Many of us don't chose to engage in destructive behaviour(s), but if it is one of only a few ways we can get people to pay attention to us, we're going to keep doing it. That is, until the day the people in our lives decide they will no longer pay attention to a particular behaviour of ours and stick to it, together.
Guess there's little chance of getting the million plus twitter followers Sheen has recently acquired to un-follow and ignore his antics. And we wonder why celebrity bad behaviour persists?
Side note: to check out a celebrity whose behaviours I do appreciate, consider following @jianghomeshi instead
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