Dearbhla Quinn, Dublin Ireland/Brussels, Belgium, SSH Blog Correspondent
I have never aspired to be famous, the trade off between status and privacy has always marred the fantasy in my eyes. This resolve was strengthened today as I was scrolling through my Facebook newsfeed and I came across a video of Jack Gleeson, best known for the role of King Joffrey in Game of Thrones, discussing the insidious nature of celebrity culture. He described how he preferred the anonymity of blending in rather than ‘teetering on pedestal on inch above the ground’ and discussed the origins and scholarly analysis of this modern cult.
Much of what he said echoed my own misgivings with celebrity culture, but I was struck by the relevance to street harassment, of one particular sentence; “You get so used to being looked at that you stop looking back”. This statement was used to define a particular celebrity affliction termed “acquired situational narcissism” and perhaps you may accuse me of the final word in that term for this comparison; however it reminded me of my own experience last month. I had a particularly unyielding week of often quite intimidating street harassment, here in Brussels, and for a while; I responded by walking the streets with my head bowed, avoiding eye-contact with other passersby, for fear of inspiring some unwelcome interaction.
While the experience of a celebrity being intruded upon by fans, bears some similarity to that of people (such as women or LGBTQ people) being harassed in the streets there is, I would argue, one key differentiator. This is that in the case of the celebrity this harassment is inspired by a deferential form of admiration, whereas in the case of sexualised street harassment, the harasser is anything but deferential, in fact their behaviour is often quite menacing.
While the celebrity may feel in that moment at the mercy of the whims of their public, they are in wider context empowered and privileged by the status in which they are held in society, a society of which they are both leaders and victims. I am reminded of Caitlin Moran’s assertion that she was not a royalist, not because she dislikes the British royal family but rather, because she sees them as caged animals that she wants desperately to release. They are endowed with every privilege, but privacy. However neither harassed woman (or members of the LGBTQ community etc) or the celebrity are being recognised as complex human beings, and this is a significant similarity. A recent series of sex abuse scandals in the Youtube ‘Vlogging’ community has prompted a discussion on sexual consent, but also of the reduction of ‘vloggers’ to their glorified online personas and the power that they glean from this endowment.
As Jack Gleeson spoke, in the familiar Trinity-esque style, and articulated ideas that echoed my own inclinations, I pondered the fact that I had chosen to watch this video of him talk; simply because he was paid ‘to pretend to be mean’ on TV. I was falling prey to the very cultural feature I so vehemently malign. Until recently I had very little exposure to this content through availing of, the filtered nature of, my own twitter feed as a news source. However, I have recently become frustrated by the escalating tendency of so many of the news and commentary outlets, I choose to follow, exposing me to a vitriol of inane celebrity gossip, the nature of which I had previously managed remain ignorant. This was an insulation I sought, not because of intellectual snobbery; but because of my own moral discomfort with the worrying culture of voyeurism that I believe such gossip fosters.
I find it particularly disturbing when feminist news outlets, which I continue to follow almost out of a habitual loyalty to their founding values, increasingly bow to the doctrine of ‘click counting’ and obediently tabloid-ise their content. It seems ironic that media outlets founded in part to critique the commodification and objectification of the female body, become, complicit in furthering its insidious bedfellow; the commodification of personality. When you reduce an individual to a media persona, constructed solely out of slogan-style values and airbrushed features; you contribute to this culture of dehumanisation. A culture in which women can be reduced to their bodies, and celebrities to the output of their marketing team; and you unwittingly further the notion, that a person can be public property.
Dearbhla graduated from BESS (Business and Sociology), in Trinity College Dublin, last year. She currently lives in Brussels, Belgium, where she has a think-tank internship working in the areas of gender, equality, and employment. Follow her on Twitter @imoshedinheels and her blogs.
