You've seen it at the grocery store, right? The latest ripped-from-reality expose of famous parents and their kids, told by the nanny/housekeeper/gardener/tutor/insert-function-here.
Makes me think: Is there a single one of us who'd want a member of our family (since most of us don't have staff) to go public with their real life stories? I certainly wouldn't want my temper tantrums, sarcasm, rudeness and occasional immaturity put out into the public arena.
And yet as human beings, that's what we're drawn to--tales of other people's failings. Is it because we can measure ourselves against outrageous behavior and feel relieved? After all, we're not that bad. I might drop the occasional F-bomb, but at least I'm not allowing my under-age kids to drink. Or to drive one of our many cars around the estate (yeah, okay, we don't have an estate. but still...).
I'm not that bad.
We're not that bad.
Are we?
Given money and fame and adulation, surrounded by people who we pay to tell us what we want to hear, insulated from many of life's inconveniences, how would we be? Who would we be?
Would we be that bad?
We are a strange species, aren't we?? So drawn to all the smut. Definitely some good fuel for thought here, Mrs. Ditter. By the way, I'm loving your book rec. column. I will definitely have to check out the Lauren Kessler one. I'm sure it would be more relevant to my life right now than I care to admit.
ReplyDeleteI think I would be that bad. Not in the driving around the estate drunk way, but surely in the uncivilized, drinks out of the milk bottle way, or the drove down the highway holding onto the child's arm with the passenger door partway open kind of way.
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