There are those that would say we're a society that worships celebrities, but that's clearly not the case. We loathe celebrities, and we thrill at their pain, failure, and decay.

So I'm being clear up front, I'm going to write this as though I speak for all of us, when obviously I'm projecting so that I don't seem like such a heel.

Of those three things, I think our enthusiasm for celebrity decay is the cruelest. Pain is pain -- everyone has some in their life, and no matter how deeply we repress it, we all whisper to ourselves, "...better him than me." The only difference is that, when it's celebrity pain, no one whispers it. Failure brings us the most joy because we see it as karmic retribution. The decay thing, though, is really sadistic. We elevate these people because they're pretty or bright or, rarely, both. But we all know that neither pretty or bright lasts forever. Especially pretty. And so we watch and giggle as the identity we've made for the celebrity molders.

It's like giving a baby an Ipecac-soaked lollipop. OK. It's not really, but what an image, huh?

Speaking of babies, the worst and best decay is the aging of a child star. Puberty smashes their once adorable faces, and we all laugh, laugh, laugh. Usually, anyway. Christina Ricci has been the rare exception. Though she spent a good portion of her teens teetering on the edge of catastrophe, she appears to have pulled through. Thanks almost entirely to her breasts.

Without those breasts, Ricci would be a slightly chubby girl that, caught in the wrong light or from the wrong angle, could easily be mistaken for a retarded person.



Not that looking a little slow isn't sexy in its own way, but it's not what's generally considered "classic beauty."

The boobs, on the other hand, are classics. She's been working toward whipping them out for a while now, what with the sheer dresses and bra scenes, but she's finally brought out the big guns in the upcoming Prozac Nation, and, baby, them boobies are beauties.

You may have pulled two on us on the way up, Christina, but we'll get you on the way back down.



Image Via Stereogum

Analogcabin @ 10:07 AM
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