{"id":25448,"date":"2015-01-02T01:00:43","date_gmt":"2015-01-02T06:00:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=25448"},"modified":"2014-12-29T21:26:20","modified_gmt":"2014-12-30T02:26:20","slug":"qotd-the-democratization-of-fame","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2015\/01\/02\/qotd-the-democratization-of-fame\/","title":{"rendered":"QotD: The democratization of fame"},"content":{"rendered":"

The radicalization of renown is good for America.<\/p>\n

In these times of seemingly limited job and business opportunities, celebrity has become a goal attainable by all.<\/p>\n

Gaining public attention by performing for the masses once required skills \u2014 deft strokes with ochre on the walls of Paleolithic caves, facility with trident and net in the Roman coliseum, recitation of iambic pentameter by the swath from the stage at the Globe.<\/p>\n

Talent and practice were needed for popularity from the dawn of time until the debut of America\u2019s Funniest Home Videos<\/em> in 1990. And even then a contestant had to have steady hands and steely resolve to keep the video rolling while his son pedaled off an improvised plywood ramp trying to leap a row of Tonka toys on his Big Wheel and got whacked in the testicles.<\/p>\n

But what does 18-year-old Bethany Mota who still lives at home with her parents (two-page spread, People<\/em>, pp. 196-7) do? She does \u201creviews of new makeup, clothes, and other mall finds.\u201d Her YouTube<\/em> channel has 5.9 million subscribers. She \u201creportedly makes $40,000 a month.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are 10,900,000 teenage girls in America, an estimated 10,899,999 of whom have the same skill set as Bethany. This includes the teenage girl at my house who is presently locked in her bedroom sharing \u201creviews of new makeup, clothes, and other mall finds\u201d with her 5.9 million Facebook<\/em> friends. She is about to get pages 196 and 197, torn from People<\/em> and heavily marked with a highlighter pen, shoved under her door. Bethany Mota, you are a beacon of hope.<\/p>\n

P.J. O’Rourke, “Welcome to Showbiz Sharia Law: No talent? Kind of dim-witted? No shame? Perfect. The celebrity industry needs you \u2014 just don\u2019t ever veil your face”, The Daily Beast<\/em><\/a>, 2014-05-04<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The radicalization of renown is good for America. In these times of seemingly limited job and business opportunities, celebrity has become a goal attainable by all. Gaining public attention by performing for the masses once required skills \u2014 deft strokes with ochre on the walls of Paleolithic caves, facility with trident and net in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,41,13],"tags":[477,248,481],"class_list":["post-25448","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-media","category-quotations","category-usa","tag-magazines","tag-realitytv","tag-youtube"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hpV6-6Cs","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25448","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25448"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25448\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25451,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25448\/revisions\/25451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25448"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25448"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25448"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}