The power of celebrity

The power of celebrity

The Power of Celebrity
According to a CNN poll, over 50% of young people today say one of their lifetime goals is to become famous.   This is not surprising given the benefits that go along with fame.   Celebrities today have many benefits that the average person does not.
The first and most obvious advantage of being a celebrity is money.   Fame today is almost a guarantee of wealth.   Famous actors receive millions of dollars for each movie they make.   Professional athletes make tens of millions each season, and the seasons don’t even last half a year in most sports.   Sure, these are the top actors and athletes, but still, the figures are ludicrous when compared to what the best teachers, the best police officers, and the best firefighters make, and aren’t all these professions more important to us than movies and sports?   We see the homes of these celebrities on television, with swimming pools bigger than the houses most of us live in.   We see the expensive cars they drive, the huge parties they throw, and the fabulous vacations they take.   Is it any wonder so many young people make fame a lifetime goal?
Beyond the money, or maybe partly because of the money, celebrities have another unfair advantage in that they can get away with almost anything.   When a famous actor crashes her car and then fails a sobriety test, she gets the equivalent of a slap on the wrist, while the rest of us would be looking at jail time.   When a famous athlete is caught with drugs and guns, he might get suspended for a few games and have to pay a hefty fine, but the fine is nothing to one of these rich people.   The rest of us would go broke dealing with such an incident, and would probably find ourselves in prison.   Yet even crimes as serious as insider trading, violent assault, and in some cases murder, often draw little in the way of punishment for these people.   They get minimal time in country club type prisons, or no time at all because their fame wins them an acquittal from...