Personas v. Reality

Imagine you could wake up tomorrow being wildly famous with a million Twitter and Facebook followers, all people who actually care to know what flavor Poptart you had or “heart” your selfie showcasing both that you have the new iPhone and your fake lashes. Now ask yourself whether or not you care what any of those people actually think of you.

People don’t contribute to fame, actions do. Do we ever really know who celebrities are when they hide behind PR agents every time they do something “wrong”? Or when they go to build houses for African children while being filmed the entire time to show on CNN?

Recently I’ve found that blurred realities turned personas like that aren’t restricted to Hollywood, but exist in just about any community. Transparency doesn’t exist because one will feel the need to be light-hearted and humorous for the sake of holding a viewer count or followers amount, regardless of the things said behind closed doors. Perhaps it’s because I am so outright blunt that it disgusts me to discover when those with an established name and success for themselves behave one way and truly are another.

Celebrities, whether you exist in Hollywood, on a stage, on a blog, on YouTube, whatever, remember that without the hundreds, thousands, and millions of people who you can (and evidently do) joke about, you would be nothing. You would not hold the fame because your actions wouldn’t be deemed worth noting. Know that it is because you have a persona that is technically designed to be likable and programmed to do no wrong that you are able to have people watch you at your every whim.

Fame and success come with many prices, a following being one of them. Tony Stark is awesome to read about and watch, but in the real world, no one likes a Tony Stark.

Note to self: everything has been duly noted and compartmentalized and put away in the back of a drawer in my mind.