DailyPost 1618
CELEBRITY, CELEBRITY AND CELEBRITY
Celebrity is one person we love and relish. This is the desired want of most of the Indians. Once you have a desired want, first and best is to achieve it and if that is not likely to materialise, keep following the person achieving the same. That explains the humungous following celebrities have in this country. People go to the extent of even losing their peace of mind and compromise their job at times to get in to that hallucinatory mode. Celebrity is a person having achieved stupendous success in an area, grows beyond the normal human self and is followed by large numbers in the public domain. At times they become the opium of the masses.
Followers find ways and means to be noticed, it might be celebrities from any field, from sport to film industry. In the current social media age celebrities of large varieties are mushrooming by the day and way and means are being found out in the most innovative manner to take the center stage. It is being believed that you can become a influencer in a variety ways and the battle is on to get his pound of flesh. So life revolves in the vicious cycle of celebrities and followers. The saner ones, which are not many, remain at the periphery of human existence. Once this celebrity culture become the predominant culture, then sanity, logic and rationale are thrown to the winds.
Hype is what everyone wants to create and hype is on what everybody wants to live. The ones who deliver the world don’t have any role to play in this game, may it be Dr. V of Aravind Eye Care System or Dr. Verghese Kurien of Amul, they quietly dedicated all their life to delivering life itself to millions of people. Being successful is one area is used to create a mania in the other. Same amount of success can have different types of following or even no following. The best part of the whole game is that in most of the cases, strategy, acumen and now technology works relentlessly to create and certainly to sustain that interest. Even a small YouTube influencer makes reasonable amount and then we have the whole concept of passive earning.
The aim is play a sentimental game, larger than life, classic, copybook or outlandish, whichever way be at the centre stage. They crisis cross fields which they have no knowledge of. Success in one field is good enough to be a propellant in any field. Politics is replete with such successes, inclusive of nominated members. They are there to contribute by their excellence. Public gaze is the only yardstick. Advertising is a celebrity game and they have to make the most of it. Celebrity Business the followers don’t understand. Monetisation of celebrity status is a forgone conclusion. Power and influence come as by products. He who can make eyeballs move is the winner.
FOLLOWERS HAVING CELEBRITY MINDSET CAN TAKE ANY SOCIETY TO THE BRINK OF DISASTER.