Rod Blagojevich, the former Illinois governor under federal indictment for corruption and scheduled to go on trial next June for allegedly conspiring to sell now-President Barack Obama’s U.S. Senate seat, is slated for an appearance on Donald Trump’s “Celebrity Apprentice” reality TV show.
Thus do we define “celebrity” in the YouTube age, when all routes to recognition are perceived — by some, at least — as equal.
Maybe there’s nothing really new or especially alarming about that. After all, the familiar description of people who are “famous for being famous” has been part of the culture for so long that nobody really seems to know who coined the phrase. Certainly there’s nothing new about people whose recognition factor is out of all proportion to any discernible talent or contribution to society.
Maybe the difference, if there is one, is that for an apparently increasing number of people, the distinction between fame and notoriety — or, in many cases, mere conspicuousness — no longer exists. Or, if it does still exist, it no longer matters.
It is in that cultural context that Rod Blagojevich is a “celebrity” and a formerly obscure Colorado man who allegedly fabricated the “balloon boy” hoax, using his own son in a desperate attempt to become a reality TV star, is now a headline name.
By now just about everybody knows the story: Last week Richard and Mayumi Heene (and let us here inject a note of editorial regret that the demands of reportage require any more media attention to those names) claimed their 6-year-old son had drifted away in a homemade helium balloon. The child was later found safe in the family’s garage. Authorities are now seeking charges against the Heenes to include conspiracy, false reporting to authorities and contributing to the delinquency of a minor.
The late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan gave us the phrase “defining deviancy down.” It was a term that stuck in the public mind as part of Moynihan’s larger study of, in his own words, “how we’ve become accustomed to alarming levels of crime and destructive behavior.” The idea is that when acceptance makes bad behavior ordinary, only the extraordinarily heinous is then considered bad enough to be noteworthy. The end result is social disintegration.
Linking freak celebrity and reality TV to the disintegration of society is somewhere between a stretch and pure apocalyptic paranoia. Under other circumstances, the balloon hoax would just be one more media spotlight aimed at one more fool oblivious to the difference between genuine fame and just making a public spectacle of himself. The Jerry Springers of the world parade these geeks before the cameras every day.
But this one involves the exploitation of a child. That’s where it stops being funny.
— Dusty Nix, for the editorial board
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