Last week Billy Corgan posted a tweet that's remained stuck in my head:
Billy ▶ Has anyone else noticed this year has given rise to a new form of entertainment; death TV. All death, all the time.
I'm not sure what his specific intent was in writing that, but if you scan the news, be it on TV or online, it's not just that there's been a lot of famous people passing away; death seems to be one of the predominant thing being covered. Some people are sick of hearing about Michael's death, but apparently a lot of others keep coming back to CNN.com to read about it - he's still one of the top headlines. And if it's not gossip about the King of Pop being wondered about, then it's some other star-studded corpse. I think that Corgan has something there when he says, "a new form of entertainment."
Why do you think we're so into reading about other's passing?
4 comments:
Do you you think it was just in reference to recent celebrity deaths or also to death and violence on tv? (crime shows, etc.)
Probably both celebrities & the TV violence. What stuck out to me is just how long and drawn out the celebrity death stories are carried out and from how many different angles. It doesn't come across as journalistic reporting, but journalistic entertaining. Hence, why the Corgan tweet stuck out to me.
I don't think celebrity deaths are always drawn out. Farrah Fawcett, Billy Mays, Ed McMahon... all died down (no pun intended, although that sounds kinda bad). Michael Jackson's death was sudden and controversial, so it is dragging out. Princess Diana's death was the same way with all the details coming out about the car accident. But once things get figured out, I think society lets them rest.
I do think we are fascinated with death though, just look at my sister. :) (She loves learning about how people died for some reason.) I'm not sure why, something to look into.
I know that they always fade away, and not all are drawn out. But...I do think that regardless of the idea that the coverage lasts for a couple days or a couple weeks, there just seems to be a point where it moves beyond explaining what happened to just putting information out there because news agencies know that people will keep coming back for the gossip. And that's the stuff that seems to make up Death TV - the after the moment entertainment journalism that seems to be tickling people's curiosity rather than anything else.
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