Fame

"Fame, makes a man take things over

Fame, lets him loose, hard to swallow" - David Bowie

"When I grow up I wanna be famous

I wanna be a star, I wanna be in movies" - The Pussycat Dolls

Being famous has arguably never been so important or more nakedly coveted. It's permeated throughout our society from top-to-bottom; so much so that when British kids were asked what they wanted to be when they were older, almost 1 in 5 simply said that they wanted to be famous. Not a singer or movie star, mind you- just "famous". How did we get here, and why?

Of course, fame has existed in some form or another for millennia. But modern fame and celebrity is a markedly different beast; with modern day mass media and the prevalence of technology, fame is faster and more powerful than ever.

The launch of Big Brother was undeniably a milestone moment, symbolically if nothing else. Here, after all, was a show about absolutely nothing; no plot, no script, no performance. Instead, the utterly consenting audience merely watched people exist in a house as a form of entertainment. The 'winner' (for they were labelled so), was voted for by the Great British public in a literal popularity contest. In return, these participants then achieved their 15 minutes of fame in supermarket gossip rags, provided they were shouty/disgusting/unpleasant enough. Naturally, existing celebs who were desperate for exposure realised that this was a bandwagon they'd happily jump on, spawning Celebrity Big Brother. In the most meta event in human history, an early series was 'won' by a 'non-celebrity' placed in the house to fool the other guests. In an entirely predictable turn of events, she then herself became famous, and is now, ironically enough, in Celebrity Big Brother as a "celebrity".

As you may have gathered, I personally take a rather dim view of such vapid ambitions. But what exactly is fame? Thinking about it the other day, the best way I could explain it was that

Popularity + Utility = Fame

Fame is merely a form of popularity which we can put to use. Popularity itself is like ether; it has no physical substance, and no practical usage in and of itself. It depends on warm, positive feelings. But popularity can be leveraged and utilised into fame, which in turn springs forth a veritable flood of physical rewards (just look up the rest of the lyrics for that Pussycat Dolls song if you don't believe me). Fame outlasts popularity: you can reach a level of fame whereby people generally dislike you, but you have an inordinate amount of fame that you can still shape popular culture and media. Like an exploding star, your supernovae will echo out long after any remaining spark has left.

Cough.

Fame is powerful, after all. Shakespeare died hundreds of years ago, but due to his prodigious and terrific talent he has been posthumously bestowed with the gift of fame. There are entire theaters that exist to perform his plays, and every child in the country is forced to read his stuff. Not to rip on old Billy S, who undoubtedly had talent- but he provides a classic example of how fame can grant you a level of immortality. Long after you're gone, you still matter.

Furthermore, fame is the perfect solution for our apathetic age. Don't have any beliefs or ideas of any opinion? No problem! With fame, you don't need to stand for anything- you just simply have to be. Your words will be immortalised and read forever, whether they're important or not. For example, here's somebody who works with 5 other writers to produce a single pop song shitting downwards on others:

But you see, because of fame, Katy's opinion matters. 

The democratic nature of fame also means that practically anyone has a chance to be elevated from obscurity to renown. If you have a talent of any description, you can be famous. How else to explain the persistent popularity of shows like Pop Idol, X-Factor, [Country]'s got Talent and the plethora of other shows designed to give yokels a crack at the big-time/flounder for our amusement?

Fame is a product of the society we have forged. We live in an age where religious, social, and political ideologies have been weakened, if not completely obliterated. We have nothing to believe in, there is nothing that we can accomplish together, and we still have no idea what will happen to us after death. What is the solution to this crisis of belief?

There you have it. Fame: the key to success, wealth, and immortality itself.

"Fame! I'm Gonna Live Forever"