Am I the only one who doesn't buy into this 'celebrity'-obsessed culture we live in?

I think magazines, newspapers and shows like the x factor are responsible for creating this illusion of 'celebrity' that so many young people aspire to these days.

I think magazines, newspapers and shows like the x factor are responsible for creating this illusion of 'celebrity' that so many young people aspire to these days.

What's so great about being on the cover of The Sun/Closer/heat etc....is it really that much of an achievement?

I doubt these so-called celebrities earn as much as we are led to believe...if it was that easy to amass such a fortune by singing a few songs, everyone would be rich. It seems to me that this whole concept of celebrity is based on lies, to try and make people envious and thus aspire to be like these celebrities.

Talk to any group of teens these days - all the girls want to be cheryl tweedy or jordan, all the boys want to be david beckham. Why? Whatever happened to when people looked up to scientists, inventors and prominent government figures? The people who really make a difference in the world.

And surely it is somewhat dangerous to label girls like cheryl tweedy as role models - soon enough, impressionable young girls will think its OK to beat people up, cover themselves in tattoos and leave school with no qualifications in the deluded comfort that they will 'make it' on some reality show. In my opinion, simon cowell is just using her as a poster-girl for the x factor, building this (warped) image of her as some sort of icon, to tell people "look, this could happen to you". I think its outrageous that someone like her is being paraded as an almost saint-like figure in the media. It's very dangerous indeed.

We may not feel the effects of such dumbing-down of society now, but we may well do in years to come.

I think magazines, newspapers and shows like the x factor are responsible for creating this illusion of 'celebrity' that so many young people aspire to these days.

What's so great about being on the cover of The Sun/Closer/heat etc....is it really that much of an achievement?

I doubt these so-called celebrities earn as much as we are led to believe...if it was that easy to amass such a fortune by singing a few songs, everyone would be rich. It seems to me that this whole concept of celebrity is based on lies, to try and make people envious and thus aspire to be like these celebrities.

Talk to any group of teens these days - all the girls want to be cheryl tweedy or jordan, all the boys want to be david beckham. Why? Whatever happened to when people looked up to scientists, inventors and prominent government figures? The people who really make a difference in the world.

And surely it is somewhat dangerous to label girls like cheryl tweedy as role models - soon enough, impressionable young girls will think its OK to beat people up, cover themselves in tattoos and leave school with no qualifications in the deluded comfort that they will 'make it' on some reality show. In my opinion, simon cowell is just using her as a poster-girl for the x factor, building this (warped) image of her as some sort of icon, to tell people "look, this could happen to you". I think its outrageous that someone like her is being paraded as an almost saint-like figure in the media. It's very dangerous indeed.

We may not feel the effects of such dumbing-down of society now, but we may well do in years to come.

I think magazines, newspapers and shows like the x factor are responsible for creating this illusion of 'celebrity' that so many young people aspire to these days.

What's so great about being on the cover of The Sun/Closer/heat etc....is it really that much of an achievement?

I doubt these so-called celebrities earn as much as we are led to believe...if it was that easy to amass such a fortune by singing a few songs, everyone would be rich. It seems to me that this whole concept of celebrity is based on lies, to try and make people envious and thus aspire to be like these celebrities.

Talk to any group of teens these days - all the girls want to be cheryl tweedy or jordan, all the boys want to be david beckham. Why? Whatever happened to when people looked up to scientists, inventors and prominent government figures? The people who really make a difference in the world.

And surely it is somewhat dangerous to label girls like cheryl tweedy as role models - soon enough, impressionable young girls will think its OK to beat people up, cover themselves in tattoos and leave school with no qualifications in the deluded comfort that they will 'make it' on some reality show. In my opinion, simon cowell is just using her as a poster-girl for the x factor, building this (warped) image of her as some sort of icon, to tell people "look, this could happen to you". I think its outrageous that someone like her is being paraded as an almost saint-like figure in the media. It's very dangerous indeed.

We may not feel the effects of such dumbing-down of society now, but we may well do in years to come.

I think magazines, newspapers and shows like the x factor are responsible for creating this illusion of 'celebrity' that so many young people aspire to these days.

What's so great about being on the cover of The Sun/Closer/heat etc....is it really that much of an achievement?

I doubt these so-called celebrities earn as much as we are led to believe...if it was that easy to amass such a fortune by singing a few songs, everyone would be rich. It seems to me that this whole concept of celebrity is based on lies, to try and make people envious and thus aspire to be like these celebrities.

Talk to any group of teens these days - all the girls want to be cheryl tweedy or jordan, all the boys want to be david beckham. Why? Whatever happened to when people looked up to scientists, inventors and prominent government figures? The people who really make a difference in the world.

And surely it is somewhat dangerous to label girls like cheryl tweedy as role models - soon enough, impressionable young girls will think its OK to beat people up, cover themselves in tattoos and leave school with no qualifications in the deluded comfort that they will 'make it' on some reality show. In my opinion, simon cowell is just using her as a poster-girl for the x factor, building this (warped) image of her as some sort of icon, to tell people "look, this could happen to you". I think its outrageous that someone like her is being paraded as an almost saint-like figure in the media. It's very dangerous indeed.

We may not feel the effects of such dumbing-down of society now, but we may well do in years to come.

You Zerg. I was a gold protoss player, but switched to Zerg. Its too hard keep loosing to Terran. Harrass with mutas have like four bases, then I lose.

Zerg sucks, switching back to protoss.

To be honest its a bad world when people aspire to be a model with a totally fake body, or a pretty half-talented member of a pretty much pointless and un-original band (Girls Aloud). Buts its like that so we have to just get on with it. Theres movies 'staring' big actors playing some people with REAL and IMPORTANT jobs like lawyers, firefighters or police officers so why aren't the lawyers, firefighters or police officers the real life heroes. Someone gets shot or loses a limb fighting for the country or a police officer dies doing his job and they are in the paper once. Amy Winehouse snorts cocaine and shes in the newspapers endlessly!! Wheres the justice in that. The Ashley Cole debacle was in the papers week in week out, probably bagging him and cheryl BAGS of cash, but a slodier saves his entire infantry from a hail of bullets and grenades and doesn't even get help from the government. Wheres the justice?!

Yes, you are the ONLY one. You are a unique snowflake.

It's not a particularly new phenomenon is it? By the 60s the Beatles were already bigger than Jesus. Marilyn Monroe is still recognised worldwide today, but how many could tell you why?

Maybe culture is dead, but really it just gives someone as worldly and intelligent as the OP to stand out from the riff-raff.