When celebrities go out of their way to be seen in public places and then later decide that, actually, they don’t enjoy having their every move documented, it’s pretty hard to muster any sympathy. Imagine this, however:
For most of your adult life, you’ve been paid large amounts of money to keep your body in perfect shape. As a result, millions of women (and probably a few men) have drooled over you and fantasized about what you’d be like in bed. You can dance like nobody’s business and act in the obligatory, career-making chick flicks, then easily switch to playing a bad-ass in high-adrenaline action films…not to mention the impressive dramas you manage to squeeze in. You’ve been devoted to your hot little wife (also a professional dancer) for over thirty years, even though you could have left her in the dust with your first taste of fame like so many heartthrobs before you. In the latter years of your career, you land your own T.V. series…but are unable to promote it due to health reasons and it gets cancelled. You have been diagnosed with cancer and the prognosis is not good.
When the show biz folks catch wind of this horrific development in your life, it trickles from the top brass all the way down to the lowliest parasite: the paparazzo. Now, you’ve pretty much been left alone for years. You’re not an attention whore like Paris Hilton, going to a different club every night just so you stay relevant in society’s fickle eyes. You treat your work like any other job and then go home to your wife, which means you’ve rarely been of interest to bottom feeders like TMZ, et al. As soon as personal tragedy strikes, however, they’re all over you. You can’t walk through an airport or exit a doctor’s office without them flashing their cameras and barking rude, invasive questions in your face. You get to see the progressing results of your ravaging disease any time you go to the supermarket, as your once chiseled bod is plastered across the covers of every tabloid in its increasingly emaciated form. “WASTING AWAY TO NOTHING!” scream the headlines. “THE CANCER IS SPREADING!!!”
When diagnosed with cancer, the best thing you can do is avoid stress. Stress is like gasoline, stoking the flames of a fire that you’re trying desperately to contain. When the whole world is obsessing over your health, speculating about which vital organ your cancer is going to attack next, it kind of feels like they’re pushing you towards the edge…like they want you to die. It’s hard not to get stressed in that situation. It would be challenging enough to take it in stride if you were just a normal dude going about his normal life. As a celebrity, though, even one who has never actively sought out publicity that extended beyond promoting a film, there is an unwritten law that says you are no longer entitled to privacy. You are no longer entitled to maintain even a shred of dignity as you attempt to live and die in peace.
“No one puts Baby in a corner” is probably the cheesiest line ever uttered in a movie and yet, Patrick Swayze turned it into panty-creaming gold. He took on a very broad spectrum of roles in an effort to be seen as anything other than just “Johnny from Dirty Dancing,” but ultimately, that’s how I would have loved to remember him. Instead of having his sad, dying face burned into my brain as I stood in the grocery store check-out line, it would have been great to be able to forever picture his bulging biceps and tapered torso, that tough-but-sensitive face with the beautifully sensual mouth. True fans – and anyone who has ever lost a loved one to a degenerative disease – respected Swayze enough to look away, mourning him quietly while still holding out hope for his recovery. The worst part is, some of you actually purchased those magazines and tabloids.
If The National Enquirer puts Patrick Swayze’s face on the cover and it flies off the shelves, it encourages repeat behavior. They will stalk and ruin whomever they need to in order to continue making huge profits, sensationalizing the demise of a fellow human being. I’m sure some of you spent your hard-earned money on such trash because you genuinely cared about what was happening to this poor man (mostly because he once got you all hot and bothered). The rest of you, though, have a serious problem. It’s called Schadenfreude.
Schadenfreude is the word used to describe the phenomenon of people getting off on the misfortunes of others. Seeing someone else experience tragedy – especially someone you perceive as being hotter, more famous, or simply luckier than you – makes you feel better about your own life. Pretty fucked up, huh?
So. Did you perpetuate the decline of Patrick Swayze’s life by purchasing Schadenfreude at a newsstand? And if so, have I succeeded in making you feel like a piece of shit?
I hope so.
Author: Britt Warner
