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 Stars 

I identify one moment in history when culture started its still ongoing terminal decline: when reporters asked John Lennon how to achieve world peace. Some time after, he and Yoko Ono declared a lie-in (this was not long after the Vietnam "teach-ins", big anti war seminars, which were then followed hippie "love-ins", free love parties and orgies): he would promote world peace by staying in bed all day, because, if everyone stayed in bed all day, they cannot be fighting and there can be no wars

Lennon was a talented musician and publicist, but I doubt he had particular knowledge about world peace, or ever spent much time thinking about the issue. To treat him as a suitable spokesperson on the topic was an act of real desperation: our society was just too short of credible sources of expertise and authority, and reporters regarded John Lennon to be as good a source of answers relative to politicians, diplomats and professors. It is not surprising that in today's world, politicians, diplomats, professors, and whatever other professions that people pay lip service to as worthy of respect, are less prominent than Paris Hilton and Britney Spears. However, at least they have not been asked to make pronuncements about world peace, yet

I recall a visit by Frank Sinatra to Australia (during which his comments on female journalists got himself into a union ban that prevented him from travelling in his chartered plane or getting meals in hotels, which were resumed only after he apologized, sort of), his spokesman was visibly annoyed when reporters could not think of better questions to ask than what Sinatra had for breakfast. But then, what do you expect? Questions about world peace?
It is inevitable that stars do what stars do, and we spend all our time looking at those activities, setting aside the s."heavier" issues. Even Osama bin Laden had to adopt the star techniques when he wanted attention - now that he could not longer command another 911 attack

Maybe he should lie in bed all day as his contribution to world peace: if terrorist stay in bed all day, they wont be blowing us up...

凡事皆因强出头 1/6/08

发生了地震后,马上看到一堆事后诸葛亮谈自己的地震预测,然后就是韩寒,张悦然等明星带着记者摄影师去救灾,现在又看到莎朗史东谈海外藏人愿意帮助救灾令她感动,脑里浮起"凡事皆因强出头"这句话.

莎小姐是位已经50岁的过气影星,最出名的事迹是在FatalAttraction里不穿内裤见侦探,在国家大事方面并无贡献,信誉,说几句无知的话本来并没什么了不得,为什么能引起大风波?

因为她发了谬论,国内要抵制她代言的产品,引起ChristianDior恐慌,很快就有了她声明道歉的结果.广告商找她代言,当然是因为她有某种影响力,影星对买化妆品的顾客有影响,相当合理,问题是记者跑去问她国家大事,也就是认为她在这方面也有影响力.而且觉得"我同达赖是好朋友;我疑惑地震是不是报应"之类话值得报道,才是引起风波的主因.

记得很多年前,记者去问披头士列侬对世界和平的意见,不久后他宣布,为推动世界和平,明天他和大野洋子两人不起床,因为如果全世界人都整天躺在床上,战争就不可能发生.歌星找这种玩意开开心,当然无所谓,问题是不但有记者觉得他能对世界和平问题发出有价值的回答,还有很多人觉得他为和平不起身是件值得报道,值得看的大事.

也就是说,那么多人做强出头的事,是因为这类消息容易报道容易看.地震后留下的重要问题,如何安置几十万灾民,安全重建几十个市镇,解决几百水库危机,要讨论,看文件,是要花精神专心努力的,远不如来一段"某明星如何如何"消息那么好写好卖.

陈冠希, 长叹息,  二十不惑古来稀 春宫无限开财源,黑市常在有商机 先进哪惧千夫指 后援何缺万人迷 往事如水莫回顾 上天不负厚脸皮

公众人物,隐私和道德 

几年前好莱坞有件逻辑上有些奇怪的官司：catherine zeta-jones 和 michael douglas控告某报侵犯了他们的隐私，因为他们婚礼照片给偷拍了；问题是他们已经约好另一报记者拍照独家刊登，也就是说他们并不准备把婚礼情景保密，所以另家报纸侵犯的不是隐私而是他们的无形资产：他们婚礼的情景是他们拥有的值钱东西，他们有权决定卖给谁，只有买主可以得到。

由此可见，像电影明星这样的公众人物，经常需要把自己的隐私作为商品出卖，他们的隐私比较难要求受到法律保护，因为保护已经转去一个不同的方向。类似的情形是政治人物要求名誉保护避免诽谤：他们的人格是竞选时需要的一种无形资产，是放在公开的地方让人看的，公众有权讨论追查；如果他们的名誉受到了损害影响了他们的事业造成了损失，他们可以要求高度的赔赏，但光是因为侵犯隐私，或资料评论有少些错误不公平，这是一位公众人物必须接受的职业风险。

我们每人都有丑陋的一面藏着不让人看见，但是公众人物要藏起来的困难比较大。而且习惯在公开场所露面的人，脸皮通常比较厚，常会做些别人做不出的事情，所以也有更多东西需要藏起来；但同时公众人物通常会有个包装好的完美形象，所以他们对藏起来的那面特别敏感，而别人又因此更想把那面用各种手段挖出来，大的挖不到弄些芝麻小事也好，没有真的制造一些假的也好，一样有人会买了看。

所以我们看到的是一个很畸形的结果，给我们的印象是公众人物和记者都是道德很低的，对下一代的影响都是坏的。

不管是否公众人物，人生的秘密是越少越好，因为每一个秘密都是一个负担，甚至可以变成一个威胁；所以每人都应该设法减少自己的秘密，还没人知道以前先用轻描淡写的方法讲了出来。现在人人都有方法制造一个个人博客，用这个路径去恰当地公开秘密，又有广告价值，又减轻了负担和威胁。

Public figures, privacy and morality

A few years ago there was a logically rather weird lawsuit in Hollywood: Catherine Zeta-Jones and Michael Douglas sued a newspaper for invasion of privacy by taking unauthorized photos at their wedding. The problem was that they already signed an exclusive contract with another paper to publish their wedding photos; in other words, the wedding was not meant to be private. What they were really trying to protect was intellectual property: the wedding scenes were valuable assets which they own, and have the right to sell to someone they choose, and other people cannot infringe the assets.

In other words, public figures who drive commercial values from their privacy have a harder time obtaining legal protection for it, because the protection has already been shifted to a different domain. A somewhat similar situation exists with the reputation of politicians, which is an intangeable asset they need to use when seeking office. Since their personal character is part of the assets they put in front of the public, it can be discussed and probed by the public. If any reports unfairly damage their reputations and hence their careers, they are entitled to seek significant compensations, but mere invasion of privacy and minor inaccuracies in reports and comments, are just professional hazards they have to live with.

Each of us have an ugly side that we keep hidden, but for public figures this is much harder to achieve. Further, people who are used to appearing in public have thicker skins and are more likely to do things others are too embarrassed to do; hence, they have more to hide. Yet, public figures usually have some kind of ideal image that they try to maintain, so that they are specially sensitive about their hidden side; at the same time, others are all the more keen to dig that side out because of this, and if they cannot find anything major, would dig out trivialities, or even invent something out of nothing, as long as the stories attract some paying readers.

The result is a mischievous scene in which all public figures and all reporters look deviant and immoral, with bad influence on the next generation.

Whether one is a public figure or not, it is always best to have few secrets, since every secret is a burden, even perhaps a potential threat waiting to be exploited by someone who gets hold of it. It is in everyone's interest to reduce the number of secrets, basically by putting a diluted version of it before anyone else knows the story. Today everyone has the means to set up a blog, which provides an excellent means to achieve this purporse; in fact one can derive some advertising value from this while reducing the burdens and threats.

added on 21/02/08 4pm

Edison Chan gave his statement to HK press an hour ago, and there was no new information; the main effect is to put a stop to all that speculation about where he is, etc - HK reporters failed to intercept him at the airport nor pin down his whereabouts till his appearance at 3.05pm at the conference room, not such good paparazzis!

I wont take his stated wish to leave the entertainment industry and work in charity very seriously - it wont be long before some company thinks of some way of building a new career on top of all that publicity; the current interesting issue is how Kira will respond - does he still have ammunition, and even stronger ammunition, to use and retake the initiative?

陈冠希对记者声明并没有新消息,主要的结果是不需要再问他在哪里;推出娱乐圈做慈善等等不能太认真看待,很快就有公司动脑筋用最近的轰动做基础推出新形象;值得看的是kira现在怎样;他手里还有没有弹药,更厉害的弹药,发出以重新取得主动

added on 22/2/08 - 12 hours later, nothing from Kira