Katrina and Famous People
I don’t know about you, but I have such a mixed reaction to stars showing up at the scene of devastation.
On the one hand, they can bring attention to something that people should see.
On the other hand, they can steal attention from something that should not be about them.
My anger that the Today show flew Harry Connick Jr. in to the New Orleans area during a time when people desperately needed lifting out, is mighty. However, he’s doing an awful lot to raise money for the cause. I think that he and the Today show could have done a lot more helping out than reporting, but given how much post-smarm fundraising he’s doing, I can forgive the gratuitous, whiffy grandstanding.
However, Richard Simmons just makes me want to vomit. And, no, not for the usual reasons. Unconscionably, he was rifling through his old stomping grounds in New Orleans and weeping over the loss. Weeping. When people are dead and homeless and without jobs. The weirdo, ever in shorts and obnoxious sleeveless shirt, shuffled pathetically down the street gasping and doing his damnedest to intimate that the loss of New Orleans would directly affect his life in some way for all the loyal watchers of E!TV
Admittedly, his parents are buried there and his brother and sister-in-law live there, but his live family was evacuated prior to the hurricane strike (a fact that is glossed over in all the sobbing interviews), and while his parent’s graves are important, I find it hard to imagine how that qualifies him to be sobbing like a broken soul next to all the people there who are truly destitute.
They showed a clip on television of him hanging off some poor woman sobbing, “It’ll be okay! I want you to say it with me: ‘It’ll be okay!’”
Sure it will be, Richard, you freak. If you give her lots of money so that she can buy a new house somewhere that isn’t underwater. Or maybe bring her family back to life. One thing we know is that it’ll be okay for you.
Fabulous Reader: How scary is the idea of Richard Simmons raising people from the dead like some sort of overly-cheery death genie?
Meanwhile, I haven’t seen Sean Penn shilling for ABC, NBC or CNN and yet he was apparently out in his own boat and rescued about 40 people. It’s been reported that he had an ‘entourage’ and personal photographer with him, as well as a hole in his boat. However, that was all denied. Apparently the boat took on water because it was overly full and his ‘entourage’ was a few friends. He spent nine hours standing in toxic water.
And I haven’t seen him on one news story as an ‘on the spot’ reporter.
My crush on Mr. Penn has just deepened considerably.
The ever-present Oprah got down to Katrina’s victims in record time and started shipping in major amounts of food and water and helping hundreds of people. I’m not a big Cult of Oprah fan, myself, but I have to say that I’m more than a little impressed with her response. It’s funny how private citizens with money can grok that in such situation those with more must do what it takes to assist those with less, but politicians have trouble swallowing the same idea.
However, Dr. Phil doing the same thing infuriated me. Primarily, I think, because I saw it on his television show. It seemed to take this incredibly hideous event and package it under the banner, “How this Terrible Hurricane has Affected Poor Dr. Phil!”
Tell me what you think about celebrities reporting on disasters.
3 Comments
with celebrities helping in disasters, it’s hard to tell their sincerities to what they’re doing once they all make a "big show" out of the act. i guess we can’t blame most of them as it’s part of their PR stuff. but i admire most those who’d help without letting the whole world know.
I 100% agree with you there. That was just too much. But, I guess, on the other hand, it’s kind of sad that these people are so self involved that they have to take a tragic thing like this and turn into their own stage show. Pathetic.
Hey dude — I know this is a late response, but AMEN to freakshow Richard Simmons. I am so damn glad I didn’t SEE him trapsing around in his glitter shorts and crying. I HATE when he cries. O.M.G. And Harry C., too, pissed me off during that Today show, as much as I lurvh him. My loudest reaction was while watching ESPN — interview with Peyton Manning (from Mississippi). *Not exact quotes:
ESPN: What does this disaster mean to you, a native of the area, Peyton?
PM: Well, it’s just truly devastating to see the places you grew up in ruins… you just… you just don’t know what to DO.
MySelf: WHAT YOU DO, Peyton, is DONATE thousands of your hard-earned football dollars to the cause. And by ‘thousands’ I mean really, thou-sands.