Saving the best for last...

Sooo I was pretty much ecstatic when I saw the 3 options for our final and last blog entry – 2 Macleans articles…and the PEREZ HILTON BLOG SITE!!!!! Could there have been a clearer choice??? As I have mentioned in a previous blog entry (Tabs: No Men Allowed! - Maclean), I am a huge Perez Hilton fan, and proud of it. To be quite honest, I probably check it about 2 times a day whether I’m at school or not. So my opinion on the site is probably pretty obvious – it’s one of the most entertaining gossip websites and very up-to-date on all the details in Hollywood. Now, I will say that some of the comments and videos posted can be a little rude and vulgar (although I’ve seen much worse – check out www.dlisted.com ) and I would not normally encourage making fun of ‘innocent’ people, BUT somehow for Perez Hilton I make an exception. Either way it should be understood that this site should not be taken too seriously, that it is purely for entertainment purposes, and that it IS only one person's opinion. That being said, this site is definitely my guilty pleasure.

Was that REALLY necessary???

I have to admit, I chose the article “Video of Airport Taser Death Released”, in a way, by default – I generally try to avoid explicitly political topics and when I saw the word “Tories” in the middle of the title of the alternative article, I ran in the other direction. It should be noted that I don’t like violence much either, but when it came to choosing between politics or violence, well, we already know who won out…

After reading the article, I have to say, I was rather shocked and disturbed by the event. All I could think about was the man’s mother, patiently waiting on the other side of the airport for her son, and how absolutely screwed the police officers were (they not only killed the poor guy but it was all caught on tape too). Like waaaay to reinforce the police brutality stereotype guys! Why didn’t they just handcuff him after the first taser? Is being “agitated” and throwing computer equipment really worth the death penalty?

I also clicked on some of the ‘related links’ to the article so that I could find out a bit more about the story, since the original article seemed slightly unfinished. I actually got to watch the video footage of the incident! (Amazing how technology impacts things…) Now, I was probably a little biased as I watched this footage because I had already read the National Post article on the matter. But no matter which way I looked at it, I couldn’t justify letting an other human being scream and DIE at the hands of an other person. An other link that I checked out was an article entitled “Taser victim spent six hours in airport baggage area”. I couldn’t help thinking to myself, if I was stuck in the airport baggage claim for six straight hours, I might throw a few computers too! Now, I’m not justifying Mr. Dziekanski’s actions, but airplanes and airports can drive a person to absolute insanity (trust me, I know ). I almost lost my mind going to Italy this summer with 11 hours total flying time (one way) and God knows how many hours waiting in airports, surrounded by beige walls, office-type furniture, public washrooms, gross food, terrible coffee, and a million employees that have no idea what’s going on…

Let's be honest, tabloids are for chicks...

So finally…a blog topic that I am familiar and fluent with – tabloids. Yes, I have to admit, from Star Magazine and Entertainment Tonight to Perez Hilton.com – I am a celebrity gossip addict (and I should probably seek help). Therefore, I feel very equipped to discuss, and can safely say that I am aware of the "issue" that the article "The Tabs: no men allowed – Why do the gossip rags only feature women when there are so many stories of male stars behaving badly?" dives into.
I have several explanations for this seemingly troublesome question. Firstly, as a regular celebrity gossip follower and as a female, to be quite honest, stories about male celebrities are usually pretty boring – it doesn’t shock or really interest me when a ‘Justin Timberlake’ or a ‘P. Diddy’ go out and party. I am way more interested in how much weight Britney Spears or Lindsey Lohan have gained or lost and what they were wearing the night before. And I think that this is a common viewpoint with the majority of the gossip magazine readers – or else don’t you think that the magazine companies and TV show executives would change things? I guess this was kind of the point of the article, but seriously, who cares if Owen Wilson gets enough media attention for his suicide attempt? Isn’t it a good thing that the tabloids are (relatively) leaving him alone so he can recover without 100000 cameras in his face? In addition, how often do you hear someone say that women are getting too much attention and credit in the media or the work place or anywhere else? So you know what boys, let us have it! Good or bad, this is one small step for us girls – let us control what we read in the gossip mags and if it’s Paris Hilton we want, let us have scandalous pictures of Paris at a nightclub on a Tuesday!
On a side note, I would like to recommend www.perezhilton.com , www.dlisted.com and www.pinkisthenewblog.com to anyone that needs to feed their celebrity gossip addiction.