Anyone who’s spent more than five minutes on the internet will know that the YouTube comments section is pretty much the sewer of the virtual world (along with the comments section on this post, obviously). Even so, it was disheartening to see the deluge of vitriol that arrived as soon as the videos of Amy Winehouse’s comeback performance in Serbia appeared this morning. “What a disgusting woman!!!” tut-tuts one top-rated commenter. “Complete disgrace. And she’s trusted as a role model for our youth!” mewls another, deftly playing the “Won’t somebody think of the children???” card. “More like back to crack hahahaha,” giggles another. “I hope she overdoses like the rest of them,” sneers someone else. And so on.
The sense of schadenfreude is almost palpable, and it’s pretty fucking unpleasant. As we said, no one expects reasoned reaction from the YouTube comments section, but there’s been a similarly vituperative tone in the way the whole sorry business has been reported in the press.
There’s certainly a genuine frustration in seeing someone with genuine talent waste it. But generally, such sentiment is notably absent from most media coverage of people like Amy Winehouse. Instead, it’s all salivating coverage of every salacious detail of her latest collapse or stint in rehab, wall-to-wall coverage of a slow disintegration. It’s hard not to get the impression that people are taking more than a wee bit of perverse pleasure this, reveling in the fact that a singer who’s pissed away most of the goodwill and career momentum her breakthrough album Back to Black garnered her is continuing to do just that. People are sitting back and giggling at the spectacle of Winehouse wasting her talent with an inability to get off drugs and booze. Serves her right for being talented and famous, eh? That’ll teach her!
But, wait, why is this any more entertaining than a balding accountant slowly drinking out his days in measures of scotch at empty bars or in a lonely living room? Or the spectacle of the sad, old crackhead who walks in fractured circles talking to herself and has clearly been sleeping on the subway for years? The answer: because Winehouse is what we like to call a celebrity, because we don’t know her personally, because we don’t have to deal with the fact that someone we know is an alcoholic and a drug addict and all that entails.
Clearly, anyone who actually shelled out for tickets in Belgrade to the concert has every right to lambast Winehouse for her performance. The rest of us, though… Well, plenty has been written over the years about the general weirdness of celebrity culture — the way people seem to live vicariously through the travails of the Kardashians and the Hiltons of this world, luxuriating in the drama of their rises and falls. It’s a bloodsport. We love our stars to swig Jack Daniel’s and snort coke and have copious sex because, well, most of us don’t get to do that ourselves. If they don’t, we call them boring and snigger at the fact that they can’t keep a man.
And if they do, we wait for them to fuck up, and then we pour opprobrium on them on the way down. Or maybe we cheer along, because it’s hilarious, right? It’s all harmless fun. But really, what’s remotely enjoyable about Amy Winehouse’s excruciating, ongoing decline? And what gives anyone the right to judge her?
There’s always the argument that singers and sports stars and actors are somehow supposed to be role models (an accusation, curiously, that we rarely seem to throw at people in genuine positions of authority, no matter what sort of shit they get up to), as if that gives us the right to shake our heads when they diverge from whatever image they’re supposed to conform to. We worry that our children might look up to someone like Winehouse, perhaps, and think that hey, being a mumbling alcoholic looks like fun.
But if we’re honest, that’s not the motivation. No one seriously believes a singer like Amy Winehouse — whose songs adorn more dinner party mixes than teenage iTunes libraries — is seen by anyone under 21 as any sort of role model. No, it’s just that the general public likes nothing more than a good train wreck (a fact that’s been recognized by every writer over the last decade who’s penned a op-ed piece comparing reality TV to the Roman circus or an auto da fé or any other metaphor of public excoriation and humiliation). We just love to tut-tut and wag our finger disapprovingly. We can’t get enough of it.
Five years ago, when the news of the singer’s “troubles” first began to bubble to the top of the tabloid press’s oleaginous sludge “journalism,” the Guardian ran a piece entitled “Emotional Carrion,” in which commentator Lindesay Irvine argued that “what is not very well concealed in the closer and closer focus on public figures in distress is the actually murderous bloodlust fuelling the coverage,” and also noted that the public’s pretty much insatiable appetite for such coverage often exacerbates whatever problems the stars we claim to care about are facing in the first place. Boo fucking hoo, you might say — but seriously, think about it. How well would you handle being tailed by the paparazzi day and night?
Five years later, it makes for pretty sad reading to look back over articles like this from the early days of her career, and to look at what she’s become. This isn’t some scripted drama playing itself out for our amusement – it’s a person who clearly has a shitload of problems slowly collapsing before us. Watching Winehouse’s decline is about as much fun as flicking through the Faces of Meth website — and if you think that is kind of hilarious, there’s something just as wrong with you as there is with every other asshole who titters at Perez Hilton and thumbs through the National Enquirer to satisfy that nasty part of themselves that secretly wants to know what terrible things the celebs have done now.
Winehouse’s decline is sad, plain and simple — as is the way it’s been turned into an ongoing tabloid docudrama for the consumption of a public as ravenous for celebrity scandal as ever. As is the way it’s lapped up by the same monumentally hypocritical ambulance chasers who then have the gall to criticize Winehouse for her behavior, for problems that are ultimately the business of no one but her and her close family and anyone else directly affected by them. As Bruce Springsteen wrote years ago, “I guess there’s just a meanness in this world.” But what a depressing start to the week.
Comments (20)
Yeah, the words “celebrity culture” alone are enough for me. Most people are dumb, the end. Back To Black is a good album.
it’s so hard to watch her like this – she clearly needs help, not judgment or scorn. nice piece, man.
I watched her live a few years ago and she’s been one of my favourite musicians for nearly seven years now, so it’s such a shame to see her becoming a shadow of the talent that she could and should be.
I for one don’t think it’s any of my business what ‘celebrities’ get up to in their own time, and the only reason why I would pay a bit of attention to the personal life of Amy Winehouse is to lament the complete and utter waste of talent that her drug addiction has ensured.
Thank you for an important post. We have become really mean, and the anonymity of the internet allows us to be even more mean than we are in public. Hopefully, we can learn to be nicer. Thank you!
Whilst I agree that enjoying the spectacle of Winehouse in decline is for ghouls, comparing Winehouse to a balding accountant slowly drinking out his days in measures of scotch at empty bars or in a lonely living room is pushing it to say the least.
Here’s what a BBC reporter has to say re her recent display;
“She was frequently booed by the crowd. Many had paid up to €45 (£40) to see her in a country in which wages are some of the lowest in Europe, and their anger was clear.”
And she’s had far too much previous. She either needs to stick to recording only or jack it in. One Pete Docherty is enough thanks.
Oh, and writing a song with lyrics as explicit as ‘Rehab’ isn’t going to help her case either.
amy winehouse dosen’t have any talent, hence why it is entertaining for most people to see her decline. She’s a celebrity in the worldwide spotlight, and it’s ridiculous for you to think that she should only receive positive praise, and no negative from people around the world. Since when did Flavorpill start posting awful opinionated articles like this crap?
What gives us the right is her choice to become an entertainer. If she had chosen to be a social worker, then yeah that would be fucked up. But she gets paid to entertain people and if she can’t even do that because she’s so trashed, then she is just ripping those people off… They didn’t pay to see her stumble around on stage, they paid to see her perform.
Celebrities made their beds and they have to lie in them. Most of their beds are covered in money so it makes it a little easier to deal with the constant invasion of privacy and scrutiny. But hey, every career is a choice. If you didn’t want to deal with people’s mouth, you wouldn’t become a dentist would you?
People that don’t work hard at keeping their shit together and getting better at their art and their craft should just get out of the way. Especially if they are fleecing people of their hard-earned money. She had no respect for herself, obviously, so how could she have any respect for the people that come to listen to her?
And her problems? Boo hoo. She had plenty of opportunity to live quite well (thereby by getting the best revenge), but all she did was shit upon all of them. So, yeah, she should get kicked around. Sorry. It works the same for everyone else. You think the “balding accountant” and “sad old crackhead” don’t get kicked around? Just different boots that do the kicking.
That said, I do wish her, and the rest of us, well.
Grow up. It’s not entertaining to watch her destroy herself, it’s disgusting. People didn’t cough up money to buy tickets to her show because they wanted to see the spectacle she continues to make of herself. Those were the few remaining people that had any faith in her, and she CHOSE to throw it all right back in their faces. These are choices that an adult woman is making in front of the world. She had received the opportunity that millions DREAM of getting. People much more talented than her work their butts off only to get a pittance of what she was offered. That is why people are “mean” to her. Because she begs for it. Begs for it! And it is pathetic for any adult behave that way, whether or not they’re in the public eye. Nobody has any sympathy for the disgustingly sloppy drunk girl in the corner of the bar. Ms. Winehouse has just brought that to a whole new level.
There is something that is much more visceral tearing at Ms. Winehouse that we all don’t get or see. Unless you have been where Ms. Winehouse is, or been close to someone who has, no one here can imagine just what a day is like for this child. It is more than just a stay in rehab that Amy obviously needs. No one is more angry and disappointed in Amy than Amy herself.
People generally operate under the illusion that they have far more control over their emotional/mental health than they actually do. They think that her problems are her own doing which is only true in a really superficial sense. For all of us our emotional make-up is the result of genes and environment and probably more genes and environment. We don’t control it. Despite her fame and wealth she deserves our sympathy. But she won’t get it from most people. Aside from the belief that her problems are her own fault there is the intense envy that most people have for celebrities. They don’t admit it but most people think that if only they had what celebrities have they’d be deliriously happy. Its not so but it is what most people think. Also most people are stupid, which explains why they are so damn unenlightened about these things.
@TMS: YES.
Almost no one who commented on this (epic) piece knows a thing about addiction. It’s not a simple black-and-white subject; educate yourselves before you make judgmental remarks.
Well lets say that nobody is perfect, we all have our addictions even if we think we dont and besides that, she is one talented girl, I love her music, live and let live.
No one is perfect and just because she’s talented and has become the “pop culture” doesn’t give us to right to judge her. She is obviously suffering and hurting. It is apparent that she is an addict and needs help. People who have no compassion or understanding and live their “perfect” lives will judge – makes them feel better, because they, themselves know that they have screwed up in their lives and have a lot to be ashamed of.
Matthew 7:2 – For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.
@TMS & Helly- ‘Nuff said.
I follow Amy because I think she was a great
singer. I always hope to see her better, and feel sad when she doesn’t seem o.k. I want her safe, healthy and happy. I think we all deserve that.
I can honestly say, that I don’t enjoy her decline at all. I so miss her early days, I really found a artist that amazed me, it was short lived but she was awsome. I don’t want to give up on her.I hope only the best for her.
What a wonderful article, thank you for writing this. No one has the right to judge anyone else, whether it’s a homeless man on the street or a celebrity gracing the magazines at your grocery store. I highly doubt as a child that Amy woke up one day and said “You know what? When I grow up, I want to be a train-wreck drug addict with mental problems and I want the whole world to see it”.
She was a human like you and I. We humans are a flawed, hedonistic species. For some reason, humankind loves to tear one another down and rip people apart when they’re going through hard times. We need more compassion and love in this world. Toss the hatred aside and put yourself in other people’s shoes before pointing the finger. Look at yourself and examine your issues before proclaiming yourself to be high and mighty.
I was devastated to hear that Amy died. What a beautiful, soulful talent that we will never come across again. I will always love her music and hope her death highlights how troubled people are in the world.
“All you need is love…”
[...] the sad news of Amy Winehouse’s death today, I wanted to repost a piece I wrote for Flavorwire a few weeks back. Her death is desperately sad, and only makes me angrier about all the faceless [...]
@TMS & Helly- The truth. Sadly you see the immaturity of those with no ability to empathise with their fellow beings
all over the internet. These psychopaths have no direct experience of this type of tragedy but watch how they crumble when their own life takes an unpredicted turn.
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