the spotlight is the new religion

I have seen the light!

...The stage lights, that is.

    We will do almost anything to feel seen, and yet ironically in this digital age we can hardly go out to buy groceries without it being documented by a stray camera. I myself am aware of my own desperate need to be told I am correct and I actively fight against public opinion influencing my decisions. So what is it to have a career that's foundations are based upon blind worship?

    Influencers are a fascinating thing to witness; they are this worship of the spotlight concentrated into pretty, young packaging in a way celebrities couldn't be previously simply due to a lack of the constant cameras that exist now. Social media as a whole as allowed us to fastrack anybody onto a stage. I am currently utilizing that very tool now, typing all this out to the void standing on my purchased newfangled stage.

    I feel the youtube channel by the name of Poppy really made this point fantastically without ever really needing to say a word on the subject. We completely treat these celebrities as Gods; as if influence, money and acclaim make them know better than us, the general populace. By drawing our attention, while we have the concious awarness that feeding her more of the spotlight results in her gaining more influence, Poppy makes the point of our own moral ambiguity in the face of shiny and new. In the face of what we've been told is the correct way to view these people, in the face of their lighting.

She then dropped 'Time is Up" which is an amazing song (that I highly recommend you listen to) that demonstrates this story coming to fruition with Poppy -the ultimate personification of this plasticity we worship- feeding her followers pills with the same content distance from the matter at hand she always has. Poppy is plastic, Poppy is a product and always has been. We live in a digital age where you can say anything to the world at large at the drop of a hat, where literally anyone is an influencer in some light and yet we flock in herds to partake in this strange cult-like worship. It's almost as if we as a species need religion to survive; something higher than ourselves that we tend to. It shapes us into worker ants, placid and malleable and we like it like that, really. We always have.

    Then you get those who realize this and try and use it to their advantage. This spotlight we so revered is now right at our fingertips. It leads to us clout chasing, doing anything within our power to have the attention turnt upon ourselves even if only for a moment. We've reversed it from a blind worship to a blind pursuit of grandeur and I find it fascinating. This seeking of the spotlight leads to bizarre happenings and very strange people gaining the spotlight, which then leads to them being more famous for the strange happenings and then it circles in on itself like a snake eating its own tail until the end of time (tail as old as time... get it? Oh, tomatoes? Being hurled at me? Ya, fair).

    Anyways, my convoluted moral here aside I simply find it fascinating the way that social media has impacted celebrity culture. The way it's fascillitated this merging of cult-like fanatacism and the limelight. That's always been the case, sure, but it did used to be you did something to get to the point of being revered. The fascinating part of it is the clout chasers, the tiktok hype houses of it all that are basically a set get rich quick scheme for the young and pretty.

I've lost my own thread here honestly, so let's get to the main event of my drabble surrounding this topic as I've been listening to way too much of Poppy's discography today as well as Mars Argo's (also a living legend). All the bits in brackets towards the end there are quotes directly from the Mars Argo video "Everybody Wants It All" by the way.

--------------------------

Spotlight;

They see this

Pick up the pieces

Damage a plenty- 

Monetize this!


Spotlight;

They’ll see this

Break up the pieces

Damage a plenty

Buying out guns


(Everybody wants it all

Everybody wants it all)

Spotlight, oh spotlight

Monetizing the fall


Spotlight, oh spotlight

Sacrifice, sacrifice

Pray at your alter

Of digitized ice

(drip drip drip)


Pray at the alter of digitized splendour

Pray at your alters of monetized wonder

Sacrifice all in the name of Limelight

Sacrifice all in the name of Limelight 

Pray at the alters of digitized splendour

Sacrifice all in the name of the game

Sacrifice all in the name of the fame


Sacrifice, sacrifice all for the light


Lights camera action

Flashes and passion

Pose on a pedestal

Bird in a cage


Dolls on stands

Salute, demand

How do they do it?

What are they payed?


Pray at the alter of digitized splendour

Pray at your alters of monetized wonder

Sacrifice all in the name of Limelight

Sacrifice all in the name of Limelight 

Pray at the alters of digitized splendour

Sacrifice all in the name of the game

Sacrifice all in the name of the fame


Sacrifice, sacrifice all for the light


(I don't know if any of them really make sense)

Everybody wants it all

(I mean what's the point of any of this anyway, right?)

Drip, drip, drip ice on my neck

(this is kinda fun!)

Everybody wants it all

(It wasn't your fault, wasn't anybody's fault,)

Drip, drip, drip

(i just wanted it all!)

Everybody wants to watch you fall


Pray at the alter of digitized splendour

Pray at your alters of monetized wonder

Sacrifice all in the name of Limelight

Sacrifice all in the name of Limelight 

Pray at the alters of digitized splendour

Sacrifice all in the name of the game

Sacrifice all in the name of the fame


(Everybody just wants it all right? Everybody just wants it all)

Sacrifice, sacrifice all for the light



---------------


Well! There's that!

*bow* *exit stage left*

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

distant memories of mattering & hoping to be seen (if i could see what would become of me would i have stuck around for the scene?)

Image
 it's been so long since the stars have been gone yet i find i'm startled still when i wake up to an empty sky sat outside my window sill i swallow the feeling deep inside as it rises in me like vomit pray in all of my naivete that the moving objects no comet asked about myself this day id beg to go without comment for there is nothing really left to say without me being honest if i could dispose of my face even if i like the way it lays on the bone that composes my frame i think i know that i'd do it just the same if i could die for a moment in time  if i could be free of my body then i'd have so much that i could say  so many things to live for today  but i'm so acutely aware of my being contained and that's the excuse that i'll feed you today We wake up ...and it starts There was a time, i could swear where we dreamt of, dreamt of stars They truly didn't seem too far Before their faces became marred Prior to being barred I still had my bars Fixed firm...
Read more

"women are born with pain built in"

Image
“Women are born with pain built in, it’s our physical destiny: period pains, sore boobs, childbirth, you know. We carry it within ourselves throughout our lives, men don’t. They have to seek it out, they invent all these gods and demons and things just so they can feel guilty about things, which is something we do very well on our own. And then they create wars so they can feel things and touch each other and when there aren’t any wars they can play rugby. We have it all going on in here inside, we have pain on a cycle for years and years and years and then just when you feel you are making peace with it all, what happens? The menopause comes, the f***ing menopause comes, and it is the most wonderful f***ing thing in the world. And yes, your entire pelvic floor crumbles and you get f***ing hot and no one cares, but then you’re free, no longer a slave, no longer a machine with parts. You’re just a person.” - Fleabag    I, myself, am nowhere fucking near menopause but it doesn't...
Read more

"i want someone to tell me what to wear every morning"

Image
 “I want someone to tell me what to wear every morning. I want someone to tell me what to eat.  What to like, what to hate, what to rage about. What to listen to, what band to like.  What to buy tickets for. What to joke about, what to not joke about.  I want someone to tell me what to believe in. Who to vote for and who to love and how to tell them.  I think I just want someone to tell me how to live my life, Father,  because so far I think I've been getting it wrong.” -Fleabag, s2  I think that having zero free will when you're a child heavily impacts your views of your autonomy for the rest of your life... but hey, maybe that's just me.      The man who lived in my house, who donned the mask of father from time to time, was very insistent on my being all 'safe and sound'. So insistent in fact that trackers, locks and freedom in windows are how I've learnt to love. It's why ownership sounds so appealing at times, why the fucked up roma...
Read more