anything goes with emma chamberlain - there is a culture shift coming (part 2: mainstream celebrities)

Episode Date: May 12, 2022

well guys, i’m back and i’m thinking about culture again and how it’s changing. this week is part two of my three part series and today i want to talk with you about mainstream celebrities…what a mainstream celebrity even is, how we viewed mainstream celebrities in the past and how i think we will view them in the future. i actually think there might be something really cool in store…or maybe i’m way off. i don’t know, but it is interesting and i’m excited to see what happens next.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello. In the last episode, I started talking about how I feel like there is this huge culture shift happening. And I specifically talked about how I feel the culture around social media was shifting. But in today's episode, I'm going to be talking about how I feel mainstream celebrity culture is shifting as a part of a three-part series where I touch on this culture shift that I feel happening even though it's not extremely obvious. I feel like we've all been feeling a culture shift happening. been feeling a culture shift happening. The way that we used to perceive social media and mainstream celebrities and trends and all of these things

is just rapidly changing, it feels. And if you haven't listened to the last episode, specifically touching on social media, go check it out or don't. In this episode, we're talking about mainstream celebrities, a-list celebrities, and how their impact and their presence in pop culture seems to be changing. First I want to start out by describing my definition of a mainstream celebrity. I would consider a mainstream celebrity to be somebody who is heavily in the industry

of whatever their form of entertainment is. For example, an actor or an actress, a musician, a singer, a model, celebrities that are famous for a craft that has historical value, like a singer, a model, an actress, an actor, those types of celebrities have existed for hundreds of years. That's a mainstream celebrity. A mainstream celebrity is somebody who is heavily involved in the industry of their craft and their craft, whatever that may be, has existed for a very long time. In comparison to, say, in internet celebrity, in comparison to say, in internet celebrity, that's a very new type of celebrity that has no roots in history.

Like, there's never been in internet celebrity before now. And internet celebrities, a lot of the times, aren't involved in the industry of entertainment. You know, a lot of internet celebrities become famous without any help from an agent or a manager or anything like that. They become famous on their own. And a lot of times, for very mysterious reasons,

it's not mysterious why a singer or an actor become famous. It's like, well, they're good at singing, they're good at acting. It is, on the other hand, kind of mysterious why internet celebrities become famous because it's a little bit more vague. Usually it's like, well, they're pretty, I guess, or maybe they are funny, I guess, or maybe they're entertaining, I guess. It's a little bit more of a gray area with internet celebrities, finding the root of really truly

why they are as famous as they are. And so now that we've distinguished the difference between internet celebrities and mainstream celebrities, let's get into the feeling of staleness that I've been feeling with mainstream celebrities. In the last episode, I kind of talked about how I felt internet celebrities were starting to feel a little stale.

But in this episode, I'm talking about how also I think mainstream celebrities have been feeling a little bit stale, not all of them. And this is not a personal attack at any celebrity at all. Just the culture around mainstream celebrities. In general, feels a little bit stale. It's not one specific person, it's this overarching feeling.

Like in the past, I mean like 50 plus years ago. Mainstream celebrities had a chokehold on society. Celebrities heavily influenced society. I think a big reason for that is the fact that mainstream celebrities 50 plus years ago, even less honestly, even 30 plus years ago,'re kind of seen as gods in a way. Like they were seen as not real people. They were seen as almost a mythical figure because they were so unreachable.

They were so mysterious. You didn't know everything about celebrities. You only knew about what they wanted you to know about most of the time. Generally, celebrities remained mysterious. And it was pretty easy to do because the capabilities of the internet weren't there. You couldn't just go on your phone and Google paparazzi photo of Rihanna in May, 2022, and see where Rihanna is in any given moment.

You couldn't do that back in the day. I also feel like things like interviews and magazine articles and things like that were slightly more thoughtfully done by the teams of these celebrities. I feel like there was a lot more thought going into what interviews people were doing, what events people were going to, and everything was a lot more thought out and a lot more careful. And the true identity of celebrities, who they really were, was hidden from the public.

And it wasn't that hard of a thing to do because unless a celebrity went out and showed who they truly were in an interview or something, the public was not going to see it because let's say there's a celebrity running around, you know, in New York City and they meet a fan somewhere and they're a complete asshole to the fan. The fan has no power to go out and say, this person was an asshole to me.

How would they do that? They can't go on Twitter. They can't go on TikTok. They can't go on YouTube. They can't go on Instagram and post about it. You know, there was so much more mystery around celebrities back in the day, which gave them this enticing feeling because they were such a mystery. You had no idea where they were, what they were doing, what they were really like.

And that was exciting. That was what gave these mainstream celebrities the power that they had because they were a mystery and nothing is more enticing the human beings than a mystery. Whereas now mainstream celebrities all have social media. They all have social media. There's so much information about them at any given moment. You can find out virtually anything you want to find out about a celebrity online within five minutes of Google searching. You know, it's not hard to do.

Not only that, we're seeing a lot more of celebrities, right? We're seeing celebrities when they're on vacation. We're seeing celebrities when they're at the grocery store. We're seeing celebrities being assholes to fans sometimes. We're seeing celebrities post a cringey Instagram photo. We're seeing celebrities talk about stuff publicly, maybe on Instagram live or whatever it may be in ways that are not as flattering. And we're seeing more of these people.

And a lot of times when we see the truth about these people we're like, wait a minute, they're not the God like a ethereal figure that I imagine them to be. They're human and they say stuff that's dumb sometimes and they post stuff that's cringes sometimes. Like, hold on a minute, what the fuck? You know, this is not what I expected. And we tend to hold these mainstream celebrities to such a high standard because they're so rich,

they're so famous. We tend to hold them to this high standard and it's almost impossible for them to live up to it, right? But not only that, just because somebody says celebrity doesn't mean that they're a good person. I think that that's another thing that we're realizing. I think for a long time people assumed that all mainstream celebrities were perfect, because that's all we ever saw of them. But now we're seeing, oh wait, not only are they not perfect, but also I don't even know if I like them. I really like them in that one movie or I really like their album when they release that album, but I don't really like them as a person. They just don't seem cool. And all of this is sort of blowing up the illusion of the prestigious mainstream celebrity.

I also think that it would be just stupid not to touch on the fact that now that there are internet celebrities, it feels like there are so many famous people that the feeling of fame is just becoming more and more diluted. I touched on this in the last episode when I was talking about mainly social media and internet celebrities. I was talking about how now that there are so many internet celebrities, it feels like the feeling of internet celebrity fame is getting diluted. But I think that this actually carries over into mainstream celebrity

as well, where now there are so many different types of famous people in total, including internet celebrities, mainstream celebrities, blah, blah, blah. There are so many famous people now that fame doesn't hold the power. it once did when the group of celebrities was very carefully chosen and very specific. You know, now anyone can be famous, right? You don't even need to be involved in the entertainment industry to be famous now. And it's become so easy that now there's just so many. But you know what I mean?

Now there's just so many. It's like, it's weird. It's really interesting. But it's kind of making the whole thing blow up in front of everyone's faces. I think that one of the biggest downfalls in a way of mainstream celebrity is mainstream celebrities trying to use social media. I don't think that it's a bad thing. I don't think that it's wrong

for mainstream celebrities to use social media. They're humans and basically all humans use social media. But I think that that's a big part of why we're seeing more of celebrities than we ever have before and why it's kind of crushing the illusion, right? It's taking away the mystique a little bit. It's also showing in the success of these mainstream celebrities Instagram pages. Obviously, there's a lot of mainstream celebrities that have done amazing on social media platforms.

And further developed their business and their level of fame from social media. There's been a lot of that. There's also been development of mainstream celebrities because of social media. Like, there's a lot of musicians specifically that boosted their career from utilizing social media properly. So I'm not saying that social media is all bad for the development and for the success of a mainstream celebrity. I'm just saying that it's not working for everybody because for some, it's like a helping hand and it just works and it's just only a positive thing. And then for other people, it doesn't really work out because maybe their personality isn't

something that's interesting, you know, when they're not doing their craft. Maybe their true colors come out and people don't really like their true colors. Social media personalities usually get famous because of the fact that they're being who they are. You know, you are seeing exactly who they are, or at least something pretty close to it right out the gate. Whereas with an actor or a singer or a model or something like that, you're just seeing them in their craft. You're seeing them in a movie. You're seeing them in their craft. You're seeing them in a movie. You're seeing them performing on stage.

You're seeing them walking down a runway, but who they really are still remains a mystery. I mean, I think it's funny because back in the day when it felt like celebrities still had their mystique, there probably was a lot of celebrities that were annoying or were bad people. No, there definitely was. Sorry. There definitely were celebrities that were bad people. Were rude, were annoying, would have been hated by the public if we saw who they truly were when they weren't putting on a sort of performance for an interview or for a performance

of some sort, blah, blah, blah. But because we never saw it, we never knew. In mainstream celebrities, we're allowed to just exist in this illusion. I think that this is kind of a crazy thing that we're witnessing. Because for so long, society has looked to celebrities for advice, for inspiration, for hope even. And now because we're seeing the true colors of every celebrity pretty much, I think that that's going away. I think that it's not working anymore. I think that people are starting to see through the solution.

And they're starting to realize that fame and fortune and all of this is not real. It's not real. And these people that we put on these pedestals may not necessarily deserve to be there. But what happens when you take celebrity culture away from the people, right? What happens? Is there complete chaos or is there like an amazing great awakening of independent thought that I don't know because I

think subconsciously almost we have hyperfixated on celebrity culture for years and years and years, hundreds of years, hundreds of years, more than that, possibly even thousands of years back to when celebrity was maybe on a smaller scale, but there was still a sense of celebrity. What happens when you take celebrity away? What happens when it loses its power? I think you could go two ways. I think on one hand, everything could kind of go up and flames in a way, because something that we as people

used to fantasize about and look up to is then gone. And when you don't have something to look up to, then you don't really feel motivated to do very much. And then, you know, it kind of makes life feel less exciting. There's something about having these God-like things in society that keep us inspired, keep us excited, right? And if that's gone, then as weirdly extreme as this may sound, it kind of makes life feel a little bit less magical. Because we need to kind of be a little bit delusional about some stuff. I'll give some more examples besides just celebrity. I think that the human desire to find their soulmate

and fall in love is a sort of delusional idea because even though you may find someone that's a perfect partner for you, a really good partner for you, that you wanna have kids with and you wanna start a family with, even if you find that, there's still going to be issues in it.

There's no such thing as a perfect relationship. And I think that for a lot of our lives, we look forward to that or we aspire to that, sort of as an impossible goal that we can just fantasize about. We know that it's possible and that it could happen. And because of that, it makes us feel hopeful about what tomorrow may bring. When you realize as an adult that there's no such thing as a perfect soulmate, there's no such thing as

being perfectly in love with somebody. There's always going to be struggles with it. There's always going to be struggles with it. There's always going to be challenges with it. Once you realize that, the sort of magic in falling in love kind of becomes a little bit more human. And that's a hard thing to realize. It's the same thing with celebrity. It's like a lot of people, myself included, when I was younger, used to look at celebrities and feel like, wow, if I could ever figure out a way

to be in their shoes or to live a life like them, everything in my life would be fixed. I would magically become this ethereal, perfect human being who never had to think about money, who never had to think about anything who is just perfect. You know, I felt like that. I felt like if I could ever become famous, that would be my golden ticket to the best life possible. I would become a better person. My life would become better. Everything would be better. But then now I and a lot of you are realizing that that's not true, that it's all fake, it's all an illusion.

And a lot of celebrities aren't even good people necessarily. This is not, again, calling out anyone in particular. I'm not like sitting here being like, when I met that one person, they were an asshole, because I've met a lot of really, really nice people that are considered celebrities. I've met a lot of really, really nice people, truly. I've also met some people where I was like, they're kind of an asshole, that's okay though.

They're kind of an asshole, but that's okay, because whatever, if you're an asshole, you're an asshole. Like, I'm not, I don't even judge or take it personally. I'm like, listen, they're just doing their best, you know, whatever. But to finish that thought, when an illusion gets crushed for society, there's a potential for society to just go crazy because nobody knows where to look for guidance anymore. That's one hypothesis, but I don't think that that's what's going to happen. I think what's going to happen is

something a lot more beautiful, which is that for once in history, people don't put celebrities on a pedestal anymore. And instead, they just enjoy celebrities for what they create, whether that's music, art, movies, podcasts, whatever it may be. Enjoy that for that. But when it comes to putting them on a pedestal, that no longer happens anymore. I think that it may inspire more individual thinking, instead of people looking up to the celebrities for fashion advice, for the ideal body type, for all of these societal norms. Instead of looking at the celebrities for societal norms,

I feel like people will start looking around to the people in their life that they admire to emulate, because the people in your life that you admire are probably better people anyway. And I think that now the people are realizing that there's going to be less influence from celebrities. I think celebrities will kind of stop influencing things as much maybe. And their chokehold on society will just lessen. I really think that it's a good thing that celebrity culture is kind of dissipating in front of our eyes. Because we're outgrowing, worshipping these people, we're starting to see that they're all flawed and they're all human. And I think that that can allow people to appreciate the lives that they're living in this present moment so much more. Because when I was a child,

living in this present moment so much more. Because when I was a child, I would look at celebrities and I was like, they got it made, you know? I would look at celebrities and I would almost get a sick feeling in my stomach because I was like, this is so unfair that they get to live these perfect, perfect lives. And I'm stuck here with my struggles and with not a lot of money and with not a lot of resources like in compare. I had more than enough resources of the child. That's not what I'm saying, but I'm saying the resources I had were one trillionth of what celebrities have. I felt like celebrity culture sort of made me feel ungrateful for what I had. And that wasn't good for me

because I actually had a lot. I had two loving parents. I had a roof over my head. I had food to eat and I had school to go to. The rest doesn't even fucking matter. It does not matter. But I was like, well, why don't I have, you know, expensive clothes? And like, why do I wear the same shoes for the whole school year?

Why don't I have 10 pairs of shoes? You know what I'm saying? It was like, I was asking questions like that because I was looking at celebrities and I was also looking at even the micro celebrities, if you will, in my town. Like, there's always like micro celebrities in the town that you grew up in. People that everyone knows

because they, you know, maybe they had a really popular older brother and now they're like the younger sister and now they're popular too. Or maybe they're really popular because they're really gorgeous, or maybe they're really popular because they have a rich dad, like whatever they're popular for. I was constantly comparing myself to mainstream celebrities and micro celebrities in my town. And it ruined my life, but I really hope that now that we're seeing the truth of these

people, the truth is not so squeaky clean. I hope that that can allow people to rationalize fame and realize that, oh, this is not perfect. Nothing in life is perfect. Not even this isn't perfect. I am actually grateful for where I am. I'll give an example. Celebrities have it fucking easy in a lot of ways. So easy, especially it mainly because of their money, I would say. It's only because of their money. Money allows a person to paint a very luxurious picture. But I will tell you that money is not enough

for a good life. Can it make life better in a lot of ways? Yes, can it make life easier in a lot of ways? Yes, but is it enough to live a happy life, shockingly no? And I think we're starting to realize that with watching celebrities struggle with really difficult things like severe you know mental health issues or even addiction whatever it may be now that that is so public and we're all seeing that happening in front of our eyes

It shed some light on the humanity of celebrities and we're to realize, wait, their lives actually aren't so perfect. Why is that? I think the reason why a lot of mainstream, massive celebrities have really shockingly tough lives is because you have to imagine it like this. Imagine you get all these accolades, you get all this praise, you get all these accolades, you get all this praise, you get all this money for being good at something, being good singer, being a good actor, being good model,

whatever maybe. You get all this praise and love and whatever. But then now you can't go to a coffee shop anymore without causing a ruckus. Now you can't walk through the airport without for security guards. Now you can't make friends in a normal, natural way anymore. You know, you always have to walk into a social interaction with the assumption that they know who you are and they know how successful you are and they probably want a little chunk of it. I think like someone like Justin Bieber is such a great example. When I think about what Justin Bieber's life must be like, it makes me almost emotional

because I feel so bad. I don't envy his life at all because I'm like, yeah, he has a lot of money and, you know, he is really talented and that's amazing, but also he can't live a normal life anymore He has all this money, but he can't even use it, you know, like he can't even use it properly He can't go and shop around downtown New York For a whole day and buy whatever he wants because there's gonna be chaos. There's gonna be paparazzi There's gonna be people everywhere, you know being like like, oh my God, it's Justin Bieber. And he can't do things like that.

If he wants to go and buy a bunch of stuff, he probably has to go do it online. Or he has to call a store ahead of time and say, hey, I'm coming in, can you kick everyone out? Like, that's the only way that he can live a normal life now. And that to me is pretty bad. That doesn't sound appealing to me. That sounds pretty awful.

And I think before, you know, the last like what, 30 years or so, we didn't see that side of celebrity's lives. We just saw their money. We just saw them looking beautiful on a red carpet. And that was kind of it. But slowly but surely we've started to see more about the truth about celebrity life and It just doesn't look so good in any way anymore except for the money Except for the money. That's the only thing about it that's appealing, but pretty much every other element is not And I really think that that's a good thing every other element is not. And I really think that's a good thing because if I would have known when I was younger that the truth of this lifestyle wasn't so

good and that these people are far from perfect, sometimes even shitty people, I probably would have been like, oh, okay, weird. And then I probably would have been like, oh, okay, weird. And then I probably would have naturally started focusing on myself more and just put my energy in word into myself. I know that there's a level of irony in me talking about all of this because I know that this is probably ironic for me to be talking about because I'm a little bit involved in this weird, new sort of internet. I'm not a celebrity. I don't know what to call it. I don't know what I like internet fame. I don't know whatever it may be.

I'm kind of a part of it. I'm fully a part of it, which is why it's so fucking weird for me to talk about it because it's like, well, but I am a part of it. I think the reason why I'm able to talk about this and see this from a unique perspective is because although I have dappled in these sort of communities, right, of celebrities and things like that, even though I've kind of dappled in that world, I have never once felt like I should be there. I do not feel like I belong in that world. I don't feel like I fit into that world. Even though I've met these people, even though maybe I've gone to some of the same events as these people, I do not in any way, shape,

or form feel like I belong there. I always feel like I'm a normal person that got invited there by accident. Like that's how I have always felt. And I don't know if there's a little bit of delusion in that, on my end, I don't know. I don't know. But that's always how I've felt. And because of that, I feel like I go into all of these experiences with a very unique perspective.

Because I'm not walking into these environments and thinking, finally, I'm home. You know, I'm with all these famous people. Finally, I feel like I belong. It's the complete opposite. I go to these events and I'm like, I do not belong here, you know, like I don't belong here. And I think that that's actually some residue from my childhood of growing up and putting

these people in a pedestal. Because the more and more that I meet these people and the more and more that I see the true colors of these people, not only in person, but also on social media, the more I realize that this whole thing has been an illusion this whole time that we've been buying into. And to be honest, it's kind of a waste of time maybe even. I think that there's parts of it that are fun and that are useful because, you know, we're humans and we enjoy entertainment.

So things like music and movies and TV shows and YouTube videos and podcasts and art and all these things like enjoying those things and enjoying the people that create them is not a bad thing because those things enhance life in some ways. But I think that putting these people on a god-like pedestal is what needs to go. And that is not helpful.

That is not helpful at all. Appreciating the creativity behind all of it, that's great. Appreciating the wisdom that people can bring to the table, that's great. Appreciating people's willingness to share things about themselves, that's great. That's all useful. But having unrealistic expectations about who these people are and what their lives are really like, I think that is fully unhealthy and just we could go without it. and what their lives are really like, I think that is fully unhealthy and just we could go without it.

It's really interesting because as I'm feeling this shift happening, I'm really on the edge of my seat to see what happens next. I really am. I don't know what's going to happen next. I don't know how celebrity culture is going to shift. Do I think that it's going to go away?

No, I don't because I think that it's going to go away? No, I don't, because I think that it's something that will never go away, but I think that it's going to change drastically. I think that its impact is going to change drastically. I think that's going to be where the shift happens. I don't think it's going to go away. I think it's just going to shift. Whereas in the last episode when I was talking about social media and how I felt like that

was sort of shifting and internet celebrities who got famous off of social media, that's shifting. I can see a world where internet celebrities kind of disappear into thin air and it just kind of goes away. Either that or everybody becomes an internet celebrity and it's like, well, I guess everyone's just famous now. I can see both sides. Whereas with mainstream celebrities, I think that will remain. I think that that will stay a thing and it will never fully go away, but I think that the impact will change. I don't know. I'm just like, I don't know. I'm just like spitting, spitting random shit right now. But this is just something I've been thinking about nonstop

and I'm so curious to hear your guys' opinion. Please DM me on Instagram at anything goes or tweet me at AG podcast and let me know what you think. Again, I could be fully delusional about this whole thing. This could be something that only I'm feeling because I'm in such a weird spot here where I'm like half in half out, right? I'm half in this shit and I'm half out of this shit. Honestly, I'd say I'm 20% in this shit, 80% out of this shit

Like I'm barely in there, but I am in there in a little bit of a way, right? Like I'm I see more than some but at the same time I see more than some, but at the same time, emotionally I'm not there. I'm not mentally there. I'm not mentally in that world. I don't mentally play that game. So I'm also out of it in a way.

But maybe, my own perception of celebrity has shifted because of what I've seen in real life. And maybe everybody else is still seeing that illusion. I don't know. I don't think so, though. I don't know, I don't think so though. I don't think so, because I think that there's kind of been this light discussion about the prestige kind of dissipating.

And so I know for almost certain that I'm not the only one thinking this. But also maybe I am. I don't know, I'm starting to gaslight myself, which is how I know that it's time to end this episode. Thank you guys for listening. Doing this series has been so fun for me because this is stuff that I really find interesting, like just analyzing culture and where it's going and where it used to be and I just love this shit. So let me know if you're enjoying it. Let me know your thoughts on this topic. Also in the next episode,

we're going to be touching on how trends and the trends cycle is shifting in this culture and this society. I think that's gonna be a really interesting episode. Maybe, maybe not. So stay tuned for that one. If you didn't listen to the one about social media, that was the episode before this. Go listen to that.

That's all I have today. Thank you so much for listening and hanging out. I really appreciate it. I love doing it. I love hanging out with you. I love you. Even though we've never met, feel free to follow anything goes on any platform, you stream podcasts.

Feel free to follow anything goes on Instagram or Twitter. Instagram is at anything goes and Twitter is at AG podcast. What else? Check out my coffee company, Chamberlain Coffee. I'm drinking Chamberlain Coffee right now as I do during every single episode. I'm actually having a hot latte right now. It's very weird. I normally don't drink hot coffee, but I am drinking a hot latte right now with a little bit of almond milk. Well, a latte sized amount of almond milk, anyway, whatever you don't care.

I'll talk to you guys next week. Love you all very much. Bye bye.