That makes total sense to me. My mom always pretty much let me stay out late or hangout at a friends after dark, as long as I called so she knew where I was. That’s fine and dandy, but there’s something about using phones to track your kids with a satellite that is just plain weird.
Actually, I’ll add “Helicopter Parents” as a cultural phenomenon that I never saw coming. And of course, I don’t mean you, WhyNot, you’re downright normal, the callphone post just jogged my memory.
I talking about the parent’s who call the university professors of their adult children to demand he change little Suzie’s grade. Or parents showing up at with their grown children to job interviews.
Along with smoking, the greater disapproval of alcohol. It’s hard to believe that late night talk-show hosts used to drink as well as smoke on TV. If a group of co-workers goes out to lunch at a nice restaurant, you can bet that every one of them who isn’t a teetotaler is wondering if they dare order a glass of beer or wine; not because they’re going through alcoholic withdrawal at 12:30 in the afternoon, but because ordering a drink is something that people like to do when having a restaurant lunch. Other subtle signs appear here and there, for instance in TV commercials. A current one that compares a particular insurance company to first-class air travel shows the passenger being poured a glass of–not champagne–but ice water. I suspect that such decisions are made to accommodate the viewers who might disapprove, or argue that depicting alcohol would glorify drinking especially to those who are underage.
The fact that things like leaf blowers and gas-powered gardening tools are accepted. How did this sonic pollution ever become acceptable? Oh, I know, the gardeners need them to get their work done. I think decades ago, the communal answer would have been to tell the people that hire gardeners to either pay out for more gardeners with rakes, or learn to live with a few more stray leaves on the lawn.
This is very true. When Chariots of Fire came out and showed them training in those knee-length shorts, everyone thought they were extremely long. Now it’s hard to find workout shorts that are any shorter than that. On this topic, people often mention the NBA move to longer and baggier shorts as the precursor of the male modesty trend, but another factor may well have been the sight of Bill Clinton’s pasty white thighs as he went on his runs. With both those factors in play I think the modesty trend will continue for about 50 years.
As sun damage gets to be a bigger priority, I’ll bet we’ll see more and more of the Speedo Fastsking types suits (the ones that look like wetsuits) rather than the itsy bitsy teeny weenies.
Dude, do you realize how long it’s been since John Lennon was murdered? Freaking 1980. That’s 27 years ago. Count 'em. I wouldn’t count that as recent.
Also 20 years ago, Regan was shot because Jodi Foster’s stalker thought it would impress her.
No, few have died, however stalkers are plentiful.
Within the last 5 years:
Colin Ferrel had a restraining order against the one woman come up to him on a talk show.
Jeff Goldlbum got a restraining order last week against a woman.
Country singer Lee Ann Womack got a restraining order last year against a stalker.
Nicole Kidman filed a restraining order against a stalker (since lifted, I think).
David Letterman go a restraining order agaist a stalker.
So did Halle Berry.
Mel Gibson had a stalker that wanted to pray with him (restraining order).
John Cusak had to get a restraining order aginast a nutbar.
So did Robbie Williams.
Sheryl Crow had a stalker who turned up at one of her sound checks not long ago.
Meg Ryan took a stalker to court.
Bjork got an acid bomb in the mail from a stalker. (10 years ago).
And who was it who had a stalker who claimed they were secretly married and she was sending him secret message via her songs?
A movie based on this theme was The Bodyguard with Whitney Houston and it was made in 1992. This stuff isn’t new at all. Madonna and others going much further back have been the victims of stalkers. It was stalker laws that changed to protect people against this remember?
You’re quite right. But Annie-Xmas may be thinking that there is more celebrity stalking now, which isn’t accurate. Now there are just more laws to convict people, like the guy who wanted to rape Speilberg, so the stories are getting more media attention now as more people are getting charged and convicted. Pam Dawber, from Mork and Mindy was a heavy duty lobbiest in for anti-stalking laws when her co-star was murdered by her stalker and that was over 20 years ago.
Stalking celebrities isn’t at all new, but the media attention is a lot more focussed than before because now its a crime.
ETA: :: pondering :: I wonder if reality TV and general media whorage has affected celebrity stalking at all?
Somewhat similarly, another cultural change has been the rise in “celebrity news.”
Not so long ago–certainly within my lifetime, anyway–publications like the National Enquirer covered bizarre news stories (“Man Cut In Half By Train Engine–And Lives!”). People magazine and others like it didn’t exist. News shows reported news (wars, political doings, crimes), weather, and sports. There were no TV shows like Entertainment Tonight. For those who thirsted for celebrity news, there were a couple of cheap publications who would happily report who was divorcing whom, but they weren’t very popular and were usually only available from a well-stocked newsstand. Not the kind of thing you might find at the respectable corner druggist.
Now, all that has changed. The Enquirer and the other supermarket tabs are all celebrity news. Other publications–People, for example–are all celebrity news, and available everywhere. Up to half a TV newscast can be celebrity news, for those who didn’t see the daily shows (E.T.) whose content is nothing but celebrity news. Heck, even daily papers carry celebrity news.
Maybe celebrity stalking seem to have increased because the sources of celebrity news have increased. Regardless, I’ve noticed this growth in demand for celebrity news over the last number of years, and it’s a cultural change that has surprised me.
I remember when People was first published. Someone (Nora Ephron?) remarked that it was like lunching on potato chips - tasty, but without substance.
Magazines in general have exploded, specialty publications didn’t exist when I was growing up. It was Time, Newsweek, Sports Illustrated and Reader’s Digest. And women’s magazines, Good Housekeeping, McCall’s, Ladies’ Home Journal. And Cosmo.
oooh — wasn’t there a time when Playboy was racy and daring? I thought it got out-smutted by the competition some time ago.
I’m surprised by the extent to which people are willing to pay for services. I’m shocked by the notion of paying a monthly fee to record television programs (that’s what the VCR - now DVR, but still - is for) or to listen to songs online, as opposed to buying a record, or to subscribe to radio, or to get phone messages. I’m troubled by many of these not only because I resent having to pay a recurring charge for something I can do for myself, but also because I have a lingering fear of some outside entity being able to track my leisure activities.
Which leads me to the second cultural change that surprises and discomfits me: the growing acceptance of what used to be considered invasions of privacy. Others have mentioned employer drug testing and tracking kids - I’ve recently noticed ads for a phone that “lets your friends know where you are”. I can’t imagine wanting my friends or anyone else to be able to see where I am at any given moment. The lack of uproar over the idea of the government listening in on citizen’s phone calls without a warrant surprised me, and so does the overall acceptance of public cameras. It’s as though the general public has, with almost no debate, accepted the idea that it’s okay for the government, employers, parents, and even complete strangers to keep track of a person’s movements and activities.
Same here. Maybe my parents were really lenient or something. I remember being suprised at how often my roommate in the dorms would talk to her parents and what she would tell them. Her mom would know when every exam was and call her to see how she did. One time my roommate had a class canceled and evidently went back to her room and tried to call her mom. Later that night, her mom called in a panic wondering if her daughter was sick because she looked at the caller ID and noticed that my roommate had called when she was supposed to be in class.
What makes it even more funny was that I went to college in the same town my parents lived in, and she saw and talked to her parents way more than I did.
It’s not hard to guess my age when I tell this story: when I lost my virginity (took hers, too), the lucky girl posted every last detail, including a performance review, on her Xanga as soon as she got home and then she was shocked that everyone at our school knew we had sex.
30 years from now, once it’s common for high school kids to openly debate how pneumatic each of their classmates are, I’m sure I’ll date myself by thinking that was rude or even interesting.
It must be surprising for anyone who’s lived in California for 35+ years that, even though the vast majority of people here are tolerant of weed–I hear coworkers openly talking about drug deals at work all the time, sometimes even placing orders on the work phone–we still have to progress ass-backwards and slowly towards legalization. Penalty reductions here, prescriptions there, and with constant setbacks like semi-legal raids on medical grow farms and dispensaries. Marijuana has become more legally dangerous in San Diego even in the three years since the days when my classmates and I would openly burn bowls with strangers and tourists on the beach. We thought nothing of smoking fatties twenty yards from the Ocean Beach police station when we were the only people on the beach at night. The worst that could’ve happened to us was a cop would confiscate our weed so he could smoke the rest. Things are different now–getting caught holding a dime bag without a prescription can lead to an irritating series of fines, court appearances, classes and drug tests.
Then again, that could just be a result of San Diego’s crippling debt.
When did this happen? What’d I miss? Stalking you hear about from time to time, but what celebrities were stalked and killed recently?
