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Celebrity rehab: cliche or concerning?
Rehab is all the rage, and all the big names are in on the act. Britney’s done it. Lindsay’s done it. And a whole lot of other celebrities we only call by their first names probably should do it. Their drunken and drug driven misadventures are the curse of our era, and it’ll probably be some time before we stop hearing about it.
Apart from the old concern of just how insensitive and unscrupulous the paparazzi are, stalking down and out celebrities at their moment of weakness, the rehab discussion seems to raise few ethical concerns. For one, it is yet to seriously look at the pros or cons of publically flaunting celebrity addiction battles, not that we would expect this from the tabloids.
Looking on the bright side, our overexposure to celebrity rehab tales has brought addiction out of the shadows and into mainstream media. It is no longer a taboo topic, and we are no longer pretending that drug problems just don’t happen. The lucky beneficiaries of public addiction battles, like the makers of shows like VH1’s ‘Celebrity Rehab’, are often quick to voice the “harsh realism” of their shows.
The argument goes that such ‘realistic’ portrayals of celebrity addictions not only prove to serve that recovery is possible and help is available, but that rehab is not a process to be taken lightly. Maybe this is the intention. Maybe. But at the end of the day is this really what we learn from the paparazzo’s sad parade of drug induced celebrity mishaps? More likely, is that we feel a little guilty for enjoying the dire situations of people who need help or play down their problem. It’s getting increasingly hard to take celebrity drug problems seriously because we’re focusing on the personality and not the problem.
If you’re anything like me, you don’t look at the tabloids and see drug addicts you care about or a serious illness that kills. You see an overpaid attention seeker living a little excessively or doing their best for a little publicity. Not only does this make for bad reading, but, according to the National Association of Addiction Treatment Providers (NAAPT) in the US, media stories about addiction that focus on personalities and not the disease is largely detrimental to improving public awareness and understanding.
The media’s taste for the outlandish personalities over hard-hitting medical problems tends to belittle the long term plight of addiction. Ronald Hunsicker, CEO of the NAAPT, points out that addiction is the one illness where we feel it’s ok to ‘dramatize the struggles of individuals in such a graphic fashion.’ Thanks to the tabloids obsession with celebrity rehab, addiction is no longer that family destroying illness that tugs at the heart strings. Instead, it’s a trivial but entertaining problem of the rich and the famous, far removed from our common folk lives.
At the end of the day, celebrity addictions, and the countless trips to rehab that follow, tend to register little more than a groan in the public sphere. Until the discussion turns away from the personality and spotlights on the problem, public addiction battles will continue to do little more than sell magazines.
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Between the Lines is a new online community for young people who participate in the use of recreational - or otherwise - drugs, balancing expert and every day perspectives on the issue.
It's not about saying "drugs are bad, m'kay", but it's also not about glorifying the subject. It's about presenting a range of expert endorsed facts and perspectives in an open space for everyone to explore. inthemix has partnered with Between The Lines because we believe in what they're out to achieve, and we also support their methods for gathering and presenting the topic. This mini-site on inthemix presents only a portion of the topics raised on Between The Lines, so if you'd like to dive in deeper on any of the subjects raised then be sure to head to the full site and join in the discussion.
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