Private Lives of Celebrities Should Be Off Limits

It’s a Monday afternoon and you are walking by a newspaper stand, you see the latest issue of People Magazine and see that Lindsay Lohan is once again on the cover and in rehab for the billionth time. Just yesterday you saw that the one and only teen heartthrob (literally), Justin Bieber was arrested for DUI and drag racing in downtown Georgia. These kinds of stories are published all the time whether it is good or bad, true or false. The paparazzi may think that they are doing what the people want and doing no harm, just giving the world the latest updates, but in reality they are harming not only the celebrity but the people they hang around including their family. The private lives of celebrities should be off limits to the public so they can have privacy, take the extra pressure off of their shoulders, and for the sake of their kids.

We have all had those moments in our life where we have just wanted to get away from the world, shut ourselves in our room or someplace peaceful, and take a break from the outside world. Unfortunately, celebrities do not have that choice. Their days are already planned out for them; press conferences, traveling to go to their next tour or concert, or going to the next big movie premiere and all the while, cameras are going off taking pictures of their every move. When celebrities do have the chance to have a day at home, it is not private at all, unless you count a camera man in the bushes of their backyard private. Even when they want to take a private vacation to one of their private islands or to a tropical getaway, the press are the first ones to greet them coming off the jet. How they found out about the trip in the first place is the one question that can never be answered, but the only assumption
that can made is that eyes and ears are everywhere they walk, step, and breathe. Nothing in Hollywood can be kept a secret. You may be asking yourself how much farther this can go. Pascal Rostain, a paparazzi photographer of over 30 years, took the game to a new level when he began stealing celebrities’ garbage bags and then taking pictures of the contents inside. Does the world really need to know what is inside of peoples’ garbage cans? I can guarantee that whatever is inside of their garbage bags are the things that we the people throw away on a daily basis. As surprising as it sounds, celebrities are normal people just like us and have the right to privacy whenever they want and should be given that option. The only difference between us and them is that they are the faces the make up the movies that we love watching five or six times or the ones that make it to the top charts in the box office. Yes, they chose this life and these are some of the consequences that come with being a star, yes some stars love all of the attention and bask in the spotlight that is on them 24/7, but everyone should have a right to privacy.

Not only do they deal with the fake stories being told about them every day, but they also have so much stress on their shoulders to not make a mistake or to not make a fool out of themselves. Just last week, the story about Solange Knowles attacking sister Beyonce Knowles’ husband Jay-Z was all over the world:
Security footage obtained by TMZ shows Solange, 27, going berserk on Jay-Z, hitting and kicking the 44-year-old music mogul in a fit of hysteria following a Met Gala after-party inside Chelsea's Standard Hotel.
The hotel said it fired the worker who leaked the shocking video.

This was published in the New York Daily News, and as you can see, revealing this video caused the
worker his job. The footage of the attack was from an elevator camera. Just when you think you are alone and behind doors, there are always people watching. Later after the incident, Beyonce stated:
"At the end of the day, families have problems and we're no different," it said. "We love each other and, above all, we are family. We've put this behind us and hope everyone else will do the same." (NY Times) Families argue and get into fights all the time and sometimes they are much worse than what happened that night in the elevator. A story like this could shatter a stars reputation within seconds of the publication and that stress and that nightmare in celebrities’’ heads are caused by us. We are so worried and judgmental about what happens in their lives and sometimes even more worried about them than our own lives. People make mistakes all the time, we learn from them and move on with our lives, but when a huge celebrity makes one it is the end of the world and their reputation is down the drain. One bad move and one mistake that we make all the time makes a celebrity seem like a terrible person and hated for a long time. This is why the public believes that with the paparazzi around them all the time is a good thing that way they don't do anything stupid and go wild, but that's the reason why they do crazy things. For example, when your parents tell you no you can't do something and you feel restricted, that makes you want to do it even more. It's almost the same thing, but since celebrities feel restricted and feel like they can not go anywhere because they will get caught, they want to do it even more. This could also lead into more problems future.

As previously stated, some stars do enjoy the spotlight and love all the attention that is on them, but even though they chose this lifestyle that does not mean that their kids wanted this lifestyle. What about the celebrities that don't want their lives being invaded into, and what about their kids? Their kids are stars as soon as the are born and grew up with the cameras always on them. For example, Kate Middleton married into the royal family, had a baby and now the baby is going grow up with it his whole life whether he likes it or not. His life will never be normal even if he wants it to be, he will never know what it is like to have a normal life. Another example is the struggle to find the legal guardian for Blanket, Prince and Paris Jackson (Michael Jackson's kids). After suffering the loss of their father and seeing him on the news for a month straight, there is also stories being made about their family fighting over which family member should be the legal guardians of the kids. "Paris said in a series of angry Twitter posts that she wasn't able to speak to her grandmother for over nine days." That isn't the only thing that children have to worry about though, if their parents were to get a divorce, the press are the first ones to know. The kids later find out about the divorce over social media or they see it on the cover of a magazine. What a great way to find out about your parents splitting up right! As much as the parents go through, the children go through it with them and that's not fair for them.

All in all, the private lives of celebrities should be off limits to the public because no one needs to be in their business and know every single thing about them, unless you are personal friends with them and have their cell number on your speed dial then by all means be my guest. Their private lives are for them to share if they want to share them. But what would be in magazines if celebrities weren't in them anymore? Things that actually matter and current events that are affecting us like global warming, the kids in our country that are going hungry, the natural disasters that leave thousands homeless every year, what’s going on with our troops overseas etc. These are the things in life that actually matter, we don't need to be worrying about Brittney Spear's new hair cut or Angelina Jolie's newly adopted son. We only live for so long and it shouldn't be wasted on worrying about the people we do not even know. Everyone has the right to live a normal life, and celebrities should be given that chance.