Digital Devotion: The New Celebrity Religion

Celebrity worship has turned into a full-time religion.

Twenty years ago, we were content just watching these people in movies or listening to their music. Now? We're glued to our phones, frantically scrolling through Instagram, TikTok, and that billionaire's vanity project formerly known as Twitter, desperately waiting for some manufactured moment of "authenticity" from people who wouldn't piss on us if we were on fire.

And we’re not just passive observers anymore. No, we’re become unpaid members of their PR teams. Millions of people spend their precious time, time they could use to improve their lives or, I don't know, talk to their actual friends, obsessing over what some millionaire had for breakfast or which other millionaire they're dating this week.

Many genuinely believe that they are part of their world. They sit there, defending these people we've never met in comment sections, getting into digital fistfights with strangers over someone who doesn't know we exist. They're celebrating their successes like they're our victories.

But here's the punchline: every moment you consume is as carefully manufactured as a fast-food commercial. That "raw and honest" social media post? It's likely written by a ghostwriter or committee and approved by several managers. These aren't moments of connection. They're products sold to you by the celebrity-industrial complex. And we're all standing in line, well, a digital one, credit cards out, desperate to buy more of this artificial intimacy. We all fall for it.

Remember, in the grand circus of celebrity culture, we're not the audience; we're the marks, and the show never stops.