I was driving east (or was it south? I can never get that straight) on the 101 the other day on my way home from work, tuned (as usual) to a radio station with frequent traffic reports. As I was passing Coldwater Canyon, word came of a "terrible accident being cleared up" north- (or was it west-?) bound at Cahuenga that had traffic snarled... and I knew that, even though I was headed in the opposite direction, I could expect to get home at least 15 minutes later than I had previously expected.
So I was ready as I sped downhill past the Highland off-ramp, and sure enough, traffic on my side of the road was already beginning to slow. And since I was going downhill, I could see the beginning of the problem: Even though there wasn't a single police car on (what I feel it's safe to call) the southbound side of the freeway, dimwits northbound in all six lanes were slowing down and even stopping, craning their necks to try to catch a glimpse, over the squatty center median, of what was happening.
And there I was, behind them... and since I could see exactly why they were stopping, I started leaning on my horn.
Now I'd like to think that the reason all these good citizens were pausing in their busy commute home to take in a little of the carnage in the opposite lanes was because they hoped to learn something from the scene that would prevent the involvement of themselves in a similar snafu sometime in the future.
I'd like to think that... but Mrs. Kernes didn't raise no dummies. The reason these aching-for-a-rear-ender waterheads were putting their own lives in jeopardy was (people tell me) a "very human desire" to have "a real kick and good for laughs and lashing of the ultra-violence" while "viddying the red, red krovvy," as Alex deLarge might have put it.
Then there's me (and, I suspect, one or two of you), who doesn't feel that urge, who's in a lane behind them all, beeping away.
So I think it is with people who like to read gossip columns: looking for blood in all the right places.
And then there's me, beeping.
Gossip as a medium creeps me out. Gossip as an institution creeps me out even more - and I don't think it's a "very human desire" at all; I think it's a learned perversion.
Without hauling Dr. Freud too far out of his grave, I can't imagine a person who's reasonably at peace with him/herself and reasonably confident of his/her own abilities and philosophy giving a rat's ass about why Starlet Y has split with Boyfriend Z, or whether Actress Q is unhappy in her contract with Studio R or Website S. Certainly, if one knew any of these people personally, one might want to commiserate with the putatively aggrieved - assuming one were on intimate-enough terms to have been told directly about the predicament. That's human nature; solicitousness from afar isn't. You don't "feel their pain."
Perhaps the best recent example is this Rough Sex brouhaha, which you can read all about in this issue. (Sometimes the line between gossip and news is rather thin. I usually prefer to err on the side of sticking my big nose out of things.)
The controversy started (where else?) on r.a.m.e. (rec.arts.movies.erotica, an Internet newsgroup) with Ridley99, and perhaps others, who aren't even in the porn biz, nonetheless expressing their opinions on how the industry should be run. Nothing particularly wrong with that; ignorance is usually bliss, and those reading the posts who are in the industry should have had enough sense to give said opinions as much weight as if those same persons had expressed a liking for, say, strawberries.
But then Linda Thoren, an actual porn star, jumped into the fray, claiming her boyfriend had interviewed Jewel Valmont, and that Valmont had been forced to do things during the taping of Rough Sex 1 that she hadn't contracted for or been warned of. (Thoren: "[I]n Europe we call these things rape.... ") One has to read the letter somewhat carefully to distinguish Thoren's own opinions from what she claims Valmont told her boyfriend - Valmont later denied most of what Thoren wrote - but if there's one thing too many gossip mavens seem notoriously poor at, it's reading what's on the printed phosphors.
One need only recall, in February, Mara Epstein's complete misreading of a John T. Bone interview on Gene Ross' site, about which she felt the (gossipy) need to inform Jasmin St. Claire, which led to an angry call from the volatile star to Ross, castigating Bone for saying Jasmin was a drug addict - when Bone had actually said the exact opposite. And then there was the discussion of whether Elegant's new fisting movie would actually show the act itself, which several r.a.m.e.rs were absolutely-positively sure it wouldn't. And a post-titled "Candy Apples Has HIV?" isn't too inflammatory, is it?
Of course, Thoren's letter first appeared on a Website the owner of which, a self-described "journalist," has publicly admitted both that he lies and that he cares little whether what he posts has any basis in fact - which should have been another clue to the Net-set of Boobus Americanus not to take seriously too much of what's written there. But then, people who take gossip seriously aren't well known for their cluefulness.
And now it appears that at least a couple of other gossip sites are due to debut, if they haven't already, not to mention a few chat sites - which, after all, are little more than gossip in real-time - since there seems to be plenty of the "red, red krovvy" to go around.
Now don't get me wrong: I have nothing against sites where the contributors know what they're talking about - you know, where they actually investigate and speak to the participants in all sides of a controversy? -or ones that review tapes, discuss perceived trends in the industry, or give contributors' preferences for one star's tits over another's - even some interesting posts detailing which scenes and bits are being cut out of Vivid movies when they go to catalog or DVD.
But personally, I'd like to see the sites where vindictive dimbulbs get vicarious thrills out of posting other people's misery to just call it quits.
That's my opinion. YMMV - but I will be behind you, beeping.
