Everyone has dreams of being famous, to have all the lights and cameras on you, to be the star of your own show called Life, but no one truly understands the gravity of having so many eyes on you all the time.
It is difficult to go from a normal life to being thrown into the spotlight, especially for children.
The music industry has a reputation for exploiting its stars for a cash grab, and children with talent are at the front of the line.
With the constant coutdown for young pop stars or celebrities to turn 18, society has slowly normalized the obsession with young stars.
At the age of 17, Britney Spears became a teenage sex symbol with her debut single “Baby One More Time” taking the world by storm and solidfying her place not only in pop, but in society’s grimy hands.
You couldn’t go anywhere without someone talking about Spears and the way she was dressed.
Interviewers did nothing but talk about her sex life and wondered if she was still a virgin, and in one interview in 1999, on TROS TV, an interviewer, Ivo Niehe, who was 55 at the time, asked 17-year-old Britney about her breasts.
Not only was the question inappropriate for a kid, but no one at the time batted an eye, and the interview moved on like nothing ever happened.
Later in 2021, when “Framing Britney Spears” was released, Niehe made a statement saying that the clip was used out of context and that there were rumors at the time that Spears had implants, and the interview gave her the space to counter said rumors and that “the atmosphere after the interview was good, and her management was more than happy.”
Even if it was a ploy to have Spears address the rumors, I feel it was done in a distasteful way, and why would her management want her to address them?
It’s not like it helped with anything but made her uncomfortable, and I wish I could say that the world grew from this and started to protect children in the spotlight, but it just got worse with the rise of the internet.
Jusin Bieber was 15 when his EP “My World” was released, and he became a global obsession.
The obsession was so fierce that a term, “Bieber fever,” was used to describe how intense his fan base was, with girls all over the world going into a frenzy just to be near the young performer.
This fixation spread to adults as well as Bieber’s popularity became widespread across not only the nation but the world.
In an interview with Mojo in the Morning, the radio hosts asked if Bieber’s mom had talked to him about the birds and the bees, then proceeded to ask the 15-year-old to describe sex to them.
Bieber would express his discomfort and fire back by saying, “Why do you want to know the sex talk from a 15-year-old boy? That’s pretty weird.”
This is just one incident where Bieber was put into a position where you can see just how uncomfortable he is, and this would continue to get worse throughout his career.
Being famous means young stars needing to have tough skin because the media doesn’t see you as an actual person. Instead, they are seen as a prop in a reality TV series, and to have children be a part of that show is a disaster waiting to happen.
People should be able to look back at their childhood with fondness and admiration for the memories they made, not with disdain and discomfort. Celebrities are not afforded this luxury, unfortunately because of their popualrity.The most sad part is that kids are still being used today. With the growth of the internet, it’s easier to make a video and post it.
These kids should be able to enjoy their youth instead of trading it for fame.