If you haven’t noticed, I love television and movies. I love the art that allows people to be different from who they really are in order to entertain us.
But I also recognize the reality that they are just as human as we are. They can suffer from the same insecurities and maladies that we do.
That being said, I absolutely hate waiting in grocery check out lines. You might be saying, “Lizzie? What the actual f does grocery lines have to do with actors???”
Glad you asked.
When we’re in those annoying grocery lines, attempting to wait patiently, we are inundated with tabloids and magazines that splash the most ridiculous rumors or scandalizing tidbits about celebrities and famous individuals in our faces. Hey Millennials! Clickbait has been around longer than you have!
I am sick of seeing these covers raking the British Royal 👑 family over the coals. I am sick of them blasting politicians and actors and athletes and performers for their distinctly private embarrassments and heart-wrenching private moments. And although I really, really abhor the President, I am sick of the blind praise or blind hatred plastered on those covers. I am sick of the paparazzo! 📸
I refuse to pay money for something that is spreading information to the public that has the potential to destroy another human being’s perception of self, self-confidence, or sense of well being. What really blows my mind as well is that right next to these publications destroying others are other publications advertising ways of building oneself up in mind and body. What a mixed message!!!!
I too catch myself on the Internet opening clickbait links and when I realize what I am doing, I stop. By clicking on those links, I am letting the authors of the salacious content know that they should just keep on disseminating their bull 💩. I am just as guilty as anyone else.
I have found a way to ignore the grocery line clickbait and bring me back to more normalizing behavior online: audiobooks.
I don’t just love the visual arts of acting. I also love the written word and have a revolving door of audiobooks (for convenience sake) in my Libby app. 🎧
When I am at the store, I spend the entire trip ‘reading’ the latest installment of a series or a completely new to me series or even some standalone story recommended by my friends’ Goodreads lists. I have also been known to open Spotify and listen to podcasts like The History Chicks or LeVar Burton Reads.
If I have to wait in a line at checkout, I continue to listen while keeping my eyes glued to a few levels of Gardenscapes, Simon’s Cat, or even Game of Sultans. I use audiobooks and app games to escape what I can’t control.
Apparently today I also felt the need to speak out. 📣
In the next few months those tabloids and magazines are going to splash Kobe, his daughter, his family, and the other victims across their covers.
Some are going to make it all about Kobe. Some are going to make his surviving family members stand center stage and pick them apart. (Shame on them.) Some stories are going to make claims designed to make us think less of him, think less of the other victims, and make us think we have the right to assign some kind of blame.
As humans we tend to need answers, even when it has nothing to do with us. We want to place blame somewhere. We need to have someone to rant and rave at in our frustration and grief.
I am not a huge sports fan, (although I am a blindly loyal Packers 🧀 Fan who couldn’t tell you a single stat!) but even I know Mr. Bryant did amazing things for the sports industry 🏀 and used his influence to better the world around him, although I could not tell you a single anecdote about something he did.
I encourage you today to take a moment and think kind thoughts about your loved ones. Then take a moment and try to find a kind thought for someone you can’t stand. We’re all members of the human race and deserve a bit of understanding and compassion.
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