Deep in the soul of every spectator is the sense that life has no
significance without the light of celebrity upon it. The aim of the
most primal of specifically human needs — to be acknowledged, to
matter — has been appropriated by the celebrity class....
Celebrities say and do the only things we have in common...
Celebrities coin the terms, gestures, and attitudes through which
spectators must define themselves. Spectators live derived lives....
Why do voters stay at home? It is demeaning for insider-spectators to
participate as if they were taken in, to act the part of the ordinary
person that celebrity politicians address so unctuously..."
-- Thomas de Zengotita The Nation 12/2/96 p15-16