Perez Hilton Textual Analysis PDF

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Final essay analyzing the Perez Hilton website and the greater implications it has on celebrity life as well as societies consumption of both the website and the celebrity as an entity....

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Harris 1

Lindsay Harris COMM 3350-01 Professor Michele White November 25, 2020 Final Textual Analysis Paper Thesis: Celebrity news platforms have not only increased our accessibility to information about the personal lives of the rich and famous, but also dehumanize these celebrities and eliminates any sort of sense of their private sphere. Furthermore, I will take a look at specific celebrities presented on the website as a means of considering the ways the Perez Hilton site constructs its subjects.

Harris 2 Perez Hilton as a Blog and a Weapon The ways in which society has produced a dependency on social media for news and recreation are immeasurable. New platforms pop up each day to satisfy various niches created for the consumer’s appetite. In recent years, it has become more acceptable to gather worldly happenings and pop culture from Twitter than from the Wall Street Journal. As a result we look to celebrities and lifestyle influencers for entertainment and information more than actual journalists and news anchors. Websites like TMZ and Reddit have become the first place people go for updates on daily occurrences. In this paper, I will analyze the website PerezHilton.com to expand on the ways in which gossip websites have removed any sort of sense of privacy for the modern day “celebrity.” Celebrity news platforms have not only increased our accessibility to information about the personal lives of the rich and famous, but also dehumanize these celebrities and eliminates any sort of sense of their private sphere. Furthermore, I will take a look at specific celebrities presented on the website such as Miley Cyrus and Lindsay Lohan as a means of considering the ways the Perez Hilton site constructs its subjects (2),(3). Additionally, the interactive sections of these websites work to engage users and make them feel entitled to commentary on these celebrities. The Perez Hilton website launched in September of 2004 and began gaining traction in the late 2000’s. It was discovered that, “Hilton's site, in 2007, was getting millions of viewers daily. His ad prices ranged from $9,000 per week for one advertisement to the highest at $45,000 per week,” (4). Today, it is reported that Perez Hilton has a net worth of roughly 20 million dollars. While this number is shocking, Perez Hilton is but a tiny fraction of what has come to be the 3 billion dollar celebrity gossip industry (5). Perez Hilton's website is a blog that receives over 4 million visitors per day (8).That being said, Perez Hilton is a pioneer of the industry and

Harris 3 can be credited with making the celebrity news blog a household establishment in today’s society. The implications that an analysis of his gossip blog suggests can have larger meanings in the study of media, technology, and the definition of “celebrity.” One of the most important facets of this website is how user friendly it is. The ways in which everything is laid out for visitors of the website ensures that they will be able to find exactly what they need. Titles at the top are kept to one word like “Quizzes” or “Gallery” so that there is no guessing in terms of what one would find through that extension (1). As the user scrolls on the homepage, the side of the website is where more specific categories are listed, such as “Hot News,” “Top Celebrities,” and “Top Videos” all of which are things that a user must seek out (1). Putting more general concepts at the top is more appealing to first time visitors, as it is not as jarring to users who may not have previously sought out information on the lives of the rich and famous. There is also a moving carousel of photos in the center of the home page to bring viewers attention to all the glamorous bodies that the site focuses their stories on. These photos simultaneously work to show visitors all the options they have when it comes to information and news about these celebrities, one of the many ways in which PerezHilton.com shows it has power as an ominous, all-knowing source. Among tabs on the home page for celebrity names like “Taylor Swift” or “Kendall Jenner” are also tabs labeled “Controversy” and “Cuteness” which act as large flashing signals for users to direct their attention to (1). By using buzzwords like these, users are likely to be enticed and curious about what lies beyond these shortcuts, and it is more probable that they will utilize these shortcuts to find out--which the creators of PerezHilton.com count on when constructing their home page. Simultaneously the creators of this site are equating entire humans to concepts of controversy; by putting “Controversy” on the same line as “Kendall Jenner” they are insinuating that they are of equal

Harris 4 importance and interest to site visitors. Additionally, the use of a carousel of celebrity images at the top of the page work to show visitors what they want instead of asking them what they want. When a user visits the website just to browse, the images at the top act as a suggestive tool to point them in various directions and narrow their field of interest. The words “STAR SEEKER” are positioned at the top of the page, next to the search bar, between two star emojis (1). This is a particularly enticing use of words, as it makes first time visitors wonder what exactly it means to seek stars while also telling returning visitors where to find the most up to date information on their favorite celebrities. It is clear that the website wants users to easily navigate the homepage to incentivize them to return time and time again. If users know that PerezHilton.com is a website that they will be able to gather information from quickly and efficiently it becomes a more desirable platform for everyday use. Therefore, it is likely the intention of the website creators to utilize strategies like this to bring users back to their blog and increase their dependency on being able to gather desirable information while visiting. “Celebrity gossip blogs enable audiences to quickly and easily engage with the latest celebrity gossip—and with each other—in ways not possible with print media. Thanks to digital technologies, gossip blogs offer a near constant stream of new information, from the mundane to the scandalous, that feeds the meaning- making processes of gossip,” (13). The frequency with which users visit the website suggests that, “Participation in these spaces allows active audiences to collectively negotiate the meanings and values of celebrities and produce alternatives to the hegemonic ideologies of gender, race, and sexuality offered by traditional celebrity media gossip outlets,” as they receive information in a more relaxed style (6). The ways in which the celebrities on these websites are depicted show them often in their most raw, natural state which gives site visitors room to construct these celebrities in a multitude of ways they may not be able

Harris 5 to if they were reading a publication like Vogue or Harper's Bazaar where a creative director chooses exactly how a celebrity is presented to its’ readers. However, these emancipated perspectives of celebrities come at the price of depriving them of their private spheres. Perez Hilton’s website does not hesitate in relation to pulling back the curtain into the lives of the rich and famous, as the words “GOT A TIP?” are positioned in the upper left hand corner, indicating they are willing to take information from anyone who might have one (1). Even further, this insinuates that they care very little about the credibility of the sources from which they receive their information. This can be used to say that PerezHilton.com is more concerned with providing a provocative story than they are with reporting factual events. As Kavita Nayar points out, “celebrity gossip bloggers do not report celebrity news, they report about it,” thus their cultural production is intrinsically linked to, and dependent on, the perpetuated system of celebrity production in media and society (6). The concept of peeking into the personal lives of people in the public eye is generally intrusive, however over time it has become something accepted by the public and is considered a part of “being famous.” Additionally these practices allow for, “Celebrity [to] become the text through which we reaffirm dominant ideas about the “right” way to live, even if the celebrity provides us with a negative example,” meaning that the existence of PerezHilton.com can serve as the standard to look up to in order to discern how one is “supposed” to act based on a user’s favorite celebrity (7). Thus, the habitual visitation to this blog can act as an instruction manual of sorts to its users by reading stories of those that they admire and how they live their own personal lives. However, one study found that the increased visitation to websites like these in addition to, “Mass media often portray celebrities and their lifestyles as glamorous, a misperception for

Harris 6 viewers that may result in their having a lower self-concept or greater dissatisfaction in life,” (8). In this way, PerezHilton.com can foster a sense of self-loathing amongst visitors who find themselves consistently comparing their lives to those of the celebrities shown in the stories on the homepage. Nina Wakeford reinforces this idea when she states that references how the overlaps of television, the internet, and personal computing have led to a rhetoric of technological ‘convergence’ (9). When users frequent the PerezHilton website, it is possible that the lines between personal lives and internet news consumption blur, leaving users with difficulty discerning their lives from that of the ones that they read about when visiting this website. The ways that readers connect to the stories that they find on PerezHilton.com are a reflection of what they are looking for, it is possible that the website presents an ability to escape for them by reading about these glamorous experiences. In this readers can try to imagine themselves as one of the stars being written about, and the continual consumption of these stories may allow for them to believe they have actually become one of these stars. However, this same vehicle that allows them to escape also reminds them of what they in fact do not have. The colors on the homepage of the PerezHilton website are also worth noting. A hot pink and bright yellow are the colors primarily used for headings and sectioning off respective portions of the page (1). The use of these highlighter hues are consistent throughout the website, no matter what page is visited. These colors are powerful and aggressive in ways that grab someone’s attention at first glance. Much like children and bright colors in television and video games, teenagers and adults can be sucked in by this use of neon coloring that is not traditionally used on other more conventional websites. Similarly, PerezHilton’s use of quizzes on their website helps to emulate these inviting feelings for visitors and encourage a playful atmosphere that will bring them back and perpetuate usage. Interestingly enough, when clicking on these

Harris 7 quizzes, it is apparent that they are based in no factual reasoning and instead based on an aesthetic based algorithm, suggesting that the website values optics and visuals over facts and evidence. The use of these colors is not only a way in which PerezHilton controls visitors' gaze, but it can also be used to soften the shock factor of the information shared on the page by comparison. While the news users are likely consuming on the site can be jarring or shocking, using colors that are equally aggressive can soften the intensity of the information itself by comparison. One of the major facets of the PerezHilton website is the ability to look into every archived story about a particular celebrity that the website has ever posted. This acts as a history book for the lives of celebrities. Perez Hilton’s articles about Lindsay Lohan in the late 2000’searly 2010’s is a major point of fame for his blog (3). When utilizing the “Star Seeker” option to find articles about Lindsay Lohan, it brings the user to a dedicated page with stories dating years back. The top of the page has a similar carousel of images to that of the home page, however this one is specifically dedicated to images of Lindsay Lohan and her escapades from throughout the years. There are images of her family and pictures from when she has been arrested as well as current photos of the star. Additionally, a user is able to use this page to sift through stories of Lohan from well over a decade. For example, a user would be able to access stories of Lindsay Lohan’s arrest(s), particularly those following her DUI in July of 2010. The way that PerezHilton reports on the story speaks to the way that the website depicts addiction as a “disease or a bad choice that requires the punitive rehabilitative response: coerced treatment and jail,” (10). Similarly, we must come to understand the ways in which, “The interactive nature of celebrity gossip blogs makes them important sites for understanding the complexity of the construction of social problems,” (7). While PerezHilton.com is so willing to dehumanize celebrities by writing

Harris 8 about their personal issues and experiences, the site also actively demonizes these celebrities in order to gain more attention from readers. Oftentimes, this comes at the expense of female celebrities. Overall, female celebrities are the center of stories on PerezHilton.com far more often than their male counterparts. This pattern indicates that, to PerezHilton, the lives of female stars is more valuable in some ways than male stars. Female celebrities like Lindsay Lohan are depicted frequently and without censors, showcasing the ways in which PerezHilton.com uses “Women’s bodies as leverage to intimidate, shame, and discredit them,” (11). When initially reporting on Lohan’s arrest, Perez Hilton wrote in a post, “Lindsay Lohan sentenced to jail!!! Damn!!!…The hard-pAArtying actress was also ordered to serve an additional 90 days at an in-patient rehab treatment…jail AND rehab will do her good!” (10). This language promotes the idea that as a female she is messy and out of control, language frequently used by PerezHilton.com in reference to females. These habits reinforces ideas that technology provides cis men like Perez Hilton with power, specifically in relation to women who do not want or need to be controlled (11). It speaks to the message that the blog contributors want to send to readers when it comes to women: they are constantly making mistakes which need to be corrected by the general public on a global stage. Perez Hilton also has an extensive page on Miley Cyrus with the same rotating carousel showing pictures of the star over the years (2). Interestingly enough, there are new stories about Cyrus posted every single day on her page. This shows the prioritization over specific celebrities based on what is currently happening in pop culture. Additionally it shows that the gossip blog is more focused on pumping out a high volume of stories instead of ensuring that the stories they do produce are of a higher quality. This is likely because the site assumes readers value fluff pieces revolving around current trends than those of thoughtful significance. Moreover, a

Harris 9 majority of stories throughout the Miley Cyrus archive revolve around the musician’s relationship status and the men she has been seen with in public. While Cyrus is a wildly successful and established musician, the PerezHilton website “is less concerned with uncovering the female stars’ "real" self and more interested in raising questions about her life choices and personal motivations,” (12). Websites like these focus on aspects of female stars that speak very little to their talent or accomplishment and instead prioritize scandal and mystery about their love life or physical bodies. The language PerezHilton.com uses in these stories and the stories they choose to publish themselves consistently work to use the bodies of female celebrities against themselves and without consent; further these blogs provide a place for attacks on celebrities like Miley Cyrus and Lindsay Lohan forcing them to uphold the constant duty to take their body and rights “back” from the internet (11). However, the rhetoric used on the website suggests that male stars are not subject to the same scrutiny and their stories do not rely as heavily on the pursuit of their romantic interests. These smaller, subliminal tendencies are what contribute to the larger issue of PerezHilton.com as a weapon that dehumanizes celebrities, who are in fact real people with emotional responses to the ways they are written about online. The lack of moderation on these websites works to reinforce these constructions of celebrities' loss of privacy and selfhood. Not only are writers of these posts encouraged to use an unprofessional tone with passages like, “Daaang! It’s not clear if Miley was serious or just being flirty,” but they also continually make suggestions on how celebrities should be living their life in an “ideal” way, “Wouldn’t it be amazing if this was Miley’s next longterm relationship,” (2). The interactive portions of every article posted on PerezHilton.com also play an important role in their power, as it allows “Audiences [to] have the ‘power to make meaning,’ and can enable and, importantly, disable celebrities through the interaction made possible by the digital world,” (10).

Harris 10 Not only does that encourage readers to access these websites because of the nonexistent barrier to communication, but it also allows for readers to dehumanize celebrities by commenting on articles about them without giving these celebrities an opportunity to speak on it or defend themselves. Furthermore, the way that celebrities are spoken about so casually may lead readers to think they are friends or peers, as if they actually know the celebrities being written about. The patterns on PerezHilton.com could potentially make frequent visitors believe that they have a right to know what happens in celebrities' lives and offer criticism accordingly. Erin Meyer discusses the idea that, “Though audiences never actually know the celebrities they admire (or revile), celebrity culture is built upon an “insistent question of ‘really’” in which the mediated image is searched for the “true” individual at its core” (13). These feelings work to emphasize how celebrities are revoked of their right to their own private sphere, as gossip blogs make their visitors feel as though they know what is going on in these celebrities' lives. Celebrity gossip blogs have become more accessible than ever with the evolution of technology; everyone is able to visit one on their smartphone or personal computer. New media has enabled these news sites to monopolize the celebrity information sector so much so that they are the first platforms that pop up in conjunction with searching a star’s name. PerezHilton.com utilizes a number of tactics to hold the viewer's attention and encourage them to return to the site over and over for information. Bright colors controlling the different pages and a circuit of photos that is constantly moving through the home page keep the viewer intrigued and wondering what they may stumble upon next. The gossip blog also employs a number of interactive measures which work to engage and entertain readers in ways other than the gossip content that they originally visited the website for. These colors and activities resemble a childlike gaming site for adults, which suggest that PerezHilton’s blog is one for pleasure and

Harris 11 entertainment, almost like a rewarding activity to take part in which distracts from the mundane routines of the average person. Through language which promotes the degradation of female bodies and questioning of their morals, we can see that the website places very little value on factual evidence. This emphasis on the commentary of the female body works to dehumanize its subjects. Furthermore, we are able to deduce from the high volume of stories about women that they profit more from female stars than those of their male counterparts. Even more interestin...