Long Live Privacy

This year, Jodie Foster was given the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Golden Globes. Now, this is a woman who's been in the spotlight forever. In her speech, she made references to reality stars of today and joked maybe she could have a reality show of her own someday. She's a gay Hollywood star with two kids. Who could be a better contender for her own reality show? But Jodie Foster has fifty years worth of experience to her credit, most of it gathered in front of the camera and in red carpets and public events. In her life, there never really was a normal period. It was always a big circus out on public display. In spite of all this, Foster was reminiscent of a time when attention-seeking people didn't need to be on TV all day, when watching someone's private life wasn't a big industry and when people weren't so willing to sell themselves to get noticed. Before saying her obligatory thank yous, Foster gave a shout out to privacy, urging it to stay strong in a time when it's least valued.

Now, we're not reality TV stars and we're not famous, but we all have a tendency to sometimes act like our lives are shows. Admit it. We all gossip like old ladies. We talk about other people's private matters as if it's our right. To be honest, I agree this can be entertaining and even acceptable to a certain limit, but limits are always easy to cross. Things often start out as jokes a.d then become to big to handle. Have you ever seen that movie 'Easy A'. It's about this girl who tries to help her gay friend by pretending to date him and soon other people (mostly outcasts in the high school universe) start asking her to help them in the same way. The girl soon becomes the school slut and that's okay for a while, but then what she realizes that nobody's really interested in the real her anymore. They're just interested in the image she has.

The truth is that we never know people well enough to judge them. We all have our secrets and struggles, things that make us who we are and still stay hidden. It's everybody's right to be reserved about some things and it's everybody else's duty to respect that. That's what privacy is all about. So next time we indulge in a salacious rumor, think about the same thing happening to you and you'll see that maybe privacy really does need to live on.