by Y Tian

Created on: December 12, 2007

She's filthy rich. She's famous. She's beautiful. She's Paris Hilton.

You might hate her. You might think she's famous for all the wrong reasons or even worse, no reason at all. You might think she's the world's biggest idiot and a waste of oxygen. But you cannot, repeat cannot, take away the fact that she is clever enough to profit from her fame. While she is the closest thing to a real-lfe barbie as any individuals can be, she is working and earning the big bucks. Sure, you might argue that singing, producing perfumes with her name attached as a label and acting in dubious reality TV shows don't count as "real" work, what she has accomplished is far more than most of us can hope in an entire lifetime. She is almost a living, breathing brand.

I have to admit that what Paris did was stupid, selfish and irresponsible. In addition, her jail sentence was light compared to what she really deserved and her living conditions were probably better than most other prisoners. But does that affect the question as to whether or not she should be able to profit from the media attention on her jail-time reflections? I think not.

Just because the general public do not like her and think she is a waste of space doesn't mean she shouldn't be able to profit from the media attention. I mean, the whole reason she is able to do this is because we as consumers are interested in her actions. Before you put on a hypocritical face and start arguing otherwise, think - why would the media want to give her millions of dollars for her jail-time reflections? Simple: because we will buy. You have to admit that we are interested in her. After all, isn't that we are having this heated debate in the first place? So if we're interested and the media is willing to pay, Paris is a fool not to agree.

Let me conclude with a simple question: if we were in her position and we came out of jail with the prospect of making big bucks from the media, wouldn't we grab the chance with both hands? It's just a pity the media isn't interested in us normal individuals. So before you slam Paris down, think what would you do in her position?

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