15 SECONDS OF FAME

Andy Warhol said that “In the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes” but it seems that for many 15 seconds is all they want or can get. At any major sporting event there will always be someone photobombing – deliberately getting into someone else’s photo.

Every piece of coverage of the England/Italy soccer final showed someone jumping in front of the person reporting the event and most of them seemed overly excited and in many cases affected by alcohol. This was a minor annoyance that interrupted the reporting.

The problem is that it can be dangerous as shown by the silly person who held a sign in front of cyclists in the first stage of the Tour de France causing a large number of riders to fall over at speed and the eventual withdrawal of three riders due to injuries they received then. They were a coward and ran away rather than helping, but the law has caught up with them. This was a major annoyance and dangerous.

We also read stories of people wanting fame from their great Instagram photo and taking major risks, sometimes fatally for that photo. This is a minor nuisance but can be fatal.

What’s wrong with just being a normal person and leaving a normal and safe life? I’m not famous, nor do I want to be and yet I live a happy life.

Dennis Fitzgerald,
Melbourne, Australia