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Feb. 8, 2013

Rabbi Berel Wein: Lofty ideals must be followed with grounded applications

Clifford D. May: Letter from the West Bank
Steve Rothaus: Judge OKs plan for gay man, lesbian couple to be on girl's birth certificate
Gloria Goodale: States consider drone bans: Overreaction or crucial for privacy rights?
Environmental Nutrition Editors: Don't buy the aloe vera juice hype
Michael Craig Miller, M.D.: Harvard Experts: Regular exercise pumps up memory, too
Erik Lacitis: Vanity plates: Some take too much license
The Kosher Gourmet by Susie Middleton: Broccoflower, Carrot and Leek Ragout with Thyme, Orange and Tapenade is a delightful and satisfying melange of veggies, herbs and aromatics
Feb. 6, 2013

Nara Schoenberg: The other in-law problem

Frank J. Gaffney Jr. : A see-no-jihadist for the CIA
Kristen Chick: Ahmadinejad visits Cairo: How sect tempers Islamist ties between Egypt, Iran
Roger Simon: Ed Koch's lucky corner
Heron Marquez Estrada: Robot-building sports on a roll
Patrick G. Dean, M.D.: Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: How to restore body's ability to secrete insulin
Sharon Palmer, R.D.: 3 prostate-protecting diet tips
The Kosher Gourmet by Emma Christensen 7 principles for to help you make the best soup ever in a slow cooker
Feb. 4, 2013

Jonathan Tobin: Can Jewish Groups Speak Out on Hagel?

David Wren: Findings of government study, released 3 days before Newtown shooting, at odds with gun-control crusaders
Kristen Chick: Tahrir becomes terrifying, tainted
Curtis Tate and Greg Gordon: US keeps building new highways while letting old ones crumble
David G. Savage: Supreme Court to hear case on arrests, DNA
Harvard Health Letters: Neck and shoulder pain? Know what it means and what to do
Andrea N. Giancoli, M.P.H., R.D.: Eat your way to preventing age-related muscle loss
The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington Baked Pears in Red Wine and Port Wine Glaze: A festive winter dessert
Feb. 1, 2013

Rabbi Dr. Tzvi Hersh Weinreb: Redemption

Clifford D. May Home, bloody, home
Christa Case Bryant andNicholas Blanford Why despite Syria's allies warning of retaliation for Israeli airstrikes, the threats are likely hollow
Rick Armon, Ed Meyer and Phil Trexler Ex-police captain cleared by DNA test is freed after nearly 15 years
Harvard Health Letters: Could it by your thyroid?
Sharon Palmer, R.D.: When 'healthy food' isn't
Sue Zeidler: Coke ad racist? Arab-American groups want to yank Super Bowl ad (INCLUDES VIDEO)
The Kosher Gourmet by Nealey Dozier The secret of this soup is the garnish
January 30, 2013

Allan Chernoff: Celebrating 'Back from the Dead Day'

America isn't a religious country? Don't tell Superbowl fans!
Mark Clayton Cybercrime takedown!
Germany remembers Hitler rise to power
Israel salutes U. N. --- with the one finger salute
Sharon Palmer, R.D.: Get cookin' with heart-healthy fats
Ballot riles Guinness World Records
The Kosher Gourmet by Elizabeth Passarella Potato, Squash and Goat Cheese Gratin
January 28, 2013

Nancy Youssef: And Democracy for all? Two years on, Egypt remains in state of chaos

Fred Weir: Putin: West is fomenting jihadi 'blowback'
Meredith Cohn: Implantable pain disk may help those with cancer
Michael Craig Miller, M.D. : Ask the Harvard Experts: Are there drugs to help control binge eating?
David Ovalle Use of controversial 'brain mapping' technology stymied
Jane Stancill: Professor's logic class has 180,000 friends
David Clark Scott Lego Racism?
The Kosher Gourmet by Mario Batali The celebrated chef introduces us to PANZEROTTI PUGLIESI, cheese-stuffed pastry from Italy's south


Jewish World Review June 29, 2007 / 13 Tamuz, 5767

Taking Paris seriously

By Betsy Hart


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | Paris Hilton says that being in lockup for a few weeks was traumatic. I think being shot at in Iraq would be traumatic — not taking a little time off from having every whim satisfied on a whim. Nonetheless, different folks have different levels of trauma-handling ability. She apparently reached hers. (The lovely Paris was sent to jail for driving on a suspended license following a DUI charge. And good for that judge.)


The fact that Paris Hilton takes herself seriously — she once spoke of "retiring" (and I wondered: "From what?") — is not what's offensive. Socialites have been doing that for decades, I suppose.


What offends me is that anybody, sometimes it seems everybody, takes her — and, for that matter, her "sisters," Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan — seriously to the point of obsession.


And so while the young heiress whose claim to acting fame comes from starring in a TV reality show about herself — her real claim to fame is accidentally starring in an Internet sex video — was in jail, we regularly heard about her schedule, her meals, her outbursts. Just before her sentence of some 23 days was up, one headline read: "The World Awaits Paris' Release."


Please tell me the World has better things to wait for.


Then she got a prime spot on CNN's "Larry King Live" this week. Or rather, King got her for a scripted interview. In the world of media, Paris Hilton, especially Paris Hilton right after jail, is what's known as a huge "get."


Why?


Thanks to media saturation and the Internet, we can see every (ugly) detail of a celebrity's life. In particular, gone are the days when Tiger Beat ruled magazine picks of young girls (and we read upbeat stories of our favorite young crushes). Now it's Paris in jail and Lindsay passed out and drooling in a car, almost in real time. Surely at least some young girls are thinking, "Wow — you can act like that and be rich and famous and have fans? Note to self ..."


Society has always been obsessed with celebrity and celebrity shallowness; now this is all just easier to get ahold of. In that sense, the Internet gossip sprees are not unlike pornography. The latter has always been there. But when I was growing up, a teenager might get ahold of a Playboy magazine and it had to last the entire neighborhood of high-school boys about two years. Today with the Internet, the floodgates have opened and it's 24/7.


In an earlier age when the gossip rags had limited pages and television limited channels and news minutes, Paris, who can't sing or act, might not have made it onto them as easily. Now, the almost infinite media of television and the Internet are aching for content. And she and her cohorts provide it, well, 24/7.


That's when you realize more than ever that, as a parent, society can't do our job for us. I don't try to use Paris Hilton as an object lesson, or at least I don't stop there. This isn't really about her. In fact, she might have some really positive qualities — we just would never hear about them in today's media world. That's the point: The Paris Hilton coverage is more than anything else a symptom of the problem that our culture values, or at least is obsessed with, the wrong things, and those wrong things are more available than ever.


I want my girls — and my son — to value what matters. I want them to value excellence in any good thing, including the entertainment world. But most of all, I want them to value excellence in character. News flash: I can't let a world defined by Paris Hilton change what's true for the "world" of my children and me. A world obsessed with her may make my job harder. But it is still ultimately up to me, no matter how the culture is raising up Paris and her friends, to raise my kids to stand up to the world and think through making wise value judgments on their own.

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