Good article. The more I learn about this woman the more she makes me angry. Firstly, although my politics are usually left-libertarian, I turn into a law-and-order conservative when it comes to driving offences - especially drink driving offences. I was disgusted when Hilton got a derisory sentence. I should have got up a petition to extend her time in the big house.

Secondly, isn't it interesting when Hilton or Jessica Simpson or the Pussycat Dolls "sing", they are usually half naked and making sexual poses in their film clips. Justin Timberlake or any number of male Black American Hip-Hop artists are fully clothed. No pouting or stripping off for them. Or to put it another way, if Timberlake acted like the Pussycat Dolls on screen he would be assumed to be gay ie: not a "real" man. But if Jessica Simpson acts like, well, Jessica Simpson then that's regarded as normal for a young woman. Age-old double standards.

Great article, but a couple of small corrections:
a. this person hardly EARNS $10m pa!
B. I understand she went to some joke "end poverty now" concert and was widely photographed with all the other "celebrity" attendees, so she is ipso facto a leading authority on the issue.
Cheers
RodC

Melinda,

I really think that you and those who share your views of Paris Hilton are completely missing the point.

Paris Hilton is actually a parody of consumerism. Weather by design or accident (or a bit of both) she is actually taking the micky out of her shallow contemporaries and their seemingly meaningless existences.

The fact that people like you bite just adds to the fact that she has hit on a real winner with her approach. She has millions of adoring fans and millions of others talking about her - she wins either way. To me this is actually the geneous of the Paris phenomenon!

The fact is Paris Hilton (Pty Ltd) is one of the most successful marketing icons on the planet. I for one whould love to earn $10m a year (especially if it was by sleeping with goodlooking people and partying - a dream job by my standards)

I think its great that she shows girls the truth that most recreational drug users, sexually liberated and fun-loving people are actually not messed up losers with nothing in life - but many of us are highly successful individuals who contribute a lot to society. I love the way she gives 2 big fingers to the puritanical anti-fun brigade and shows that most headonists are harmless, normal people.

People should just accept that liberated, attractive, young people will have a lot of sex and probably love partying - Its been the same story since the dawn of time.

The trouble is Paris Hilton will be a loser when she gets old. All the millions in the world and regular cosmetic surgery will not alter that. Anyone seen pictures of Farrah Fawcett lately? Case in point. Nobody likes old women. Men can get away with ageing much more so (except in cases where they traded on their looks when younger and then pathetically try to preserve their looks when they were 20 at age 60).

Anyhow, it's so great to see her in the slammer. A friend of my parents had a son who was killed by a drunken driver. So I'm not exactly sympathetic to privileged parasites who think that laws most of us have to obey don't apply to them.

Melinda: Another article which echoes most of my thoughts and concerns. You say: " The American Psychological Association has found the sexual objectification of girls leads to academic failure, depression, eating disorders and poor self-image."

Yes that’s reasonable. And also the possible swaying and consequent early introduction of young girls to drugs can also cause most of these problems too. Hilton‘s association with drugs more or less advocates such self- destructive behaviour. Her behaviour suggests that the reliance on addictive drugs for pleasure is a positive lifestyle. She has a gullible and often easily influenced audience and for the media to wrap her foolishness in a positive light reflects poorly on their adherence to any code of ethics.

It is also true that the most influential people in a girl’s life are her parents? Why don't we hear more about the parenting methods of the Hiltons? This is something that a lot of poorer families must wonder about. We always hear about wealthy parents getting their kids off from crimes that poorer kids go to jail for. Moreover, if they were indigenous or the flannel-shirt brigade, we'd hear all about their lack of parenting skills.

I think this question goes a lot deeper than Paris Hilton’s behaviour influencing young girls; it goes to why aren’t young girls more resilient to such nonsense and others’ opinions? While feminists are “kicking against the pricks” so to speak and doing their bit, it seems to me that young men need to show their distaste for inauthentic and pretentious girls like Hilton. The alternative music and media are making some inroads into transforming society by helping develop more resilient and self-assured youngsters who see the Hiltons of this world for the weak drug-dependant false fools that they are, but the mainstream media is holding back progress.

“Be what you are
Don’t let heroes get your kicks for you
It’s up to you and no one else
Everyone is someone”

Why don’t the mainstream play more positive, albeit alternative, lyrics like these? No money in young girls wearing the same black tee shirt all week?

Paris had an accident, reverted back to age sixteen. And it was - all in all, safe and warm.

She went into the slammer and in a mirror looked and started to scream. A similar thing happened to me when I was of the age thirteen. The reflection held a picture of a man Of two hundred and three.

Reading a book I had no teeth to talk about on that day. The Badly Boy Drawn had confiscated them and put them in a mouldy old accoustic case, safe and warm for a Saturday.