Blondes Do Have More Fun: America Bestows Undue Amounts of Attention on its Golden Haired Gals

This is how Paris Hilton fan Jake Byrd was quoted in an Associated Press story shortly after Paris Hilton was sentenced back to jail during this week.

The media circus that has been following Hilton's quest for civic justice/get-out-of-jail free card is a spectacle matched only by the incessant whining coming from both her and her supporters, the latter of which are apparently so large in number they could colonize the mystery island on "Lost."

These supporters claim that Hilton deserves to be free, that she is being unjustly punished by an overzealous judge; the other side, where I'm at, says that a 45-day sentence in prison for driving under the influence with a suspended license should have brought down a far worse sentence and she's lucky they didn't just throw her to the prison inmates on HBO's "Oz."

They scream, we roll our eyes, they scream some more, we jeer, they cry, we jeer some more, they throw insults, we throw insults ... it's like a Pittsburgh-Cleveland football game without the battery-packed snowballs flying everywhere.

I think the papers got it right when they questioned if Hilton's initial early release was due to her fame. The excuses offered for her release were sketchy at best; a mystery skin disease so bad she had to be moved out of her private cell, and the jail she was staying in, to serve out the rest of her sentence under house arrest.

When I was 20 I was arrested for underage drinking a month before I turned 21. I got six months probation, paid a $300 fine (a fortune at the time), underwent substance abuse counseling and had to attend AA meetings. For a shot glass of beer. Hilton, on the other hand, only had to serve 45 days in jail in a cell away from the general prison populace. Kids forced to go to summer camp have it tougher than this, but what can you do; Hilton is one of this generation's female public figures of interest.

We've always had females that grab the attention of the masses: our Hilary Clintons, our Condoleezza Rices, our Queen Elizabeths, but every decade the people of the world select one person out of all the celebrities, heads-of-state, royals and the like to fixate on.

There doesn't seem to be any criteria for this selection, such as drug tests, pre-screenings or interview with department heads; the only known requirements appear to be that the person most be a female, well-built and sexually appeasing. They always seem to be blonde, too. Past members of this club of perpetual public interest have included Marilyn Monroe, Anna Nicole Smith, Princess Diana and, most recently, Paris Hilton.

Having been so chosen, this one person, for reasons no one can properly articulate, becomes the target of mass fascination and obsession. The question of why we are so fascinated with these people has been explored time and again, always producing answers that never satisfy the greater truth behind the question.

People look at these select few and find they share a bond of some kind. They claim these figures are perhaps a manifestation of their own hopes and dreams on a larger stage or that they bring beauty and fashion to the masses; an avatar for numerous gods of beauty, arts and general well-being.

They identify with the struggles of the chosen individual, whom many have never met face to face, and they cheer for them, attack their critics and provide the kind of support for this person that you only read about in history books describing the state of the American people right after Pearl Harbor. The support for the figure may not be that mythic in scale, but it's got ambition behind it.

These people scream "Celebrate these individuals!" To which the rest of the populace looks at them, turn their heads to regard the figure in question, turn back and exclaim with ever-slipping sanity "why the hell should I?" because, aside from being well-known for their sexual exploits, none of these people really seem to do anything other than be themselves.

None are well-known for their talents: Hilton attempted a CD which appeared and disappeared faster than a deer at an NRA convention; Smith, while a reality show star like Paris, never got much higher on the Hollywood food chain than a "Naked Gun" film and, while she has become a film icon, Monroe's roles were always more visual then emotional; one has trouble imaging her attempting Lady Macbeth or Sigourney Weaver's role in "Alien."

They don't make world-changing decisions. They don't enact policies. Most don't create anything but media frenzy. But none of that matters; we can't ever seem to get enough of these people. The obsession eventually runs into the individual's daily life, where even the most mundane of actions are reported with the weighty significance one sees in disaster movies before the earthquake happens. (Such-and-such person walked into a Starbucks today and ordered a large regular coffee. And got it. Details at six).

So I read the stories about Hilton sobbing how unfair the system is and crying for her mother before being physically removed from the court room. I see the pictures of her in a police car, sobbing hysterically at the idea of finishing her sentence and I know I won't have to go far to find out more about her struggle. More news stories will be published. Editorial pages will sound off on her attempt to avoid jail time. Fans will post blogs calling for the judge's early retirement via pitchforks and torches (those who know what pitchforks are, anyway). News stations, if they haven't already, will be trying to set up an inside interview with the newly returned convict.

And I, like everyone else, will have a front-row seat waiting for me should I choose to follow this. The only remaining question is if I really do have a choice in that matter.