The meaning of the word "celebrity" has really gone downhill.
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Once upon a time, you actually had to have done something worthwhile - like appeared in a movie or something - to be tagged as a celebrity.
These days, some nuffy who was on that one reality show is now deemed to be a "celebrity".
That's my main takeaway from watching my first ever episode of I'm a Celebrity .. Get Me Out of Here!.
A contestant from Love Island is a celebrity these days? Or some guy from Married at First Sight?
No thanks. And then there's the "star" from Geordie Shore.
There's also the stand-up comic who herself expects loads of people will have never heard of her.
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And don't forget the former celebrities - those who were someone a decade ago and snapped up the chance to get back on the TV for a while.
Perhaps a more realistic title would have been I'm a 'Celebrity' ... Get me Some Publicity! . Or maybe I'm a Celebrity ... Get Me Some Money, given they are reportedly paid more than $30,000 a week to appear (and you thought they were there just to raise money for a charity).
A large part of the problem is that real celebrities are actually doing stuff and so don't need this show to raise their profile.
But reality TV 'stars'? Well, their entire existence is due to reality TV so appearing on I'm a Celebrity ... would be just another gig for them.
A peek at those taking part in earlier series shows the "celebrity" was set a bit higher.
These days, perhaps they need to spend some time scraping the bottom of the barrel in order to get enough contestants in order to make the show.
Not that the fans watching the show care how low-rent the celebs are. It's rating well, though, you know, it's not as if that really matters right now as we're in the non-ratings period.
Though I can't understand what they see in it. I watched the premiere episode last week and was so glad I recorded it rather than watched it live.
The show just dragged so I was glad to be able to hit the fast-forward button through some of the most boring bits.