Is Revering Of Dead Celebrities a Form of Ancestor Worship?

[stromboli]

Think about it. Before technology gave us the ability to capture on film and video the lives and doings of famous people, we handed down the wisdom of ancients in writing. Prior to the printing press, we handed down the wisdom of ancestors in written scrolls. Before that, in legends, lore and eddas. My wife watches the 10,000 Pyramid reruns with Dick Clark, who is now dead. We all have watched Casablanca and other old movies, seen Judy Garland retrospectives and so on.

I once stated the opinion to a friend that being a Bond Girl in a movie amounted to immortality, because Bond movie marathons come on about twice a year. Ursula Andress in her prime will always be there, renewed forever and lusted after across time by generations.

In a manner of speaking, is this not similar to the reverence paid to ancestors by tribes who disinter their dead ancestors and then reinter them, to appease their spirits. We are not appeasing spirits now, but paying homage in a like manner to icons of a bygone day. Is this somehow endemic to our nature? Curious, would like your thoughts.

[commonsense822]

Yes, they had to close down streets when MJ died.  It's too much.  They are just other fucking people.  They shit just the same as anyone else.

[NitzWalsh]

I was a big fan of Nirvana when Kurt Cobain was still alive, and still am today. I listened to every Nirvana album I own on Kurt Cobain's birthday on February 20th. I can see why fans of Michael Jackson, Marilyn Monroe, and others would still be very much interested in them. I can also see why they would continue to gain more fans.

These ancestors actually existed and their accomplishments are remembered. I can even go back in my own family tree and find people I pay a good deal of respect to. On my dads side of the family grandpa, his dad, and all of their male ancestors were navy men, officers in the Royal Navy going back to well before Trafalgar. My moms side includes John Loudon McAdam who invented the modern paved road, and Rob Roy the famous Scottish outlaw. These are people I admire, even though they're dead. I ask them for guidance or pray to them though.

[Aroura33]

Perhaps more like Idol worship than ancestor.  But basically, yeah.  

I'm guilty of it a little bit, I adore Rossalind Russel and Catherine Hepburn, both old and young.  However, I know they were just people.

I think everyone does this to some extent, and it must be a human trait.  We seek out "hero's" to idolize, be they spiritual, athletic, intelligent, beautiful, etc.  It seems to me to be pretty normal, and also pretty harmless (most of the time).

[bennyboy]

In a sense, these people ARE gods.  Because their behaviors affect so many, they represent not only their own individual humanity, but part of the humanity of entire cultures.

When we idolize past stars, it's not really a recognition of the person as a human being doing the job of acting (or singing or whatever).  We are idolizing that special quality that resonates in ourselves and in those around us.  For whatever reason, some people embody for others part of that archetypal Man that is encoded into our DNA, and it is really that which we are worshipping.

I'd say that's what the God / gods myths are too-- they are ideas about archetypal Man, which is why they resonate so deeply with people even though they aren't real.

[PopeyesPappy]

Ancestor Worship



Not Ancestor Worship

[stromboli]

The Lincoln Memorial is a monument to a man we revered. It isn't a stone sitting on a Pacific island, but the result is the same. A week long retrospective of the movies of some famous star is a form of reverence. Twice a year some cable channel gives us a retrospective of Bond films. Ingrid Bergman movie festivals are reverence.

Are we not, in effect, digging up our ancestors and reburying them when we do that? Showing reverence to forebears that have affected our lives in the post tense? I think there are similarities.

[Jmpty]

Celebrating someones art, or their accomplishments is not really worship, unless you consider a love for art, music, or cinema, a part of the afterlife, or that it can directly intervene in your life today. Ancestor worship in China is kind of misunderstood in the west. It mostly a matter of respect, and remembrance, and mostly symbolic.

[stromboli]

Celebrating someones art, or their accomplishments is not really worship, unless you consider a love for art, music, or cinema, a part of the afterlife, or that it can directly intervene in your life today. Ancestor worship in China is kind of misunderstood in the west. It mostly a matter of respect, and remembrance, and mostly symbolic.

[AllPurposeAtheist]

I call celeb worship nonsense worship, but if you want to worship nonsense you might as well join my church of the Dental Deity.. She did, after all pay cold, hard cash and STILL DOES!

[Cocoa Beware]

Worship and devotion (too often to the point of obsession) of late famous people is indisputably common. I can definitely see a connection between that and the idolatry of our ancestors.

Personally I find that I very much admire people like Archimedes, who sets a great example to follow. (he nearly invented calculus 2000 years in advance, the guy was incredible)

However, I realize that he put his pants on one leg at a time like anyone else.

[Cocoa Beware]

I call celeb worship nonsense worship, but if you want to worship nonsense you might as well join my church of the Dental Deity.. She did, after all pay cold, hard cash and STILL DOES!

Ive become apostate to that one myself.

[SGOS]

We are not appeasing spirits now, but paying homage in a like manner to icons of a bygone day. Is this somehow endemic to our nature? Curious, would like your thoughts.

Something akin to that is in our nature.  We do have the capacity to "worship" leaders, movie stars, and various so called important people.  But watching an old movie is not necessarily worship.  It can be for simple enjoyment.  I'm hesitant to use the word worship.  I reserve that word as holding someone in such high regard that I'm going a little nuts.  The closest I can come to that, and it doesn't even make it to that level, is how I regard some things in nature.

[Brian37]

Yes it is a form of worship. If I win the lottery I am going to build a giant statue of Hitch with a glass of booze in one hand, a smoke in the other, and a hot chick on his arm.

[Zatoichi]

It should be kept in perspective.

I do however think it's important to remember great accomplishments and the people who achieved them. It's how we recognize when we've gotten something right.

It also serves as inspiration for others to follow in their footsteps.

But perspective, as I said. Rather than put these people on a pedestal and engage in hero worship, we should remember that they too are only human. This should serve to remind us that we all are capable of great accomplishments. The more we revere others and see them as something beyond, the more we diminish our own self confidence and oppress our drive to achieve greatness.

Reminds me of a band mate I once had who was so starstruck that he was constantly trying to emulate his heroes; Kurt Cobain in particular... and always talking to other musicians, bragging about once meeting the singer from some 3rd rate indie band. It was a real embarrassment all his name dropping and imitating so eventually I read him the riot act and said he would never achieve greatness as long as he saw rock stars as heroes rather than peers and was undermining the band by trying to impress people with who he'd met rather than the merits of our music.

I met Krist Novoselic once when he stopped by the studio where my band was mixing our album. My bassist's jaw dropped to the floor and all I did was offer him some pizza, not knowing he was a veggie.

I don't really get impressed by famous people... they all gotta wipe their butt when they poop just like everybody else. I admire their accomplishments and see that as the mark to beat.

All our Heroes are imperfect and none of them nearly as great as all the hype.

OJ was a great football player but he turned out to be a murderer.
MJ was an amazing pop star but he turned out to be a child molester.
So many great rock stars died from their drug addictions.

Brings to mind a song by Jill Sobule, one of my favorite songstresses and a very humble, normal person who you could walk right up to and have a conversation with...

[spoil:1x1ks7ck]Why are all our heroes so imperfect
Why do they always bring me down
Why are all our heroes so imperfect
The statue in the park has lost his crown

William Faulkner drunk and depressed
Dorothy Parker mean, drunk and depressed
And that guy in Seven Years in Tibet turned out to be a Nazi
The founding fathers all had slaves
The explorers slaughtered the braves
The old testament God can be so petty

Paul McCartney jealous of John, even more so now that he's gone
Dylan was so mean to Donovan in that movie
Pablo Picasso cruel to his wives
My favorite poets took their own lives
Orson Welles peaked at 25, ballooned before our eyes
And he sold bad wine

Heard Babe Ruth was full of malice
Lewis Carroll I'm sure did Alice
Plato in the cave with those very young boys
TS Elliott hated Jews, FDR didn't save the Jews

All the French joined the resistance after the war
Raymond Chandler drunk and depressed
Tennessee Williams drunk and depressed
Think I'll just get drunk and depressed
Lyrics from <a href="http://www.elyrics.net">eLyrics.net</a>[/spoil:1x1ks7ck]