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What kind of culture would embrace Paris Hilton?
Creators Syndicate ^ | June 1, 2005 | Ben Shapiro

Posted on 06/01/2005 9:27:48 AM PDT by UltraConservative

Paris Hilton is at it again. The 24-year-old hotel heiress is the feature attraction in Carl's Jr.'s new Spicy Burger ad campaign, aimed at the horny male TV-watching population. Scantily clad in a one-piece leather outfit plunging down to below her navel, Hilton struts into an empty warehouse, licks her finger, then suds up herself and a Bentley automobile, as a stripper-styled "I Love Paris" rendition slowly plays in the background. At the end of the spot, Hilton bites the burger and sucks her finger clean. The commercial closes with Hilton's tagline flashing across the screen: "That's Hot."

The spot is pure, soft-core pornography, beginning to end. The website for the commercial, spicyparis.com, touts the "too-hot-for-TV spot." And while Carl's Jr. CEO Andy Puzder defends the ad as "a beautiful model in a swimsuit washing a car," it is clearly designed to capitalize on Hilton's target audience -- porn watchers.

As I explain in my upcoming book, "Porn Generation: How Social Liberalism Is Corrupting Our Future," the plain truth of the situation is that Paris Hilton would be a relative nobody today were she not incredibly rich and profligate with her favors. Hilton made perhaps the most infamous porn video outside of Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee. That hard-core work, starring then-boyfriend Rick Solomon, brought her international fame. At least nine other sex tapes are said to be floating around somewhere, including a lesbian sex tape with Playboy playmate Nicole Lenz. The sexually uninhibited Hilton became a target for Larry Flynt of Hustler fame, who released pictures of Hilton sharing some lesbian tongue at a nightclub. As Conan O'Brien observed, "Hustler magazine announced that it will feature photos of Paris Hilton making out with another woman, while the woman fondles Paris' breasts. So the search continues for a photo of Paris Hilton not having sex."

Because of her pornographic involvement, Hilton has grabbed an endorsement deal as the Guess? Jeans girl (the New York Observer reported that "her bad-girl image jibes with the clothing company's porn-lite ad campaigns"), endless tabloid headlines, and now, this deal with Carl's Jr. As Brad Haley, marketing chief for Carl's Jr., stated, "Paris was chosen to star in the ad because she is an intriguing cultural icon and the 'it girl' of the moment."

Here's the big question: How, as a society, did we allow Paris Hilton to become a cultural icon? Clearly, no one likes her very much. Liberals and conservatives alike agree that she is vacuous and silly. Media commentators all over the map label her "spoiled" and "stupid." Maureen Dowd, hardly a cultural right-winger, lumps Hilton together with "vacuous, slutty girls on TV sitcoms."

No, Hilton is today's "it girl" for one reason and one reason alone: Individual scorn, though that opinion may be shared by a vast majority, does not control the river of a culture. It is those who push the envelope who do. Over the past few decades, we have implemented a "live and let live" culture whereby abhorrence for immorality is seen as illegitimate if promoted through governmental means. Instead, we are supposed to let our culture be poisoned slowly -- and if we protest, we are told that as long as we turn off our own TV's, all will be well.

That's why it should come as no surprise that Hilton's spicy ad has ardent defenders, who proclaim that just because you don't like pornography doesn't mean that it can't make someone else very happy. One man's pornography is another man's means to happiness. And so Keith Olbermann of MSNBC ripped the ad's detractors: "I'm reminded tonight of H.L. Mencken's definition of Puritanism: the haunting fear someone somewhere may be happy. Is that at the bottom line here, I mean, that the people who have to protest crap like this ad -- and it's crap -- but are they afraid it will corrupt somebody, or are they afraid somebody will enjoy it?" Paul Begala labeled the offended "the sanctimonious Republican right." And Michael Hiltzik of the Los Angeles Times simultaneously condemned the commercial as "a new high (or low) in television crassness" and slammed the ad's opponents as members of the "manufactured outrage industry."

This is the new pattern: individual condemnation and societal acceptance. The moral among us have been forced into tolerance of immorality. Paris Hilton is a cultural icon because of it. As long as the moral majority is impotent, the lowest common denominator will continue to define us.

©2005 Creators Syndicate, Inc.


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; Editorial; News/Current Events; Philosophy; US: California; US: Tennessee
KEYWORDS: benshapiro; california; carljr; carlsjr; cheesecake; ckerestaurants; culturewars; cyberburger; hardees; libertarianism; minimumwage; morality; nannysquad; needlebutts; parishilton; pornography; sex; socialliberalism; tennessee; tramp; unwadthepanties
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1 posted on 06/01/2005 9:27:53 AM PDT by UltraConservative
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To: UltraConservative

Oh come on its not like a wardrobe malfunction


2 posted on 06/01/2005 9:29:07 AM PDT by al baby (Father of the Beeber)
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To: UltraConservative

The French?


3 posted on 06/01/2005 9:29:25 AM PDT by since1868
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To: UltraConservative

Bacterial culture.


4 posted on 06/01/2005 9:29:45 AM PDT by dead (I've got my eye out for Mullah Omar.)
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To: al baby

Yes, she would have made a great ambassador to UNICEF under the Clinton years.


5 posted on 06/01/2005 9:30:23 AM PDT by nikos1121
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Comment #6 Removed by Moderator

To: since1868

You beat me to it darn!!


7 posted on 06/01/2005 9:30:40 AM PDT by handy old one (It is unbecoming for young men to utter maxims. Aristotle)
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To: UltraConservative

Stupid spoiled whore.

8 posted on 06/01/2005 9:30:55 AM PDT by isthisnickcool (Get all the incumbents out of politics!)
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To: UltraConservative
More importantly, what man would want to marry a woman who has uummm serviced more men then Jiffy Lube has serviced cars??
9 posted on 06/01/2005 9:30:57 AM PDT by Millee (So you're a feminist......isn't that cute??)
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To: UltraConservative

It nothing you don't see at the beach or pool.


10 posted on 06/01/2005 9:31:06 AM PDT by Perdogg (Cheney for President - 2008)
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To: UltraConservative

Even Madonna (the fake one) will not let her children watch what she has done to "make it"...she didn't give a hoot that other people's children might be watching, as long as the money was coming in.


11 posted on 06/01/2005 9:31:21 AM PDT by 2banana (My common ground with terrorists - They want to die for Islam, and we want to kill them.)
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To: UltraConservative

The "culture" hasn't embraced her. She's more of a joke celebrity than a real one.


12 posted on 06/01/2005 9:31:32 AM PDT by Mr. Jeeves ("Violence never settles anything." Genghis Khan, 1162-1227)
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To: UltraConservative
What kind of culture would embrace Paris Hilton?

For how long? Years? Months? One night?

13 posted on 06/01/2005 9:31:56 AM PDT by Doctor Stochastic (Vegetabilisch = chaotisch is der Charakter der Modernen. - Friedrich Schlegel)
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To: UltraConservative
Here's the big question: How, as a society, did we allow Paris Hilton to become a cultural icon?

Diversity, baby, diversity.

14 posted on 06/01/2005 9:32:01 AM PDT by SaveTheChief
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To: UltraConservative

She's a feminist donchya know?


15 posted on 06/01/2005 9:34:24 AM PDT by RushCrush (Never give in. Never, never, never, never! Never yield in any way great or small.)
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To: UltraConservative
Yes, in a free society those who push the cultural envelope will get attention. A popular culture will inevitably seek the new and different. Sometimes it will be cheap and tawdry.

But like Winston Churchill said about democracy, all of the alternatives are worse. Attempts to control the culture by any "elite", self appointed or elected, religious or "sensitive", can only lead to the loss of liberty.

-Eric

16 posted on 06/01/2005 9:35:39 AM PDT by E Rocc (If God is watching us, we can at least try to be entertaining)
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To: 2banana
Even Madonna (the fake one) will not let her children watch what she has done to "make it"...she didn't give a hoot that other people's children might be watching, as long as the money was coming in.

Add Eminem to that list of hypocrites.

17 posted on 06/01/2005 9:36:41 AM PDT by frogjerk
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To: UltraConservative

Obviously the current one...


18 posted on 06/01/2005 9:37:07 AM PDT by stuartcr (Everything happens as God wants it to.....otherwise, things would be different.)
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To: UltraConservative

It's not about decline of standards; it's about the rise of niche marketing. You can put together an ad that annoys or even offends 90% of the people watching it, because if 10% like it, you're probably going to gain market share. McDonald's could never run an ad like this, but a minor player can.


19 posted on 06/01/2005 9:37:28 AM PDT by Numbers Guy
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To: UltraConservative

I sent the link home. I will have to watch it carefully before forming an opinion.


20 posted on 06/01/2005 9:39:07 AM PDT by SoDak
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