Sometimes I consciously fight against the bubble I live in, operating by yesterday’s feel, and seek out the latest newspaper headlines. The other day I skimmed The New York Times’ highlights and came across a briefing that immediately caught my eye: Simpsons’ Silence.
In some ways I am the typical American college student: Nothing like a Simpsons rerun gets me glowing with radiation and delight. Watching it makes me want to lose a finger. Inhale chocolate-drizzled doughnuts. Play the sax. Sport a blue beehive. Marry Homer Simpson. Homer Simpson is a genius.
Despite the respect and joy I derive from the show, I was quite negatively affected after reading the highlight. Basically, the voices of the show’s major characters have gone on strike. The actors demand $360,000 an episode, as opposed to the current figure of $125,000. That means $8 million a season. Six actors. $8 million apiece. I got a D in calculus back in high school, and even I know what this means.
There is something off about our salary system. In Oakland, an upstart teacher struggles to tame 32 students and simultaneously support her family. Meanwhile, household name Oprah Winfrey films yet another show regarding our inner selves, hands out audience giveaways like nobody’s business and earns $575 million a year.
Oprah Winfrey is a talented conversationalist. She eases the souls of suburbanites and makes life a little nicer. She delights us with the latest trends, the befores and afters, cocktail moment jokes, Dr. Phil’s big shiny dome. Her literary picks, Oprah’s Book Club, skyrocket up the bestsellers’ lists. We trust her with our aesthetic decisions. Oprah is Oprah for a reason.
Dan Catellaneta, Julie Kavner, Hank Azaria, Harry Shearer, Yeardley Smith and Nancy Cartwright comprise The Simpsons, demanding the kind of money your local grocer can’t even dream about. I set to wondering: Just exactly how much are Oprah’s and Bart’s time actually worth?
I’m thinking materialism in general. I’m thinking makeup counters. I’m thinking fashion magazines and the Thought Police. The pope, the dope, the Harlem Shake all juxtaposed. I’m thinking of the proprietors of design, of the human mind and its limit-loving possibilities. Who decided what in the first place?
We live in a domain of domination, a theory set forth by books-turned-films-turned-cults like Fight Club, by anti-conformity conformists (yours truly), by all the poor ducklings made to suit the affluent. We live with the all-consuming desire to desire consumption of the best food, the best sights, the best minds. We live with expectations such as effortless perfection (sorry, couldn’t help myself) and breathtaking salaries. We live in a cultureless culture, and we bought it.
We pay those basketball players. We pay that actor, this songstress. All that money in one pocket, the faucet of economy going straight into Shania Twain’s metaphorical drain. We talk about it to the point where it has become a cliché. The manipulation is blatant; the strings attached are scorching our eyes. We use the music of our hippie past to propagate the clearances of today. The capacity of advertisement—of buying Pepsi endorsed by Britney—extends its arms to choke us in its preferred embrace.
We hear Bob Dylan. We hear the Eagles. We hear the best and we connect it to the ad. We drive down the block to Rite Aid. Sephora. Clinique. Sold by Turlington. Crawford. Gisele. Because even buying, applying, and dying in makeup comprises a class system. You get Maybelline. Estee. M.A.C. You wipe it off with Vaseline or the French oil with thyme base you saw on the latest Suzanne Somers infomercial. It doesn’t matter. You’re left with the same face every night.
So many people, victimized by a lopsided bell curve—and for as long as I can remember, the victim has been okay with it. How have we come to accept the indecencies in Julie Kavner’s salary? Her demands of increase? It isn’t a question about morality, or greed or failure. I am more curious about the basic rationale. If everyone just took a step back, would it become increasingly clear that society is just absolutely whacked out?
At any rate, I want to be rich and famous when I grow up.
J. Patricia Kim is a Trinity sophomore.
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