Do Celebrities Have A Right To Privacy?

Identification of issues of focus on research

In your view do celebrities have a right to privacy? Should they be able to determine what is or what isn’t published about them? Use relevant examples to argue for or against this argument.

Privacy has been defined by U.S. Justice Louis Brandeis as “The right to be left alone.”It is a state of enjoying ones’ life without being disturbed or observed by other people. The right to privacy has been referred to as “an element of various legal practices restricting government and private actions which may threaten the privacy of individuals.” The right of privacy has been mentioned in in more than 150 national constitutions (Abril  & Olazábal, 2009). New technologies according to Allan Westin belief alter the balance of privacy and disclosure. In addition Allan believes that the government may be limited to do surveillance to protect democratic process as a result of privacy rights. He defines privacy as “the claim of individuals, groups, or institution to determine for themselves when, how, and to what extent Information about them is communicated to others. Westin identifies states of privacy in their four categories (Abril & Olazábal, 2009). They include one, solitude, two, intimacy, three anonymity, and reserve. David Flaherty, network computer databases threatens right to privacy. There are people who are famous and make money from being known. Their way of life and every action they take has an impact on society. These people are called celebrities.

Celebrities have a right to privacy. But sometimes may be limited because their lives are of interest to almost everyone (Allen, 2012). Celebrities enjoy mass following and recognition in places no one else can be recognized. Media keeps an eye on the celebrities so they don’t do anything perceived wrong in society. Due to their intention of getting into this wanting business and trying to seek attention every day, it becomes to determine when their privacy has been invaded. Some celebrities intentionally compromise their privacy to hit headlines in the next days’ media headlines. This, however, does not give the right to any invasion of their privacy where their individual lives are concerned. The law does not offer limit privacy to celebrities even though sometimes they expose their own privacy to get publicity.

In a survey done by debate.org with a tag ‘do celebrities have a right to privacy” 63% of respondents said yes whereas 38% said no. some of the reasons given were because they are human too and have sometimes they are not in work because they also have working hours, with others saying celebrities do not need privacy since they signed a contract to be of public interest. Others said because they get a lot of payment for their publicity, they have to pay a small price which is compromising their privacy. There are many reasons why privacy must be protected which include and not limited to: limitation on power, respect for individuals, reputation management, maintenance of appropriate social boundaries, building trust, control of one’s life, ability to change and have  second chance, freedom of thoughts and speech, having not to justify or explain yourself, and freedom of political and social activities.

Systematic analysis of the topic

Ability to change and have a second chance

Most celebrities do not enjoy this right and privilege because every time they are being exposed. Since many people are dynamic and keep growing and changing for better throughout their lives. They need time for a second chance, so as to be able to rectify mistakes in life and reinvent them. With privacy, this happens effectively as no one is there to keep reminding or showing your mistakes in the past. Although some mistakes should not be given a second chance, celebrities too would need to enjoy this privilege in order to grow again.

Respect for individuals

Privacy allows people to respect others. If people have good reasons why they want certain things to be private in their lives interfering with this wish is disrespecting and violation of their rights (Strahilevitz, 2013). There are times however privacy is not considered over important values especially when the two conflicts. For instance, when people would want to keep private that would harm others or themselves, privacy they think is good when not, and this is where it conflicts with the values arises.

Freedom of Social and Political Activities

Our ability to associate with others is protected by the privacy we have on political activities. The importance of privacy is that one can join any political association freely when they choose to. Many celebrities do not have privacy to decide where they should belong because of the avoidance of being misquoted (McNamara, 2009). Mostly they are without clear stand on what they want in politics to avoid being misquoted or disadvantaged at the end of their actions in politics. Privacy of associating with the politics and political activities even before voting forms our political beliefs. Watchful eyes disrupt celebrities from taking place in these activities.

Freedom of Thought and Speech

Privacy provides with an opportunity to enables people to have freedom of thoughts. When people keep watching on us they chill us from exploring ideas outside the mainstream (Kane 2010). Celebrities will be pressured to make a decision fast or give a comment on something without having to critically think broadly about it. This put them on dangers of speaking unpopular messages.

Not Having to Explain or Justify Oneself

Privacy matters to every person as we do not need to explain or justify ourselves to people. There are things we do need to just do them without explaining it to those who doubt our actions. Some actions we take may be taken to be embarrassing or worse to those who know (Kavka & West 2010). Many celebrities will find themselves having to explain to the public through the media to maintain their reputation. This need for justification is not a very good thing as people should not be tied to perfections.

Ability to change and have a second chance

Trust

Building trust in a relationship with others is very important to every person, business organizations, companies, government, etc. in life. If confidentiality is breached the trust is lost. Celebrities often desire to have the trust of their followers. The followers continue building more and more trust in celebrities if they only know the good side of their story (Hearn & Schoenhoff, 2015). It becomes dangerous for celebrities’ lives if they privacy is invaded to a larger extent to expose their weaknesses. Their followers may not want to trust them again if their privacy has been violated and exposed in a negative way.

Maintaining Appropriate Social Boundaries

People need boundaries from others in society. These boundaries are informational and physical. There is a need for people to find places of solitude to hide and be free from gaze by other people in order to relax and feel free. In a different relationship, people form informational boundaries and the only way for it to be effective is having privacy (Drake & Miah, 2010). It is difficult for celebrities to have a place they are relaxing without someone chasing after them. They sometimes fail to have closeness with people since they hear stories they shared in privacy get out to the public. This is not appropriate as many people don’t want everybody to know every bit of things happening in their lives which is termed as ‘none of your business’ or mind your own business. There is social friction affecting the celebrity world as many times they are not able to reduce it.

Findings and recommendations

This research finds that every person has the right to privacy and coming in between them is a bad idea and violation of someone’s’ fundamental rights. Celebrities have the hardest time as well as the entire society to recognize when the issue of privacy for celebrities can be said to have been violated. They too want their privacy invaded to make headlines in the news media (Wenner 2014).

This research recommends consultations between parties involved in order to avoid mistakes done by many people who would always want to invade other peoples’ privacy for their own benefit (Rojek 2015). There should also be clearly defined laws that must protect every person’s privacy from being invaded when there is no need to do so.

The government must respect the privacy of individuals as it is their rights to private lives where there are no serious issues amounting to the protection of public interest.

Celebrities must also be respected as they also need time with themselves to reflect on their lives and progress they want to make and it should be realized that theirs is a profession like any other and it has holidays too.

Conclusion

The issue of privacy, especially for a celebrity, is a challenging issue as they want to showcase their own life to all the people to know. At times privacy may be bridged when no one is aware they are doing so due to celebrity themselves wanting very much to create attention to the public. However every time any person must be cautious when dealing with issues of privacy they are dangerous and can put someone in jail

References

Abril, P. S., & Olazábal, A. M. (2009). The Celebrity CEO: Corporate Disclosure at the Intersection of Privacy and Securities Law. Hous. L. Rev., 46, 1545.

Allen, A. L. (2012). Privacy law: positive theory and normative practice. Harv. L. Rev. F., 126, 241.

Drake, P., & Miah, A. (2010). The cultural politics of celebrity. Cultural Politics, 6(1), 49-64.

Follett, L. N. (2010). Taming the Paparazzi in the Wild West: A Look at California's 2009 Amendment to the Anti-Paparazzi Act and a Call for Increased Privacy Protections for Celebrity Children. S. Cal. L. Rev., 84, 201.

Hearn, A., & Schoenhoff, S. (2015). From celebrity to influencer: Tracing the diffusion of celebrity value across the data stream. A companion to celebrity, 194-212.

Kane, B. (2010). Balancing anonymity, popularity, & micro-celebrity: the crossroads of social networking & privacy. Alb. LJ Sci. & Tech., 20, 327.

Kavka, M., & West, A. (2010). Jade the obscure: celebrity death and the mediatized maiden. Celebrity Studies, 1(2), 216-230.

McNamara, K. (2009). Publicising private lives: celebrities, image control and the reconfiguration of public space. Social & Cultural Geography, 10(1), 9-23.

Rojek, C. (2015). Celebrity. The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Consumption and Consumer Studies, 1-3.

Strahilevitz, L. J. (2013). Toward a positive theory of privacy law. Harvard Law Review, 126(7), 2010-2042.

Wenner, L. A. (2014). Fallen sports heroes, media, & celebrity culture