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March 26, 2011 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
18:40
1878 Charlie Sheen - Death by Fame
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So, in regularly being behind the eight ball as far as media goes, I wanted to talk a little bit about Charlie Sheen, given that he was a hot topic who's dropped.
I thought now's the time for philosophy to pick over the scarred and syphilitic bones of his recent rise to fame and rise to notoriety, I suppose.
So, I don't know much about the details of his...
Story. I know that this is sort of what I think I know.
Correct me if I'm wrong. He's had a history of hitting call girls.
I mean, not hitting, like punching, but like going having sex with call girls.
I think his girlfriend, Kelly Preston, was shot in the arm by him accidentally, quote, accidentally at some point in the past.
He's had substance abuse problems.
I think he's been to rehab.
He's had a bunch of marriages.
He was accused by Denise Richards of death threats and just other kinds of truly horrific behavior.
And his early promise of talent.
I mean, the man is extremely talented, of course.
His early promise of talent in films like Wall Street seems to have diminished a bit.
He did a lot of goofy comedies, hot shots and so on.
he was in platoon I think And he then sort of fell off the radar for a while.
And he showed up doing this show, Two and a Half Men, which is pretty cynical and depressing.
And I sort of enjoyed it a lot less over the last couple of years because I just found it just too negative and too circular.
It was like a Seinfeld with the clap.
And... So then he had this meltdown of kinds.
He cussed out the creator of Two and a Half Men.
He did these weird webcasts where he looks kind of haggard and like he's sitting on a gnone-shaped cactus that's rotating at high speed.
And he just seems to be doing this fairly spectacular flame-out.
And, I mean, the man's fantastically rich.
He was getting like, I don't know, two million dollars per episode or something like that for Two and a Half Men, which I think was the number one sitcom.
So, yeah, I mean, very, very successful guy.
I think a good-looking guy.
And... I know he's a smoker, but he works out at 6am every morning.
He's got his health, he's got kids, he's got good looks, he's got a pretty prestigious family tree.
It's as far as the arts go.
Lots of money, talent, fame.
And so, to me, there's sort of a question, why are people fascinated?
Well, it is a public flame-out, and that is pretty spectacular to see.
But I think at an even more fundamental level, there is something that people are always striving to see.
You know, they're trying to see beyond the blinding, glaring shallowness of the culture that we live in.
And to be fair, it's not just the culture we live in, it's all cultures, everywhere, all the time.
It is what culture is.
But most of us feel, right, most of us feel if we had, you know, if we got two million, if we got paid two million dollars for a week's worth of work every week, we'd get, we'd be pretty happy.
You know, if we had, I don't know how much money he's got, it's got to be 50, 100, 200 million, something, I don't know, who knows, right?
But we feel that if we won the lottery like that, that we'd be happy.
I've heard that bald guys feel that if they had a great head of hair, they'd be happier.
And I will say this, Charlie Sheen has a great head of hair.
I think his hair really should have picked up a tiny set of Oscars for its acting ability to show ribald insouciance.
I think that is pretty much key.
And I think if Rival Insouciance was a category, it would win pretty much every time.
And, I mean, there are other people who've got great hair, too.
Obviously, Brad Pitt, Kyle MacLachlan.
But, I mean, there's a list that goes on and on.
But, of course, only bald guys obsessed with their hair loss would have anything like that on the tip of their tongue.
Anyway... So I think that we're always trying to see something when we look at these kinds of celebrity flameouts.
When we look at, you know, the supertank size of Kirstie Alley's thighs or these sorts of things.
We're always trying to see something.
And what we're trying to see is that it doesn't work.
It doesn't work.
Money doesn't work.
Fame doesn't work.
Good looks don't work.
Great hair doesn't work.
Success in your profession doesn't.
I mean, look at Elizabeth Taylor, who just died yesterday.
Fifty films, two Oscars, a bunch of nominations, eight marriages.
Apparently, her rather acerbic butler, who she is reported to have demanded sex from, used to call her the old damn trampoline.
And I don't think it's because of her gymnastics.
So, this does not seem to be what works.
She was considered to be the most beautiful woman in the world.
She has died with a fortune of $350 million.
And, you know, obviously had no trouble garnering attention and had no trouble having friends and getting dates and marriages and so on.
Had four kids.
But was so...
I mean, this is how messed up she was when she was younger.
She was so messed up when she was younger.
I think Eddie Hilton was her first husband.
She was 18.
I don't know how old he was. And he was heir to the Hilton fortune.
Some other fine specimens of modern celebrity are evidence of.
The quality of that bloodline remains in question.
This guy... Although superficially charming and perhaps ribaldly insouciant, he was such a monster of a husband, he beat her so senselessly and to such a vicious degree that she lost a baby that she was carrying when she was very young.
So he beat her into an abortion, a spontaneous abortion.
That is just how wretched a life she must have had prior to her rise to fame.
She, I think, achieved fame very young in a film called National Velvet about horses.
I've never seen it, but apparently she was Jodie Foster slash Brooke Shields kind of young when she hit that kind of fame.
And you'd think with that beauty and that money and that talent and that fame and all of that, that she would end up with a better lot in life than having a baby beaten out of her body by a drunken and abusive husband.
I mean, look at Marilyn Monroe.
Marilyn Monroe, I mean, if looks, money, fame, and beauty were enough to make anyone happy, Marilyn Monroe would probably still be alive today.
Miserable life of exploitation and degradation.
Ah, poor Michael Jackson.
Poor Michael Jackson.
Being drugged by his handlers, being propped up so that he could do another 50 shows at his age, make everybody some money, and tortured into mutilating himself, mutating his body and his face into something that never should have existed on this planet in any way, shape or form. Miserable.
I mean, George Michael.
One of the best singing voices in pop that I've ever heard.
And a very good looking guy and very talented.
Very talented. I mean, I think at least in the past, a great songwriter.
A song that he wrote with the Stones, Waiting for the Day.
Waiting for that day. I mean, beautiful, beautiful stuff.
And you think that would be enough.
But no, he's trawling toilets for sex.
I mean, that's just wretched, wretched stuff.
Billy Joel, divorced, drunk.
Oh, mess. Phil Collins, famous guy.
He's retiring from music, at least according to what I've read recently.
Because, I mean, his back is killing him.
He's got nerve damage to his drumming arms or his forearms.
He's got, you know, numerous health problems, struggled with depression, been married four times, and now has openly and publicly said that he completely regrets the success that he had.
And he's been ground down by all of the critics who have harassed and undermined and undercut him over the years.
Brian May, guitarist for Queen, suicidal at one point in his life at the height of his fame.
I mean, it is endless and wretched.
Freddie Mercury himself, one of the most talented singer-songwriters, and I think a good pianist that the world has ever seen.
Certainly one of the best showmen, if not the best showman, that the world has ever seen.
And basically, you know, killed himself with liberal application of penis.
And got AIDS even after he'd been tested negative and knew all about the dangers.
Wretched, tragic, monstrous.
Now, of course, you can find examples to the contrary of people who are famous who apparently have had quite good lives.
I think Paul Newman was married to Joanne Woodward for many years, never a hint of impropriety.
He was the one, I think he came up with a statement about infidelity, which is why go out for a hamburger when you've got steak at home.
Amen to that. But Mullen Brando, a massively talented actor.
A complete mess as a human being.
Massive weight issues.
Terrible childhood. Numerous marriages.
One son committed suicide.
One son was in jail for murder.
I mean, just absolutely monstrous.
Monstrous life would not be exchanged for...
I mean, that to me would be a special kind of hell.
And as he said, acting is an empty and useless profession.
And it's kind of true in a way.
I mean, actors don't do, they ape, they imitate.
They don't actually, they aren't there, they are portraying, which is a very dangerous thing to do, I think, in the long run.
But yeah, so you can find people who've been sort of famous and successful who have maintained some sort of happy or decent or positive life.
I mean, apparently Tom Hanks seems to be a very nice guy.
I mean, what do I know? But that's, you know, can work.
But the reality...
Is that these things that we dream of, these things that are dangled at a height we can almost never reach, these baits with the fish hooks of self-slaughter, these baits of money and fame and talent and success, wealth, all these kinds of things, that they do not make us happy.
They will not make us happy.
And, I mean, I, you know, I'm susceptible.
I think, gosh, well, what if somebody died and left Free Domain Radio $10 million?
No. 11 million.
No. Okay, 11.
No, 10 and a half would be good.
You know, I would think I would be happy.
But I know, I know that it wouldn't make any difference fundamentally.
It would not make any difference fundamentally.
And I don't know.
So I popped some pill and got Charlie Sheen's hair.
I'm still the same guy.
Still the same guy. Still got the things that I love.
Still got problems. Still got opportunities.
I wouldn't be fundamentally any different.
Oh, if I lost 10 more pounds, I've got a six-pack.
Abs. Or, I don't know, if my skin cleared up, if you've got bad skin, or all of these things.
These are the great temptations of petty inconsequentialities.
These are the great temptations of striving for an existence that is impossible to achieve, and if it can't be achieved, it's impossible to maintain.
And you can see this when you watch the Oscars, right?
I mean, these are people at the height of their careers with usually millions of dollars and usually fabulous looks and all of the sycophants that you can buy on a keychain.
You know, they want the Oscar and they don't get it and they're crushed.
They're disappointed. It's negative.
So you're the second best actress that year.
I mean, good heavens.
I don't know. I just think that's...
I mean, look, I have no problem with ambition.
I'm hugely ambitious as a thinker, but...
We all know that this is not going to guarantee you happiness.
The number of marriages these people have, the degree of correlation between narcissism and fame, apparently, statistically is very high.
And that is not a...
Recipe for good relationships, for happy relationships.
So I think when we are drawn into watching this kind of atomic at all glow self-destruction, as we can see going on with Charlie Sheen, who's, you know, probably going to survive it, lay low, come back, reinvent himself, do something else, or maybe do the same thing in another sitcom.
You know, if you have the magnet power of drawing money from people's wallets, there's an almost infinite amount that people will forgive you for.
And so, that he will still have.
In fact, maybe even more.
But he is not a man who is loved.
He's a man who lost custody of his children.
He's not allowed to see them unsupervised, to my knowledge.
He is a man whose ex-wives and ex-girlfriends fear and hate him.
He is a man who has to pay for company from prostitutes and porn stars and I would assume his other friends.
This is not a good man.
He is not a good fella. And that is, of course, what is driving his unhappiness, is just not being a good guy, not being a good husband, not being a good father, not being a good friend, not being a good person, not being kind, not being charitable, not being virtuous, not being courageous, not standing out for what is right, whatever the cost.
I mean, that's what's driving.
The man is an exploiter.
I mean, to me, prostitution is paid rape.
And that is not a good...
It's not a good situation to be in.
And so, we are striving always to awaken.
We are striving always to awaken.
While there is a part of us left to wake up.
I don't think that's true of Charlie Sheen, but what the hell do I know about it?
But we're always striving to awaken.
And a general fascination with disaster is, I believe, A desire to awaken.
You've probably had this a bunch of times, assuming that you have, I don't know, an unconscious.
That can be exciting at times.
You're in a dream, and something terrible, terrible is happening.
You become aware that you're in a dream, and you're struggling to wake up.
You're striving to wake up, striving to wake up.
Well, to me, that is life.
I mean, we are trapped in a kind of nightmare in life.
A nightmare of culture and prejudice and bigotry and superstition and allegiance to tax farmers and countries and sports teams.
And we are striving, struggling to wake up Grasping at anything that we can use to pry our eyes open and see while at the same time desperately fearing what we're actually going to see when our eyes are open.
What the outside of our matrix looks like and what we look like once we're outside to the people still in.
Like demons, like monsters.
So we're always, always striving to wake up.
And our fascination with people like Charlie Sheen's Flame Out, I think, is part of that.
Now, look, there are some people, I'm sure, who like Charlie Sheen's Flame Out because, you know, he tried to do all of these things, and he strove to be great, and now he's just flaming out, which gives me an excuse to stay small.
I think that's part of it, but I don't think that's the majority of why people are really fascinated.
I don't think it's that malevolent. It's hard.
It's hard to wake up. And of course, those in charge of culture, which is malleable to manipulation in a way that philosophy is not, it's hard to wake up.
And those in charge of culture, those in charge of our matrix, those in charge of our delusions, those exploiting our fantasies by creating them and cashing in, they don't want us to wake up.
And of course, the best way to get people to not wake up is to have them focus on On unattainable things as the source of happiness.
Because then you don't focus on what is possible.
What is possible is virtue.
What is possible is integrity, courage.
Those are possible to you, for you, for me.
And so by getting us to focus on if I were better looking, if I were richer, if I were more talented, if I were famous.
Fame! It's the number one thing that teenagers want these days, according to recent polls.
Fame! The number one thing.
A good relationship with their parents was, I think, 12.
But everybody imagines if I were famous, I would be happy.
And that is the best way to get people to continue to focus on their existing dissatisfactions by imagining that if they win the lottery called fame, called money, called looks, called talent, if they win that lottery, they'll finally be happy.
That's a way not of having people be happy.
It's a way of having them avoid the necessary steps.
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