This is the age of fame for fame’s sake, the strange loop of becoming famous for becoming famous, where Instagram, Snapchat and YouTube create instant celebrities whose only achievement is becoming an Internet celebrity.
An entire generation is growing up craving shortcuts to the public spotlight, hoping for that one offbeat “viral” video that can catapult them from obscurity to national recognition.
The desire for fame is the need to prove we existed, to cheat the eternity of death, to show we mattered, to leave a mark in the minds of others in the hope that they will remember us. It is the deepest of all needs, the existential urge to mean something, to
be somebody.
For a small segment of individuals, who are either evil, barbarically murderous, mentally ill, easily manipulable by the language of hate, or some combination thereof, a mass killing is the surest and quickest path to “being somebody.” It is no coincidence that
of the 12 deadliest shootings in the United States, six have happened from 2007 onward. The advent of social media and the rise of instant celebrities creates the unrealistic belief that fame requires no training, no hard work, no accomplishment. Anyone can be famous for any reason – or for no reason at all.