The Problem With Perez Hilton (and Gossip Media)

I want to talk briefly about gossip, or more specifically about the responsibility of gossip-mongering television shows and websites. I’m well aware that, as a deeply invested consumer of the entertainment industry, I’m willingly jumping into a shark tank. If I run a search on my favourite actors and musicians, I have no doubt that the first dozen results will be more rumour and hearsay than relevant news on their film or music careers. I have no issue with this (I’m also entirely conscious that many of my favourite actors and musicians are as responsible as ET and TMZ for the perpetration of this trend).However gossip writers have become proper journalists, landing columns in newspapers and reports on CNN, and as such, take up the accountability of their other news counterparts. I’m not talking about rumours about a celebrity’s personal life – that’s a topic for another article, and something I’m not informed enough to speak about. What I take issue with is the inaccuracy and dismissal of relevant information in their articles.

I have been sent several links to Perez Hilton’s website from friends of mine, articles about casting rumours, or random tidbits about movies or television shows I am interested in. Each of these articles had some kind of error or misinformation. A Spider-Man related cast update falsely stated the new film was creating a villain that previously had never existed (something I disproved with a quick Google search), an article about the popular show Firefly was completely ignorant of facts in its excitement over the appearance of Zac Efron, and so on and so forth.

I understand that I am biased in my disinterest in celebrity gossip. My problem with Perez Hilton is not that he talks about these things; it’s that he is so blatantly ignorant of the other information to get to his topic. Almost a year ago, I wrote for Bam! Kapow!, a relatively small website, for about three months. In that time I wrote about a dozen articles discussing upcoming TV and film projects. Even with such a short body of ‘work’, I was painfully aware of every error and mistake, however small, I made in my articles – enough so that when a commenter pointed out something I’d missed or forgotten to add I spent days refreshing the page, terrified that more and more readers would be up in arms over the smallest detail. So I don't understand how someone so involved in the entertainment business can be so happily flippant about the stories he tells. It's insulting to his readers and, more so, reflective of his own lack of integrity as a member of news media. I’ll admit, the mistakes I take offense to are nitpicky, and somewhat irrelevant. However the spirit of these errors remains evident – Hilton seems almost proud of his ignorance toward the subject matter, and this is something that would never fly in other aspects of journalism. A reporter could never errantly mistake the details of a President’s press conference and keep his job.

This situation is the result of the media shoehorning a more popular and profitable, yet younger and less reliable standard into reputable, established news outlets. There is a perception that, as the content is less formal and factual, there is less responsibility on the writers. Maybe so, but until these gossip-makers are held to the same standard as the rest of the medium, I don’t believe they fall under the umbrella of proper journalism.