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EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Sarah Kickler
EDITORIAL EDITOR
Mike Schmierbach
NIGHT EDITOR
Carl Yeh
THE PROFIT MARGIN
By selling to Diana’s grave, the Spencer family is fueling the
absurd spectacle of celebiity
Forget about Walt Dis
ney World and Dolly
wood; fora cool
$16.50 each you and
the whole family can take a
gander at Princess Diana’s
grave.
That’s right. In one of those
weird cosmic twists that one can
usually only find in an episode of
the Simpsons, the Spencer family
Kameron
Cole
announced on
Monday they
will open their
home to the
public and sell
tickets to view
Diana’s grave
site.
I mean, one
would think
that Diana’s
family, of all
people, would think she deserved
more than to have her final rest
ing place become a stop on a
package tour. But then why
should they? After all, Elvis’ fami
ly turned his home into a mecca
for slack-jawed tourists. And they
have a gift shop.
The Spencers say the money
raised will go to Diana’s favorite
charities, which, in all fairness to
'.'SEE HER FINAL BESlWfr PlflCt
N' *
them, is probably
true. But come on, Diana
mania is still in it’s prime.
1 here are any number of ways to
raise money without resorting to
such dubious measures. So let’s
strip away the nonsense and be
honest. The reason Princess Di
ana’s family is turning her grave
site into the Graceland of Great
Britain is a very simple one: be
cause they can.
Skeptical? Within 20 minutes
of opening phone lines, more
than 10,000 ticket requests from
around the world overwhelmed
the 221 phone lines set up by the
Spencers. No doubt about it, The
Di Death Tour will be the hottest
ticket in town.
I feel the need to pause here
and offer a few words of explana
tion. I made a firm resolution to
make the Princess Diana affair my
own personal Titanic — to sink it
and banish it to the bottom of a
figurative ocean. But there are
some things that just won’t stay
down,
that are so
mind-boggling
that to not comment on them
would be unthinkable. This is
one of those things.
This latest chapter in this
sometimes sordid, always twisted
tale begs myriad questions, not
the least of which is whether the
British are now officially as crazy
as Americans. But at the heart of
this issue is a deeper, more press
ing question: Has the collective
fascination with celebrity finally
overwhelmed all common sense?
How far are we willing to go to
get a piece of a celebrity? Are we
really willing to pay good money
to hover like ghouls over a grave?
And if we are, why?
As usual, the media is part of
the problem. By engaging in a
CHRIS HUTCHINSON/Emerald
symbiotic relation
ship with movie studios,
record labels and anyone else out
to hype a product, the news me
dia have all but erased the line be
tween themselves and the enter
tainment media.
By deifying people, we elevate
them to a position in society that
they are often ill-suited for. We
assign labels like “voice of a gen
eration” or “role model” to people
based on criteria like wealth and
recognizability rather than actual
contributions to society. In doing
so, we are setting a trap for future
generations that they may not be
able to extricate themselves from.
Consider this: Studies done on
how children and young adults
perceive celebrities have con
cluded they often equate media
exposure with respectability. In
other words, kids find strangers
more deserving of their respect
and admiration than people
whom they interact with every
day, such as teachers,
by virtue of nothing
more than the num
ber of times they ap
pear in magazines or
on television.
Aside from being
profoundly sad, this phenome
non manifests itself in more in
sidious ways.
Nowadays, anyone can be a
celebrity. Actual talent is no
longer a prerequisite. If you break
enough rules, kill enough people
or appear on Jerry Springer
enough times, you too can be
come a cultural phenomenon.
There’s nothing wrong with ad
miring a celebrity. There’s noth
ing wrong with being a celebrity.
The problem lies in how we as a
society respond to them. Celebri
ty status does not make someone
an inherently superior person.
The most important thing is that
we not let our admiration over
ride our dignity.
Kameron Cole is a columnist for the
Emerald. Her ivork appears on al
ternate Wednesdays. Her views do
not necessarily represent those of the
newspaper.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Donations help corporations
Some important information was lack
ing from the Emerald article, “Rally targets
corporate donors,” (ODE, Dec. 4).
The increased corporate donations to
the University are part of a broader and
systematic pattern of strategic corporate
philanthropy that is directed at universi
ties. Since 1980, corporate investments in
universities have tripled from $235 mil
lion to $1.2 billion. Two major laws, Small
Business Patent Procedures (P.L. 96-517)
and the Recovery Tax Act (P.L. 97-34) fa
cilitated the intensity of corporate invest
ments in universities. The small business
act and the 1983 executive order allowed
universities to sell patent rights derived
from research to corporations. In addition,
the new law and the executive order al
lowed for increased corporate tax deduc
tions for any contribution made to univer
sities (Lawrence Soley, “Leasing the Ivory
Tower”). Therefore, the general pattern of
increased corporate donations must be un
derstood in this context. These donations
provide massive benefits in the form of
technology transfers for corporations. As
James O’Connor has pointed out in the
“Fiscal Crisis of the State,” corporations
may socialize their costs by having the
public (taxpayers and students) pay for the
research and development costs. In the
specific case of the Nike investment (com
bined donations from Penelope and Phil
Knight, the Knight family, Nike Inc. and
Nissho Iwai American Corp., a company
for which Nike has acquired all marketing
rights), the return is development of a
“new field of study,” sports marketing that
the Oregon Foundation proudly advertises
in its glossy publication (“Celebrating
Achievement: The Oregon Campaign”).
As James Warsaw, former president of
Sports Specialties Corp., points out, he
created the endowment for the Warsaw
Sports Marketing Center because “he
knows the industry can benefit from the
application of university-level research
and education” (bizuoregon.edu/sports
mark/jimwarsaw.html). In 1993, Sports
Specialties was acquired by Nike. This is
a point that the Emerald “infomercial”
(ODE, Dec. 8) failed to mention. Phil
Knight knows the importance of cheap
university research because "a local de
sign student at Portland State University”
received a mere $35 to develop Nike’s
swoosh logo (Forbes, “You are what you
wear,” Oct. 13,1996). According to Nike’s
1996 Annual Report, image is extremely
important and accounts for $1.3 to $1.7
billion of Nike's assets. The University’s
marketing will contribute to this image. As
Steadman Upham, vice provost for re
search and the dean of the University
Graduate School, points out, “outreach is
not just a word in our mission statement;
it is the tangible result of aggressive tech
nology-transfer programs. ... The Univer
sity of Oregon reaches out across space
and time to the very frontiers of knowl
edge,” and “it involves blazing a trail
across the interface of athletics and capi
talism ’ (“Special Advertising Supplement
to the Business Journal: Gold Behind the
Glitz and Glory,” Inquiry, www.uore
gon. edu/~uocomm/inquiry).
As Soley points out, corporate funding
in universities is siphoned away from ed
ucation and channeled back into the re
search and development for corporations
and into the funding bureaucracy of the
fund-raising institutions. One of the most
recent marketing developments that has
come from the Warsaw Sports Marketing
Center is a registered trade market — The
Sports Executive Retreat (FastBreak, Fall
1997). Do you think the students and the
public will benefit from this retreat?
Julia Fox
Sociology instructor