This, that and the Oprah

Well, this looks like a good book. This is intriguing (wonder who he will be?) and I've not much to say about this other than, "Hmmm, how curious and perhaps unfortunate...",

but I have plenty to say about this:

American TV chat-show queen Oprah Winfrey is ditching the high life to star in a poverty-stricken reality TV series, reports IMDB.com.

The 51-year-old media mogul, who is one of the world's richest women with an annual income of more than $300 million, has agreed to live a life of poverty in the hard-hitting documentary. Winfrey will live in a notoriously tough Chicago neighborhood for a month.

The series plans to highlight America's urban housing crisis. A spokesperson for Winfrey's Harpo Productions company says, ``She has interviewed just about every major celebrity and done shows on almost every subject imaginable. But now she intends to tackle really tough, serious issues, putting herself right in the front line.''

However, to ensure Winfrey's safety, she will shadowed by security guards during her stay. But the spokesperson adds, ``In every other respect she will have to fend for herself, just like the many people who have to live in these substandard conditions.''

Oh, where do I start? Where?

I'll just shave my head so that I know how it feels to have cancer. No, wait. I'll misplace my calendar and say that I know how it feels like to have Altzheimer's.

Is Oprah serious?

She's going to go play Ghetto, er, house, for a month while WITH HER BODYGUARDS, and that will let her experience "the front line"? Yeah, she'll be fending for herself. Right.

Does she have children that will be crying in the supermarket, wanting sweets and toys she can't afford? Crying themselves to sleep at night because they're hungry, and frightened of the noises rats make, and afraid that a bullet will come in through their window? Will she have to humiliate them by using electrical tape to hold their shoes together so that they have something to wear to school? Will she ever know the despair of knowing that your child has been bitten by a rat, or has serious asthma because you live surrounded by cockroach feces?

Life of poverty, my ass. Give away all of your money, you sanctimonious publicity whore. Then we'll talk about you even remotely understanding a life of poverty. Even though it still won't really be valid, because you can just ink another deal to earn yourself some money.

It's insulting. It's obscenely offensive to people who don't have the option of going back home to "the high life."

I am in such disbelief, that can't sum it up any better than this excerpt from the song "Common People" (William Shatner, with guests I can't recall right now)


You'll never live like common people. You'll never do whatever common people do. You'll never fail like common people. You'll never watch your life slide out of view, and dance and drink and screw because there's nothing else to do.

Sing along with the common people. Sing along, and it might just get you thru.' Laugh along with the common people. Laugh along, even though they're laughing at you and the stupid things that you do 'cause you think that poor is cool.

Like a dog lying in a corner, they'll bite you and never warn you. Look out. They'll tear your insides out 'cause everybody hates a tourist. 'Cause Everybody hates a tourist, especially one who thinks it's all such a laugh.

You will never understand how it feels to live your life with no meaning or control and with nowhere left to go. You're amazed that they exist and they burn so bright, while you can only wonder why.