Paparazzi vs. Celebrities: Who Wins, the Camera or Britney?
Posted on March 17, 2008
Filed Under Criminal Law |
The last five years or so has seen the rise of the 24-hour celebrity. Britney Spears, Lindsey Lohan, Paris Hilton and a few others are on our television sets, in our magazines, on our websites producing news almost non-stop. However, celebrities aren’t able to do this on their own, they need not just the news outlets to disseminate the news to the public, but the paparazzi to follow them around non-stop.
The conflict created has caused a huge confrontation between the paparazzi and the celebrities who want constant attention, yet also want their privacy. In order to properly understand some of the issues though, there are a few legal terms to decipher:
Public Figure: People like Gwyneth Paltrow, Madonna and Brad Pitt fall into this category, they are individuals who have such a high level of popularity that the law views them differently than a normal citizen. Paparazzi are allowed to cover this individuals as much as they want, and can only be convicted of certain crimes if they are proven to have acted with malicious intent.
All-purpose Public Figure: These are people, such as The President of the United States, who have achieved such high status that their name or image can be used for all purposes and in all contexts. If, for example, there was a political cartoon about an unknown citizen which was inflammatory, it wouldn’t be seen the same way as if the cartoon were about President Bush, or one of the current presidential candidates.
Limited-purpose Public Figure: These are individuals who have not sought out fame (unlike a movie-star) but who are in the news enough to have a different status legally. Major crime victims or perpetrators, lottery winners and the like may fall into this category.
The paparazzi do not have free reign to follow any citizen they want around while they go to Starbucks, but when an individual is seeking stardom, then the situation changes. After the death of Princess Diana however in 1997, California passed (along with other states and cities) anti-paparazzi laws which cover the physical invasion of privacy, increases the “buffer zone” around a celebrity, restrictions on the invasion of personal or familial activity and a broad definition of the term “offensive to a reasonable person.” This is one of the few laws that has restricted the freedom of the press in some time.
The criminal penalties for these laws include possible jail time, fines (including losing the fee that a photograph might bring) and other penalties.
Comments
Leave a Reply