Public Spectacle

Why is it that we feed on tragedies like Amy Winehouse, and only after her death do we seriously look at the disease rather than the spectacle? We watch like vultures. And while we all probably said to ourselves, after looking at her stumbling across the stage or slurring her words, "Wow. That poor girl is going to kill herself unless she gets help," Winehouse continued to provide the scandal fodder that we have such an appetite for.

We view these people - Lindsay Lohan, Charlie Sheen, and the ranks of the 27 that Winehouse has just joined - as circus clowns, as Christians being fed to lions - those who merit our laughter, our scorn, mixed with the morbid fascination of watching a train wreck.

Those who really care about these people are the ones who stay awake at night waiting for the inevitable phone call. They see the drawn-out suicide and suffer.

And then, when they self-destruct, the rest of us sit back and say what a tragedy it was, how addiction and mental illness should be treated like the diseases that they are.

Yeah, the way Winehouse lived her life was tragic. The way she died is tragic. But so is the entrainment value of it.