From Cai Xukun’s “one-night stand” to see why celebrity privacy is special
2023-07-06 15:19:32
□Zhang Xin (South China University of Technology)
Recently, artist Cai Xukun was exposed to scandals related to “one-night stand”, which aroused widespread attention and discussion. From this incident and the scandals of artists such as Wang Leehom and Li Yifeng that appeared before, it is not difficult to find that during the process of the incident being exposed and fermented, the privacy of these high-profile artists was a topic that the public was keen on. So in this process, will it violate its legitimate right to privacy? Will the protection of their privacy rights cause worse social impact to a certain extent? Why is celebrity privacy always more special?
In similar incidents, it is not difficult to find that the two parties in conflict are “celebrity’s right to privacy” and “public’s right to know”, and both parties need to protect their rights. But here lies the special feature of celebrities’ right to privacy: the public’s right to know actually creates various news events of celebrities to a certain extent, and celebrities always use their privacy rights in exchange for various attention-grabbing news events to a certain extent. reports. That is to say, the public’s knowledge and attention actually brings a lot of benefits to celebrities, which also determines that the privacy space of celebrities cannot be the same as that of ordinary people. Moreover, the maintenance and control of the privacy right by individuals is not unlimited, and this right should not override social public interests and should not cause damage to public interests. The scandals of officials often attract much attention because of this. Officials themselves are more linked to social and public interests, and their personal behavior is related to public interests, so their privacy space is relatively small. Celebrities often occupy more social public resources because of their high popularity and attention; and because of their fame, they are more likely to have appeal and influence, so their words and deeds may also have an impact on the entire social atmosphere. Therefore, celebrities tend to have less privacy space than ordinary people, which is to a certain extent the price that celebrities have to pay for their independent choice of engaging in related industries.
But at the same time, it cannot be ignored that when various celebrity scandals are exposed, the public’s attention to the event will always violate the celebrity’s privacy to a certain extent. For example, in the case of Cai Xukun, some people and the media paid attention to and considered not the possible illegality of the incident itself, the impact of the incident on the social atmosphere, etc., but too much attention to the details of the “scandal”. The public and the media should pay attention to the privacy of celebrities from the perspective of maintaining public interests and creating a good social atmosphere, instead of using the particularity of celebrity privacy to expose their privacy without a bottom line, and should respect their privacy that has nothing to do with social public life. Otherwise, the protection of the right to know and the criticism of bad behavior will easily turn into the pursuit of vulgar information and excessive violation of the privacy of celebrities. This will instead blur the specific scope of the “ugliness” in the scandal, which is not conducive to a reasonable and legal settlement of the incident, and public opinion may not be able to play the role of supervising celebrities and correcting the social atmosphere.
Public figures should be aware of their social status and the social impact that their privacy may bring; and the public and the media should pay attention to returning to the part where their behavior will damage the public interest when facing related incidents instead of wantonly poking into their privacy.
Source: Red Net
Author: Zhang Xin
Editor: Tian Dezheng