Letters to the Editor
This letter is associated with the following article:
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Yes and No and Thank You
Yes, I think we may, for ugly reasons, prefer the fall of women to the fall of men, though I think Paris Hilton does not fit neatly into that dynamic. In her case she is rich and talentless first and a woman second. The audience wants to see someone who has been so insulated and so elevated brought down to a base level of humanity. This is the very formula her TV show is predicated on. The gender issue is incidental (or at least ancillary) to that; look at the attention her brother recently got for a similar DUI. I didn't even know she HAD a brother before that story.
But mostly I'm just glad you used the word "schadenfreude".