is that if George W. Bush were younger and female, he would be Paris.

As it is, his two daughters have a great deal in common with her.

They are the entitled wealthy, those who will never know that their actions have consequences. They are allowed to break laws, to destroy, to drink and drug their way across continents because an enabler is always waiting to bail them out.

The waste of their own lives is a serious enough problem, but when one of the entitled wealthy has been allowed to create a situation in which hundreds of thousands of people have died, it goes beyond beaver shots and drunkeness.

Seriously...if you wanted to Stop Her you wouldn't Write About Her. How else would one stop a Blatant Attention Hound with no other Apparent Qualities? In fact, I believe there was a Simpson's episode on this topic (where advertising caricatures took the place of the Paris Self-Caricature).

she gives good entertainment value if you ask me.

As much as I love Salon, one of the things I hate most about their community of article responders is their insistence, day after day, month after month, of writing in to say how much they hate said topic because it's too vacuous, or beneath them, or too stupid, or... whatever their complaint du jour is. Excusing those of you out there who are held hostage at your computer, forced at gunpoint to read funny, moderately important (in that anthropological, "analysis of culture in all its forms is important" sort of way) pieces from Rebecca, Cary, Heather, ... -- If you don't like it, don't read it!!

And please, please go spend your oh-so-valuable, precious time doing something (*anything!!*) besides bitching to the rest of us about how you're too important for "these types" of articles.

Because I enjoy them -- Thanks for the amusing, appalling, entertaining, enlightening social commentary Salon!! Keep it up!!

I stopped reading after the first paragraph. Salon editors, are you that out of ideas?

Paris Hilton obviously was never really parented and, as a consquence of this neglect, has simply grown up to be a very wealthy juvenile delinquent. If she was poor she would have probably turned to prostitution to support both her drug habit and any children she might have conceived out of wedlock. She would probably also have a criminal record with convictions for passing bad checks, shoplifting and possibly assault. However because she is wealthy her antisocial behavior occurs on a grand scale and with a lot of "shocked" attention from the press. I simply see a young woman in need of shelter, rules, consequences for bad behavior and lots of positive attention for any decent behavior she exhibits. She isn't the least bit remarkable but for the exception that she typifies perfectly the poor little rich girl stereotype. Where is the compassion for this obviously unloved, maladjusted girl/woman? Why don't people shudder more at what people like her say about our society's attitude to childrearing and child development? What does it say about our society that most people would rather pick on pathetic people like her than see her as a psychologically disturbed woman in desperate need of treatment?

Those unfortunate qualities just made her an easier mark for the pernicious influence of the world's most famous succubutante, and the rope line of gaunt, twitching bodies in Hilton's wake tips us off that it's unlikely to end well for her latest victim.

Even when Traister uses words like "succubantante" she is still just a Paris and Britney watching bimbo. Her mock shock at the party queens gives away the fact the she once took these two seriously. It's as if the only difference between fame and infamy was panties.

Thanks for an interesting article. I have found it odd about this whole hate Paris obsession. Maybe we should hate ourselves for caring what she does and buying into it. The only reason she is famous is because we fat, poor slobs are at home swearing at the TV and calling her a dumb whore.

What has she really done? She's a young, rich woman out to have fun. This whole "bringing down the house" bit is crap. Britney was beloved? Excuse me? She married too young to a man who had a pregant girlfriend. Who is the "whore" here? Then she popped out two children way before she was ready. She's not wearing underwear and we care why? Britney was the one strutting her virginal stuff suggestively giving a whole new rolemodel to tweens everywhere.

Why the entire world has their panties in a knot because these young women like to go out and party is beyond me. Someone has to have fun. Someone has to stop whining in the wind about these young, rich, powerful women who don't need men, marriage, or responsiblity. We are bitter. There was an article recently about the unprecedented power that these girls have. The Olsons. Lindsay Lohan. They are rich and powerful before they can vote while we are wasting away behind our cubes. No wonder we hate them. No wonder we call them sluts and whores and berate them for partying. I suppose the question to ask is this- is this what ultimate female empowerment can mean? That's why we want to get Britney back to her babies wearing some undies. Slap an apron on her and put her in the place. We want her tamed and domesticated because that's how we like women to be.

It's dangerous. It's destructive. Not Paris. Not Britney. We are. We are for being such hypocritcal assholes. They are what they are, no more, no less. Move on.

I'd forgotten all about Paris Hilton until you had to bring her up again.

I don't understand what inner demon forces you to keep holding this silly woman up for the express purpose of knocking her down in front of other people.

But you're kind of almost looking like a stalker now. A weird internally conflicted kind of stalker.

Maybe that's the real secret to Paris' fame. She attracts critics who stalk her more relentlessly than any fan.