Remember that one Halloween episode of the Simpsons when all the annoying advertising icons came to life and began wreaking havok on Springfield? The solution? Just ignore them and they will go away. I think a similar tactic would work well on Paris and her annoying band of fiends and associates.

Seriously, she's big business - don't for a second buy into the fact that she's just out having fun. Forbes listed her most recent year's earnings at greater than $10M, which is probably much more than those a rung higher in the family tree make on their Hilton legacy dividends in a year.

Every move is scripted by her and her handlers, her PR guy knows exactly where she'll be every night and smooths the sailing. She needs to remain front and center to continue getting contracts and paid exhorbitant sums to simply show up. So you're not into her "thing" - the too rich, too thin and too smart 24/7 self-marketing then move on, but don't begrudge her the talent to recognize and exploit herself. Many of would probably applaud her aplomb had she invented the slinky, yoyo or Rubik's cube - each socially useless items that engrossed some people's time more than it should and heaped millions upon their creators.

It's probably no coincidence that she rose with that tide. This is their era. Let them enjoy their respective downfalls. This revolution is being televised.

Is that the woman is FINE! That's not an excuse, or a reason...it's just a fact.

So much unfocused hate, all the words describing a promiscuous immoral, sex selling female strung together over and over, even references to the devil and witches and her biological functions and vomiting.

I cannot imagine why anyone would write such a nasty article about a rich nobody and quote Fey, and Olberman to support her own attack.

All this venom directed at a woman who does not know you exist and would probably ignore you if she did happen to glance in your direction.

So you hate Hilton. Especially for corrupting America's sweetheart Spears. Good for you. This generous defense of that other stupid trailer trash from the toxic effects of Hilton ought to qualify you for sainthood soon.

What has happened to Salon?

I’m with Anne (ultimate female empowerment?). I know next to nothing about Paris, Linsdsay, or Britney but I know projection when I see it. Sounds like they misbehave at times, yet their faults and excesses I suspect would be of no more interest to us than those of our neighbors’ if not for their social roles as targets for our anger associated with disowned, unrealized drives. “We want her tamed and domesticated because that’s how we like women to be.” And because we can’t own our unrealized drives to be untamed and liberated.

I get a huge kick out of the flashing. Does anyone think that Britney et al. are not perceptive enough to know that the men who watch them are thinking about fucking them? And that women, at least some disowned part of them, are wishing they could be as sexually free and desired? I like to think that when they flash their stuff, and we pretend to be horrified while we are captivated, they’re laughing inside and thinking, “Whatsa matter you repressed chickenshits? You afraid of what you’ve been secretly fantasizing?”

The joke is on us and we don’t get it.

I could feel as I read your article that at least two types of Salon readers would

a) be angry at you for being angry at Hilton

b) moan about the standards of Salon, implying that Hilton is not worthy of a Salon article

I couldn't agree less

I think the article shows remarkable insight and honesty. The venom inside it is honest venom and it is born of despair, it is a long overdue and very sane response to the mystifying addiction of mainstream media to a seriously dysfunctional young woman.

Ironically:

"This has been Hilton's whole shtick: I'm dumb and badly behaved, but it doesn't matter because I'm rich"

...applies to the commander-in-chief as well

What we all need is a Hilton Survey Group intervention to at least declare that the madness is over. She, like the decider, obviously won't take a blind bit of notice, but it will signal loud and clear to the whole world that the game is finally up.

Thanks for the hilarious article. I must have laughed a good fifteen minutes at it right here in my open office. It's kind of funny how people get all in a huff over a sarcastic piece of cultured pop journalism. I mean, the article actually contains the phrase: "The other almost-supernatural aspect of Hilton's reign of harebrained horror is the way that she herself remains intact while those around her wither. Hilton is like some kind of Dorian Gray cockroach".

Rebecca Traister is either scarily obsessed or genuinely worried. Either way, it makes for one hell of a read!

I like Keith Olbermann a lot, and I like Rebecca Traister. But the fact that he said THAT, on television, and that she quotes him not as evidence of him going off the rails for a moment but as evidence of Paris's alleged malevolence -- well, something is amiss here. Paris is an opportunist, and as Rebecca says, we create the opportunities. But let's not have Keith Olbermann indulging in mean-spirited misogyny and Rebecca Traister nodding along with him!

As an aside, why is Salon so protective of Britney Spears? It doesn't bother me, but I also don't get it. Yes, she does look innocent, but, by her own admission, she isn't.

britney and paris don't give a rat's ass about you. why do you care about them?

I don't know ANYONE who does!

C'mon, Ms. Traister! "We" have been trying to ignore Paris, so don't include us in your royal we -- it's the MEdia, not the WEdia -- that has made Paris famous. That's you, not us.

As elite an institution as any it reports on, the media decides who and what gets ink and airtime. No media, no Paris. If the press was half as attentive to reporting the outrages of President Bush that it was about Paris's bush, maybe things would be better than they are.

The media always uses the excuse "we're giving the public what it wants!" and yet "we" (the public "it") are buying less newspapers, reading less magazines, tuning out more television -- so the media's clearly not delivering the goods that "we" actually want. Maybe less Paris would bring us back, put the critical "mass" back into mass media that advertisers want so badly.

But don't worry; no matter what she does, whatever additional outrages she perpetrates, Paris will get older, and I doubt she'll have it in her to age gracefully. From plastic surgery disasters to failed marriages to a cartoonish demise, Paris is not immune.

We'll get to examine her unexamined life as gravity and entropy and inevitable biology do away with her, until you anoint another succubutante to take her place, and then suck your teeth at all the attention the next one gets, how terrible she is, etc., etc.