Do you believe you'd like to be famous?

My psychiatrist wants me to be a spokesman for schizophrenia. Not sure that I want to be public about it. He said that I am a success story.

Where is the line between fame and notoriety? No, given the choice I would avoid celebrity like the plague. Those saddled with it as a factor in paying the mortgage have my sympathy.

I would. But not for the money or royalties, but for the opportunity to take the limelight and use it for good.

Yup. I would like to be a celeb because only their views seem to count these days. I would love to use my influence in youth for living better life and helping others to do that. I know it will come with a cost but would be ready to bear it.

I never yearned for it nor strived for it, but if it happened I would be ok with it as long as it was for positive reasons. If it came with lots of money even better.

I have never been famous, but I have been in situations where lots of people in a group knew who I was and I didn’t always know who they were, or I didn’t remember who they were.

One situation was when I was a manager in a department store of 400 people. It seemed like all the employees knew who I was. They knew me by name, and seemed to like being in my presence. It wasn’t fame, but it was a nice feeling.

The other was being the social chairperson of our car club. Almost everyone who participated pretty much knew my name and sought me out at minimum to say hello at club functions.

I think a lot of it has to do with what I would be famous for.

I certainly wouldn’t want any part of being famous for being famous, like a Kardashian. A boring, self-centered and high maintenance lifestyle, IMO.

If the fame came with a talent or skill (like singing or sport), I suppose I’d like to be famous as long as I earned enough money to have fame on my own terms. It’s not inappropriate to mention Prince here. His talent quickly earned him enough money to express his shy extrovertedness as he pleased.

If fame came with knowledge like, Richard Dawkins, bring it on.

By and large, though, being famous just sounds too high maintenance for me.

I wonder if it’s possible to earn a decent living through avoiding celebrity

Not a life for me

I’m the opposite of @NerdyKeith No desire for the spotlight but I’ll take the money and royalties. haha
I almost had a famous rooster once. He went to a photo shoot in San Francisco to audition for a french Film productions company logo. The cock ( Gallic Rooster ) is the unofficial French equivalent to our Bald Eagle. Their Natl. bird symbol.

” Wild Bill” was quite handsome and his photos turned out beautifully, drawing others from the high rise building where his interview was to watch the cock of the walk. haha
He stood on a glass table with alternating black and white backgrounds and he was a feather in no doubt but then the campaign was scraped and he went back to his humble country roots after a spin in the spotlight. lol

Yeah. Like you @Jeruba I’m famous among a small group of people. Well, don’t know if you consider my school a big or small community. I’m not famous to the point of being a household name, but enough not to sound like a complete stranger. So far I haven’t seen any big effect of being famous. I just live my life like nothing has happened. The only thing that sets me apart from the “ordinary” seems to be that I’m sometimes approached by people who I has never known. They just come and speak to me with my name as if we had known for sometimes, and I’m like “hey! How did you know me?”

I consider myself to be somewhat of a celeb. I’ve been interviewed for TV news, radio, and the local newspaper. If you ask many in town or the surrounding area if they’ve ever heard of me, they are sure to say, “No. Should I have?”
It would be nice to be more famous and have the extra cash…

I am a minor celebrity in astronomy circles although my heyday was about 3 years ago. It’s fading. And it’s astronomy so it’s not a big deal.

I think the closest I came was being first chair clarinet, then first chair saxophone when I played in the school band.

I enjoy being as anonymous as I can. Too much attention makes me uncomfortable.

I just remembered the time I moved from Las Vegas to a small town in Illinois my junior year of high school. Everyone heard about me before school started. I was known as the girl from Vegas. Everyone wanted to meet me and it helped with the transition. I was a terribly shy girl so the attention did help, but it did become annoying after a bit.

I hated it. I hated having people I didn’t know vie for my attention, as if I owed it to them because I was “somebody,” or want to tell me all about the last time we met. I don’t like to be the center of attention even when it’s my birthday. I don’t like speaking before a group of as few as 20 people. Fortune wouldn’t be so bad, I think, although it does ruin some people’s lives; but if fame were the price of it, I’d probably give up the fortune to avoid the fame.

It’s no wonder to me that many sudden celebrities have a hard time handling the attention and begin to get a very distorted idea of their places in the world. It’s also no wonder that people who aren’t brought up to it—say, royal spouses who aren’t royalty themselves—can find it hard to bear; or that writers who’ve been working in solitude for years and then wind up with bestsellers and TV appearances can end up wanting to run away from everything. The grace of people like Kate Middleton and J.K. Rowling is pretty remarkable.

It just amazes me that “fame and fortune” are the dream of so many. Sounds to me more like a nightmare.

(This is one way that you can tell I’m not Cate Blanchett.)

Have you been famous in any context?

Yes.

Did you like it?

Some parts yes. Not having to solicit clients is nice. They just fall out of the sky trying to work with me. Still living off the notoriety from twenty years ago.

…why?

Fame is the closest identity to being a real life super hero. Consider whatever the fame is for, a talent, smarts, invention, idea, charitable act, infamy… consider that as your super power that few others possess to the degree that you do. To be recognized as the top of…whatever heap… is not only personally rewarding, and a tribute to all the hard work put into the super power… But it can also give inspiration to others to pursue the same, and make it even better. That’s how humans progress, evolve, and make life different than it was before.

This assumes the fame is for something achieved, and not accidentally lucked in to. But even lucky fame can inspire those who aren’t so lucky.

I think it the responsible thing to do. To pursue refinement in any endeavor. Set the bar as high as possible to demonstrate what is possible. Unfortunate that the public eye will usually foist unwarranted extra responsibility upon the super achiever, demanding fame on their terms. The public adores the giant, then cheers the giant killer to answer with greater deeds previously unimaginable. The species evolves. Humanity snails towards enlightenment. Sometimes.
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Hi @Rarebear… Funny I know a bit about your astronomy ties. And although we’ve had a number of private talks about it, I still envision you with a banjo. You might be famous for one thing. But my curiosity about you involves something completely different.

No, I’ve never been famous and would not want to be.

I would love to win the lottery but hope I’m in a state where winners are allowed to remain anonymous.

I have no desire to be famous. I want to be successful at what I do and it would be nice if my achievements were recognised, but famous… no.

It really depends on the reasons of my fame. In general, I feel nonchalant about my popularity. When I was a college student I have almost always been late for classes most of the time that I was known as ‘the one’ who always late in the class by the entire class (not that I prefer such popularity).

I’m already a famous person for myself and that’s enough for me. What you think of yourself is more important than what others think of you.

I am “famous” for 2 reasons…

1) I am considerably richer than the vast majority of my peers
2) The butler, chauffeur & assorted house staff hang on my every whim word

I would like to be famous, but not extremely famous. I wouldn’t want everyone to know about me, but I would like to be famous. Having fans would be kind of incredible.
I may not be ever be famous, but I can kind of imagine myself being famous. Is that weird?
I would like to be famous for music, writing, acting or a youtuber.
I have quite big goals.

No. I would absolutely hate being recognized on the street.

“I’d rather be famous.

Than righteous.

Or holy.

Anyday…”

At work, I’m in a position where I work for an organization that represents thousands of people, and many people know who I am. However, I don’t consider that famous. To me, that’s not famous by a long shot and many of the descriptions that Jellies gave above for why they consider themselves famous is not “famous” either. To me, famous describes someone who many, many people know. Not just a select few who are members of an organization or several hundred who read someone’s research paper. To me, “famous” and “well known” are two different things. The mayor of a small town or his family members may be “well known,” but Kelly Ripa is famous.

With my definition of famous, is it something I’d want to be? No. I’d not want to have paparazzi outside my house or trailing me at the airport or people speculating about my motives or writing on social media about my looks. It would drive me nuts.

Definitely not. I believe it creates a false dichotomy between the famous and the rest of the world.

@marinelife It isn’t false.

I am well known in my state by my professional peers, simply because of holding office in the professional trade group. That has not proven to be a problem other than people knowing me and me having no idea who they are. I have refused to hold an office again effective this year.

@RealEyesRealizeRealLies I’m definitely not “famous” for playing the banjo, although I started taking lessons again so who knows?

I’m asking about actual magazine-cover, talk-show-interview, stalked-by-reporters-and-photographers celebrity. Does anyone want that? In my estimation this has nothing at all to do with real achievement, much less excellence. You can be a high achiever and known for excellence in your field without ever being famous.

I have been interviewed in online talk shows, but never stalked by reporters. So, in the spirit of your question I amend my answer to “No, not famous.”

@disquisitive It is false. You are no better than your peers who have not achieved renown.

No, I would not want to be famous. I would have a difficult time handling it.

The closest I came was my 15 seconds of fame on NPR’s Car Talk for having my puzzler suggestion being chosen. The puzzler was not even one that I came up with on my own. Oddly, they did not notify me beforehand by email. I just happened to be listening to the show and heard my name.

I think this is an interesting paradox. I do not have anything that I see people are famous for. I can’t sing, act, tell jokes, perform, do politics, nothing. Therefore I cannot conceive of being famous. If I had these talents then I would possibly feel different, but I don’t know.

GA, @Stinley.

I think it’s high likely that any of us, discovering an extraordinary hidden talent, would want to be recognized for that talent, i.e. “famous”.
Let’s not pretend that we’d be happy singing in the shower with a voice like Adele.