#2- Supermarket Tabloids

 Made You Look

 

We are a part of a society, well in my case a part of the cultural elite, were most would never admit to indulging in the frowned upon supermarket tabloids.  More often than not a few tabloid magazines may or may not fall accidentally into our shopping carts to satisfy our inquiring minds. Sometimes it’s hard not to believe or resist the amazing over the top stories within the tabloids. 

 

Have you ever been waiting patiently in line at a supermarket's checkout and can't help but to stare at the bright and vivant covers of the juicy supermarket tabloids? Come on, I know I can't be the only one. I don't know what it is about being stuck in the aisle with notorious magazines, but they force you to do a double take. What made you look? Was it something that made you laugh, scratch your head, or sounded to shocking to be truth? It’s the can't help but to focus in on the huge fonts and color schemes for me! 

 

Even as a child I could recognize the stars on the tabloid magazines and would cry for my mom to buy them just for the picture inside of my favorite stars. I couldn’t care less about to stories printed on the pages beside the pictures. Now as an adult, once I see the racks of magazines only one thought comes to mind. How do tabloids owners stay in business and out of the courtrooms?

 

Global well-known tabloids such as The Star, The Globe and The National Enquirer rarely face lawsuits for regularly fuming celebrities by printing lies, half-truths and innuendo about them to grab the attention of readers. Tabs have built an intimidating reputation that allows them pay publisher to say whatever can make a buck by being protected by the freedom of the press act.

 

Which means the tabs face little to no criminal actions and the lawsuits that do make it to trials are won by the tabs because by law the celebrity has to prove actual malice that the tabloid was negligent, knew that the items published were false, and displayed a reckless disregard for the truth. Impossible! 

 

According to one of the most sort after lawyers in the entertainment industry, Vincent Chieffo of Los Angeles, every few months an angry Hollywood celebrity is in his office waving a copy of a supermarket tabloids with them as the focal point offering readers a feast of gossip, scandal, and believe-it-or-not phenomena. In the article, the veteran lawyer continues to elaborate on how the celebrities assure that the tabloids have printed lies about them and wants to sue. Mr. Chieffo then response with what he calls “the facts of life” in the expensive neverendingly war between tabloids’ publishers and the famous people whose lives they have put on display.