We all know the popular magazine saying, “Stars, they’re just like us!” But are they, really? The world has had a long-standing fascination with celebrities. We’re all guilty of being star-struck—whether it’s by their talent, good looks, or massive bank accounts. We follow their every move, admire their style, and obsess over their personal lives in the papers, tabloids, and more recently, social media.

But lately, it seems that celebrities are trying a little too hard to be relatable to the masses. From posting “candid” pictures of themselves in sweatpants to raving about their love for fast food, it seems like everyone in Hollywood is trying to prove they’re just like us. But let’s be real: we don’t care. Or at least I don’t. 

Maybe it’s because stars think we’ll like them more if we see them doing “normal” things, or that we’ll spend more money on their stupidly overpriced concert tickets or corny t-shirts. But frankly, I really couldn’t care less that supermodel Bella Hadid gorges on pepperoni and cheese pizza or that Ellen DeGeneres thought the COVID-19 lockdown in her giant Montecito mansion was “pretty tough.”

I miss the Paris Hilton of celebrities—when they don’t know how to microwave a burrito because they’re so absurdly rich they have people to do it for them. Let’s go back to suspiciously manicured “cook with me” videos and steer far, far away from Trever Noah pretending to care about the price of a carton of eggs at the Grammys. It comes across as disingenuous and even a little bit pathetic, like they’re trying desperately to get accepted into a club they’d never even belong to in the first place. “I know what it’s like to have money problems. I only have one glamorous vacation home in the Hamptons, and it’s not even that big!” And remember when Bella Hadid complained about her childhood because she was never allowed to buy from designer brands until she turned 18 and received her first pair of Louboutins? 

The entire point of celebrities is that they are, crucially, not like us. Somehow they’re special enough to justify being rich and famous and above everyone else while the rest of the world is deemed as ordinary. Why would I want a celebrity to be anything like me? I want celebrities who are so out of touch with reality it doesn’t even occur to them that they have anything to overcompensate for. I want them to tweet deranged ramblings praising their own genius and name their child “X X Æ A-12.”  If I wanted someone “just like us,” I’d look in the mirror.