Celebrities come with rules of their own. We have seen this time and again ever since titillation became our drug of choice. They are placed on pedestals, which means they are to be afforded no privacy. Their existenceis for our benefit alone. When a celebrity passes away, what was once treated with respect has turned into a free-for-all, with no linen deemed too dirty to air. This is human nature, of course, and to deny that this sort of voyeurism excites millions of us is to be hypocritical. I wonder when we will draw the line though, and start treating victims of tragedy as people rather than talking points.

Consider the times we live in. Television channels and newspapers have spent the past couple of weeks obsessing over a movie star who died a few months ago. They have been putting forth all kinds of inane hypotheses, questioning the nature of his demise, the possible reasons for it, and the role played by everyone he was close to in his final months.