Is tabloid trash a thing of the past?

Is it? Well, here’s what Russell Goldman had to say about it in an article on ABC News (quoted here from www.abcnews.go.com):

For a while there it was touch-and-go. We as a country would walk past a newsstand in the airport or flip thorough a tabloid in line at the supermarket and collectively breathe a sigh of relief that our crazy country cousin Britney Spears was still alive.

You still hear sighs at the newsstand, but they’re no longer sighs of relief. Now they are sighs of resignation.

Spears isn’t the only one keeping us bored by staying out of trouble these days. Nearly all of the so-called bad girls who just several months ago graced magazine covers as they sauntered out of rehab, sashayed out of prison and stepped out of cars sans underwear have been bumped off the pages by dime-a-dozen reality show stars and politicians.

….

“Certainly, sales of photos and videos of Britney have gone down since last year and the beginning of this year,” said Brandy Navarre, vice president of the paparazzi photo agency X-17 Online. “She’s just not out doing wild and unexpected things anymore.”

“There is still a market for the weird and wacky, it’s just other people doing it,” Navarre said. “We’ve got shocking photos of Colin Farrell on the beach looking really skinny.”

Colin Farrell? Really? That’s it? Sigh.

Read Russell Goldman’s entire article here.

[Citation: Is Tabloid Trash a Thing of the Past? by Russell Goldman, ABC News, 26 June 2008.]