The murder of a princess is an event that looms large in the world of myth, which is itself a larger-than-life world.

The murder of a princess is an event that looms large in the world of myth, which is itself a larger-than-life world. It is reasonable to assume that the larger the event, the more important it is on a psychic level, for both the individual and the collective. So, if we concede the value - and the values - of myth, the death of Princess Diana, ironically named for the Roman goddess of the hunt, must have a message for us of critical importance.

Those with fame have always been important to those without it, so our fascination with the pretty, young lady who became Princess of Wales is by no means indicative of anything unique to our culture. What, then, is different about the relationship we share today with celebrities? The answer lies in the unprecedented degree to which our culture fails to meet the psychic needs of the individual. It has become almost a cliché, but the truth is that, while we presently know more than ever, we can apply precious little of that knowledge toward our personal fulfillment, which has resulted in a shallow culture whose spiritual emptiness dwarfs its technological power. The U.S. led megaculture's gobbling up of smaller cultures of longstanding stability and integrity has been one the 20th century's most profoundly disturbing trends. And the more a psyche (or culture) is consumed with emptiness, the greater becomes the need to fill the void with outside materials. In other words, the bigger the hole is inside, the more compelling will be the inclination to internalize, that is, to create inner psychic manifestations of people with whom we resonate. So, a Princess in a Dark Age will be heavily utilized in the service of manifesting internalized light. Diana's meaning to us, therefore, has been predominantly archetypal, which is why the particulars of her life on a personal level are relatively unimportant to this discussion. What ultimately matters is how we saw her, not who she actually was.

This process might be relatively benign if we were conscious of it, at least to some degree. The fact is, however, we are not. All we know is that our lust for information is particularly strong with celebrities. We have no awareness of the internalizing process and its relationship to our emptiness. We see the tabloids at the checkout counter and find ourselves drawn into them. In reality, we are drawing them into us.

Let's look at some other celebrities who have been particularly powerful for us in recent times. Elvis Presley eventually ran from the vampire world that hounded him all of his adult life. He ran, but he could not hide. Death came early to him, by that time an obese, solipsistic recluse whose methods of escape were not only limited in effectiveness, but ultimately lethal. Marilyn Monroe was supposedly so doped up at the end that she couldn't retain her lines. The cause of her premature death is still being debated. The world has chased Michael Jackson through his journey into states of increasingly tenuous reality; even his face has become strange and distorted. John Lennon was assassinated at the age of 40 by a deranged fan who reportedly believed that he was John Lennon himself and that the world could no longer contain two of them. This is the internalizing of celebrities at its psychotic edge. Kurt Cobain, perhaps more fragile than most, could only take a couple of years of fame before a gun to the head became the superior option.

Clearly, when the public "loves" you, the eventual price tag is more than most can afford. But then, I don't think what the public feels is anything like love. Love requires a respect for the "individualness" of the other. Celebrity adoration is more parasitic. Furthermore, it carries with it an ambivalence that contains a frighteningly aggressive underbelly. Specifically, the more a culture raises a person to iconic status, the more that person then becomes prey for the destructive aspect of the relationship. The higher they build you up (i.e. the greater number of people see you), the more of a target you become. We have a jaded expression for it: "the price of fame." Part of that price is the resentment that the collective carries because they are not you. This resentment, however, is largely unconscious and is thus projected onto others (e.g. the paparazzi).

The image of Princess Diana was - and still is - one of the most sought after in the world, so her price for fame was always particularly high. Her understandably embittered brother recently implied while issuing a condemnation of the media, that there was a constant battle between the Princess, attempting to carve out a private life, and the hunters of her image, whose mission was to do whatever necessary to provide the public with more. Both sides worked passionately to achieve their objectives. Diana's desire to keep some of her life to herself was understandably pressing. It is important to realize, however, that the passion generating the energy on the other side was quite powerful, too. The public devours information - photographs, stories, gossip, innuendo, etc., - like a compulsive overeater, using the soothing stimulation to numb and distract, in lieu of wholeness. Unrepentant even today, we are allowing the media to saturate our psyches with Diana data until we lose all feeling about her death.

As we should have expected, the scapegoats were quick in surfacing. First it was, of course, the paparazzi, the word itself exotic and suggestive of expensive Italian shoes, hinting at our ambivalence toward those scavenging scoundrels whom we consciously love to hate. "They've gone too far this time!" was the early message. Soon came reports of an intoxicated driver, adding intrigue and ambiguity to the mix; a princess being driven by a drunk is a bizarre and disturbing image. Still, given the fact that the car was being pursued at high speeds by photographers on motorcycles, it doesn't seem reasonable to put all the heat on the driver. So, we have formidable villains: a drunkard, always a potent and reliably negative archetype, and the paparazzi, who ironically lost the battle for the life of the princess as they overcame her and she lost her own life. All subsequent images will have to be retrospective.

But, while our collective guilt may have been somewhat assuaged by the well worn defense of externalizing the evil, it does not stand up: the evil is in us, too. After all, the paparazzi, whose purpose generated the fatal incident, are our hired guns. It is our emptiness that gives rise to the meaning and value of their work. Let those who have never gotten a kick out of a tabloid story while waiting for a cashier cast the first stone.

In the end, what is most alarming is not the ruthless tenacity of the paparazzi, but, rather, the amount of money their pictures are worth. The market price reflects the culture's value of the commodity. One million dollars was the going rate today for a photograph of a dying princess. This speaks terrifying volumes of our dark side. Diana, upon whom we projected so much of the good that is unlived in us, ultimately fell victim to the shadow of the light that illuminated her pedestal. While her untimely death is certainly tragic in human terms, more importantly, it sounds a clarion call to the world to wake up and move toward the filling of the emptiness. When the day comes that we kill a princess, it is time we face the dark side together.

 

Copyright James N. Kraut 1997. All rights reserved.

Dr. James N. Kraut is a licensed psychologist in private practice in Plantation, Florida. He is the Program Director of the Center for Jungian Studies of Southeast Florida.

Send e-mail to James N. Kraut at: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

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