beautiful-people-awards

The Whitney Houston Index: What if These People Died the Night Before the Oscars?

Maureen O'Connor · 02/24/12 02:32PM

Sigmund Freud theorized that humans have a death drive, a latent desire for self-destruction. In a media ecosystem rife with celebity death pictures, celebrity death bets, Celebrity Rehab, I'd say we have a culture-wide "death drive," too. The reaction to Whitney Houston's death two weeks ago, reported the day before the Grammys, underscored our obsession with such celebrity tragedies. What would be the Oscars' version of that particular fallout?