I'm under the impression that Naomi Wolfe is considered to be a fairly reasonable feminist, but you can't tell it by this piece on Paris Hilton in today's Post.

Wolfe's point seems to be that "we" are fascinated by the Hilton story because we're uncomfortable with the fact that women have become so strong and self-sufficient. Consequently, the culture starts producing images of helpless, out of control women, like that of Hilton sobbing the back of a police car.

Wolfe writes:
What value is there in such countervailing images -- the shadow to women's increasingly bright reality? The first is psychological. On some deep level, there's a generalized feeling that women's vulnerability equals the guarantee of receiving a reliable supply of their love and care. There's an anxiety that if women become too strong, too independent, we won't be able to count on them to nurture and they won't need love. Because men, children and (not to put too fine a point upon it) the whole edifice of human civilization depend on women's willingness to nurture, it's scary to take a step into the unknown -- to see if women will continue to love if they're really free to choose whether to do so. (We will, of course, but it will take a generation or so of proof for everyone to calm down about it.)

This seems like fairly patent BS to me. Nobody thinks they're ever going to get a "reliable supply of love and care" from a self-absorbed, egoistic (and egotistic) moron like Hilton. So Wolfe's explanation of the public's fascination with Hilton seems to fail. (And, furthermore, given the American public's fascination with vapid celebrities of all types, the fact that Wolfe can point to two or three who happen to be helpless, out-of-control and female can't support her case.)

Why are people fascinated with Hilton?

Well, first I challenge the presupposition. I don't give a damn about her, and neither does anybody I know. If Wolf's op-ed hadn't appeared in the Post, I'd certainly never be writing this. But why are those who are interested in Hilton interested in her? Well, in all probability it's because Hilton is a loathsome and eminently hatable character. A paradigm example of the spoiled, rotten rich girl, dripping with cash she didn't earn and doesn't come close to deserving. Such a person might better be ignored than hated, but that she is hated is simply no mystery. There's a natural desire to see such people brought low(er) in a very obvious way.

As is the case with so much cultural criticism in general and feminist cultural criticism in particular, Wolfe's essay seems to turn on a set of explanations that are overly baroque and ideologically-driven. The phenomenon in question is fairly innocuous and easily explained, and no feminist theoretical apparatus is required to do so.