Think tale of two cities…
Media know-it-alls are falling over themselves connecting the suicide deaths of KC designer Kate Spade and “foodie” Anthony Bourdain.
Which to me says more about today’s celebrity worshipping culture than it does the hidden demons that many of us possess.
But can we draw a line here?
Spade and Bourdain may have been celebrities, but the resemblance ends there.
Bourdain, for example, thrived on, and was obsessed with fame and becoming fabulously wealthy. And frankly, it’s hard to imagine anyone being more full of themselves.
As evidenced here a handful of years back when locals ponied up big bucks to watch and listen to Bourdain boast about his decadent eating exploits at the Midland.
Kate Spade, on the other hand, was a down to earth Kansas City girl.
Her recognition in life was achieved by hard work and behind the scenes accomplishments. She lent her name and celebrity to charitable causes and business endeavors, rather than bumping around on the world’s stage fishing for publicity by eating weird things and getting wasted.
Bourdain was the quintessential fame junky.
Now think about the word “foodie” for a minute…
The Urban Dictionary‘s take:
“A douchebag who likes food.”
Catchy.
“Douchebag – ‘I’m a big foodie’
“Non-doucher – ‘Really? I like food too, but I’m not a tool.’ ”
Or how about:
“A person who has no actual interests or hobbies. ‘Oh that’s really interesting! Me? Hmmm let’s see, let me describe myself…well…I guess I would consider myself a real foodie.’ ”
Back to the matter at hand.
Bourdain was a former chef and heroin addict with a plethora of dark moments on his resume, and who had addressed the thought of killing himself on more than one occasion.
Meanwhile Spade, though her name still graced the company and stores, had been a dozen years removed from the company. Rendering the story about the Florida mom who took her six year-old daughter into a Kate Spade store for her first big fashion purchase and then wrote about Kate kinda of odd..
Speaking of which, it must have been awkward having to endure the association after all those years given that she had nothing to do with her brand. Which may have lead to Spade’s bizarre name change in an effort to forge a new identity – Katherine Noel Frances Valentine Brosnahan Spade.
As for Bourdain, Kansas City Blues Society founder Roger Naber – something of a food connoisseur himself – never quite crossed over to being a Bourdain groupie.
“I got tired of watching him eat and drink beer on TV,” Naber says. “Or do a shot of brandy, something like that. But at least he exposed a lot of people to Trump’s shit hole countries.
2GREAT PEOPLE GONE.
BUT BOURDAIN’S CONTRIBUTIONS AND TIME SPENT ON CHARITABLE CAUSES
FAR OUTWEIGHED THOSE OF SPADE.
AND USING ROGER NABOR AS A SOURCE. GIVE ME A BREAK. HE MAKES
GLAZE LOOK LIKE HARLEY RACE!!!!!!!!!!!
Lemme guess, Booms: You hail from a shithole country?
No, he’s just a shithole!
glaze…nothin personal…you’re just wrong.
you were wrong all years in baseball and football (below 30%)
and you were wrong on everything else…except pointing out a
few hotties for the seniors to get all worked up about on kcc.
I like you glaze. But its just what you write. Let’s have a beer
sometime. you can find me at cigar box!
BOOMER ODD LOTS OF MEDIA QUOTE MY OPINIONS FROM SPORTS TO ENTERTAINMENT SORRY YOU DON’T LIKE IT.
glaze…nothin personal…you’re just wrong.
you were wrong all years in baseball and football (below 30%)
and you were wrong on everything else…except pointing out a
few hotties for the seniors to get all worked up about on kcc.
I like you glaze. But its just what you write. Let’s have a beer
sometime. you can find me at cigar box!
I think you are being a bit unfair to Bourdain here, Hearne. I get it that you like Kate Spade and have a personal connection there but since they both died at their own hands so closely together, it appears that you are trying to elevate her by comparing her in your mind to Bourdain based on perceptions of brief encounters with him by yourself and Roger Nabors. If liking strange food, getting wasted, and having some darkness on your resume makes you a bad person then an awful lot of us are bad people, me included. Bourdain didn’t ask to be anybody’s moral compass and shouldn’t be judged that way. Every one of us has flaws.
How about just saying that Kate Spade was a quality individual that made a positive impact in her own way. In my mind, Anthony Bourdain did, as well.
Good points…
I think what I was saying was that there was very little similarity between someone like Kate and a dude who didn’t just get wasted – he was a heroin addict! And one who took getting wasted to levels and over a length of time that even you fell well short of the mark of. And, in the course of his obsession with high profile, decadent fame (and fortune) combined with talking openly about killing himself – whole different kettle of fish…in many ways.
since when did you hate drug addicts…like_____,_______,
_!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!___________, and ________________.
How many of your friends were drug addicts? Let boom boom count them for you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Hate?
I have a hard time working up sympathy for people that kill themselves. Especially famous people. It’s a coward’s way out. On the other hand, I do feel bad because there’s usually some mental illness involved. Leaves me very conflicted.
ITS A tragedy that happens more than people realize.
but we tore the mental health industry in america apart and today all we have
left is an 800 phone line.
We have cut our own throat. Between opiods/suicide/murder we’re killing our own country off.
I thought I heard that Harley, Boom Boom, JoJo, etc Et al. had committed suicide after Trump took office. Rumor was he was found in his Winnie the Pooh suit , hugging his Obama doll , with Goodbye Cruel World scrawled across his alleged MU degree.
Im glad to see he is alive and unstable.
Not for nothin, but Bourdain will be forgotten almost as quick as Harley.
Good point, Mark…
Say what you will about Bourdain’s bad habits and dark history, when all is said and done will people going forward celebrate for years to come his legendary skills at traveling to far corners of the world, consuming unusual delicacies while drowning his sorrows?
Has life come to this?
To anyone who abuses drugs: Do you really want to alter your mind? Is reality really that difficult for you?
Yes. Reality sucks the big one. Drugs are the only way to go. They are AWESOME!