“Divorce is the death of a dream for any couple, but when you’re in the public spotlight, the pain is magnified,” says a recent article in the Denver Post. Many people, including some Colorado divorce attorneys, would scoff at such a notion. Making a statement like this seems on some level to devalue the pain and hardship that comes with every divorce.

We live in a celebrity-obsessed culture, and there’s little more that we as a culture enjoy more than to see celebrities break down. Rarely do we see news headlines about celebrities enjoying success in life (in areas other than award nominations); we don’t see more than minor, passing mentions of the good works done around the world by celebrities, but when a celebrity has an emotional breakdown on Oprah, enters rehab, gets arrested, or goes through a nasty, bitter divorce proceeding or a legal separation, it makes headlines for months.

This article talks about how difficult it is for celebrities, because it’s all public. They don’t have the freedom to mourn in private. It talks about how difficult the divorce process for celebrities is on their children, because mom and dad’s dirty laundry is all publicly aired.

Aren’t “regular” children pained and even ruined by divorce, too?

Why is it that nobody stops to consider that while the adjustment has to be huge, celebrities know what they are signing up for when they pursue the path of fame and fortune? It’s not like it was in the early days of film—media is everywhere in our society, and it only takes the right YouTube video to hit that status. Nobody can claim they don’t know what fame carries with it in this day and age, and we shouldn’t pity celebrities just because they’re famous.