Think about a party that’s become so famous that it is broadcast around the world. The public begins speculating about who will be there as the annual celebration draws near. But don’t expect an invitation. Only a select few people are invited to attend. Like all good parties, it’s incomplete without a goody bag. For the 28 guests of this exclusive party, it is worth $140,000. Included in the package are an all-inclusive three-night stay in a castle with butler service, a $1,000 personal life coaching session, a $12,000 liposuction procedure and gift vouchers for botox and chemical peels.

It’s awards season in Tinseltown. A time when the great and not-so-good of Hollywood descend upon Beverly Hills. A place where integrity and intelligence seem to diminish in proportion to wealth. At the height of awards season, you can’t move for the Dior-encrusted elite who gravitate to this chic part of the Golden State. These are the holders of luxury beliefs – values and ideas that confer status on the wealthy but which they themselves rarely embrace or practise. As a classification system, it distinguishes ‘them’ apart from us – the low-status masses who watch their movies.

Alongside the Emmys and the Golden Globes, the Oscars are one of the biggest events in the entertainment industry. Ignore the terribly ironic acronym EGO; the holy trinity has been in decline for years. Viewing figures for the Oscars fell by nearly half between 2014 and 2020. Even without a host – which some may argue is an improvement – only a meagre 10 million watched the 2021 event. It’s the same with the Golden Globes. 6.3 million viewers tuned in last year, the fewest since NBC started broadcasting the awards show in 1996. The network decided to ditch the event because the figures were so low.

I’m old enough to remember when the Oscars were a highly anticipated television event. Few cared about who won best hair and make-up and you would occasionally hear self-indulgent speeches or stunts. However, in the past, the Oscars were a reliable barometer of the direction the industry was taking. With a few exceptions, you would pay attention to the winner of the best picture. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King dominated the event twenty years ago, setting a record for most awards for two decades. But there appeared to be a paradigm shift over time – moving away from an artistic celebration to an outright critique of contemporary culture. Identity politics has become a secular religion. And actors are the high priests.

With increasing regularity, winners would use their time on stage to advance polarising and poorly considered political opinions. From immigration to sexism, nothing is off-limits to the anti-Trump Hollywood sect. The #OscarsSoWhite controversy in 2016 sparked calls for nominees to be selected more for their demographic make-up than for their acting prowess. The best picture Oscar will include an ethnicity target for the first time this year.

Righteousness is the handmaiden of moralisation for the luxury belief class. Leonardo DiCaprio took an 8,000-mile round trip in a private jet to accept an award on climate change, just months after using his Best Actor speech to remind us that ‘climate change is real’.

Officials dismantled a homeless camp in advance of the 2021 Oscars, allowing them to self-congratulate about Nomadland – a movie about homelessness. One would’ve assumed that this would have been front-page news. Instead, the media were fawning over Chloé Zhao, the film’s director – it seemed more important that we knew she was the first Chinese woman to win the award.

The more Hollywood attempts to project an image of progressiveness, the more we discover about the murkier aspects of the industry, such as the casting couch and the ongoing abuses of power that go unchecked behind the scenes, which some in the business chose to ignore for years. Hollywood has come to symbolise dishonest, hypocritical elites who conveniently ignore their own problems while lecturing normal people. Its actors push nebulous political and sociological theories that they have little to no understanding of, all the while criticising the system that supports their extravagant lifestyles and pays their outrageous salaries.

This hasn’t always been the case with actors. As I’ve previously stated, celebrities were rarely known outside of rare, well-staged magazine interviews. They avoided making their personal lives public, with a few notable exceptions. What changed? In his book The Revolt of the Public, author Martin Gurri uses the term Fifth Wave to describe the emergence of the internet and the widespread ability for people to communicate with one another. Because of this technological revolution, the traditional line separating public and private life is collapsing.

Social media has exposed the transitory nature of celebrity. Once recognised for their self-control and modesty, actors now tend to overshare, whether it’s because of their lazy attempts to preach and pander or their total inability to relate to the general public. Who can forget Gal Gadot leading an off-key accapella version of John Lennon’s ‘Imagine’ at a time when thousands of people were worried about losing their jobs and homes? This insatiable need to share everything in a never-ending attempt to gain attention, to be in the spotlight and to receive a few likes and retweets is a symptom of narcissism.

The desire for recognition is a quintessential part of modern culture, a symptom of the secular confessional world of the celebrity. Bojack Horseman is among the best examples of this in modern culture: the titular character of the animated Netflix series, an anthropomorphic horse, who attempts to acclimatise to life after stardom. Once famous, he has grown bitter, deeply depressed and disillusioned with Hollywood. Now he is insecure, lonely and in constant need of approval. For this existential equine, happiness is a chimera. In one episode, he wins an award for his autobiography. He is shown holding the award throughout the entire episode, despite the fact that he neither wrote the book nor wanted anything to do with it. It’s a razor-sharp, dark satire on the dangers of fame and celebrity.

Perhaps we should feel sorry for the pampered privileged elite. But not too much.