At first glance relying on a celebrity comparison to prove the existence of a phenomenon as important and as serious as this might seem like an odd and maybe even superficial choice. But after looking at the situation a little longer it should be clear that, short of lab work, what other choice is there? Celebrities are the only people known to a large percentage of the population, or more accurately put they’re the only people known to more than a miniscule percentage of the population, so if the case is going to be made to a wide spread audience that the syndrome has dramatically affected people in a clearly visible way, centering the argument around celebrities is the only option. Using non-famous people, the people that I know personally, as examples might be helpful in a supporting role, but they of course couldn’t really prove the syndrome to those who have never seen them. Fascinating results from the lab would obviously be nice, but strange as it might seem, hard scientific data supporting the existence of the syndrome might actually be less convincing than the celebrity comparison to most people. If you couldn’t see the syndrome for yourself you might just think that the scientific data was flawed. And conversely, if you could see the syndrome for yourself it wouldn’t matter if all the scientific data in the world claimed the syndrome didn’t exist. You would know with complete certainty that the scientists had just missed something.

Although the value of a celebrity comparison is dependent upon how many celebrities are included. Not much can be proven with a study of 2 people, or 4, or even 10, but a study of 300 people is a different story. Think of it this way - imagine the celebrity comparison showed that 145 of the most famous 150 actors who were born from 1970-1980 grew to be no taller than 4’10”, while not even 1 of the most famous 150 actors who were born from 1946-1965 was shorter than 5’2”. Because of the huge number of people involved in the comparison the chances of it not indicating a problem in the greater population would be next to nothing.

The celebrity comparison does, however, have one drawback. It requires that the reader has the ability to distinguish between adult and child, physically mature and physically immature. If a person can’t recognize that a 26 year old Matthew McConaughey looks like a grown man while a 28 year old Tobey Maguire isn’t even close, then to them the celebrity comparison will fall flat. I can see the physical maturity difference between the two as easily as I can see that they’re both over 4 years old - there’s no effort, it’s just the most obvious thing in the world staring me right in the face. This almost has to mean that many others will be able to see the difference just as easily, and that most others, if not everyone else, will be able to see at least some clear difference. But there’s also the real possibility that some people won’t be able to notice any difference at all. For them scientific data would be the only evidence to have an impact, and since this website will contain none which proves the syndrome's existence it will no doubt leave these visionless people unconvinced. Happy to continue thinking of Natalie Portman as a stunning example of womanhood.

To help people evaluate the celebrities for themselves the point needs to be made that watching a person on videotape is a much better way of judging their level of physical maturity than looking at them in a photograph. For this reason the celebrity comparison uses only video evidence to judge a celebrity’s level of physical maturity. Before watching any of the TV show “Lost” I saw a picture of Evangeline Lilly in a magazine that made her look just like a fully grown woman. It wasn’t a tiny, out of focus shot of her profile while she was wearing sunglasses, but a clear, medium-sized shot of her staring right into the camera. Never having seen her before I just assumed that the picture was telling me the truth, so when a child who looked a lot like the woman from the picture walked on to the screen in the show’s first episode I was given a perfect example of exactly how deceptive a photo can be. Lighting, the angle of the shot, and even a facial expression can work to conceal and distort the subject of a photograph’s real appearance. Photos certainly provide enough information to distinguish between an 8 year old boy and a clean shaven 38 year old man, but it’s possible that a photo done in just the right way might make it difficult to distinguish between a 16 year old boy and a 38 year old man. If photos were used exclusively to analyse the celebrities the syndrome’s existence would still be proven beyond any doubt, but it wouldn’t seem as dramatic. In a couple of cases a child might even wind up being classified as a marginal adult. But video shows people in such clarity that it can accurately convey a person’s level of physical maturity. It provides enough information to make the magnitude of the syndrome perfectly visible, and prevent even a single celebrity from being mistakenly placed in the wrong category.

It needs to be made perfectly clear that the celebrities chosen to be used in the comparison weren’t handpicked to support the child for life syndrome. Manipulating the comparison would have been completely transparent and totally unnecessary. A fair and honest evaluation produces such an overwhelming amount of evidence that there’s no need for a con game. The system that was used to select which celebrities would be included in the comparison was very simple - everyone was included. At least, every young person who is famous enough to be reasonably well known. Listing every older person who was reasonably well known at a young enough age to be used would turn this website into primarily an almanac of data on old celebrities. So for the older celebrities the fame requirement had to be a little higher. Although it should be pointed out that the older celebrities who aren’t as famous prove the syndrome’s existence just as well.

The celebrity comparison is divided into two categories: actors and actresses, and musicians. The two categories are both divided into four smaller groups - male adults, male children, female adults, and female children. The adult/child distinction is made based on my assessment of the celebrity’s level of physical maturity.

The celebrities listed are accompanied by their birthdate, in almost every case their height, and occasionally by a comment. Each celebrity is also accompanied by the name of at least one key piece of video evidence in which they appear - movie, TV show, or music video. All of the pieces of video evidence named are at least reasonably well known, as video evidence that very few people have seen isn’t of much value.

Which pieces of video evidence were selected for the celebrities depended on whether they are deemed to be an adult or a child. For adults the game is to try and find the earliest evidence of their being an adult, and for children the game is to try and find the most recent evidence of their being a child. Showing that Julia Roberts was an adult by age 28, and that Rachel McAdams was still a child at age 22, doesn’t do much to prove the syndrome’s existence, as it leaves open the possibility that Julia didn’t become an adult until sometime after she was 22, and that Rachel may well have become an adult since she was 22. Maybe there was no difference whatsoever in the maturity rates for the two, and maybe Rachel actually reached adulthood first. But showing that Julia was an adult by age 22 when she made “Pretty Woman” and that Rachel was still a child at age 28 when she made “The Wedding Crashers” shows a huge difference between the way the two physically matured. A.K.A. - there’s something very wrong with Rachel. Prove that this isn’t an isolated case but a wide spread pattern with very few exceptions, and you prove the syndrome.

At least, you prove that some sort of syndrome is affecting young people, but you don’t actually prove the “child for life” syndrome, since the “for life” part would technically still be in question. To eliminate the far-fetched possibility that the syndrome is only drastically slowing down the rate at which young people are physically maturing, and that they may yet grow into adulthood at some freakishly late age, it’s essential to establish that those affected have completely stopped physically maturing. Doing this requires an additional piece of video evidence for the victims of the syndrome, the earliest example of the celebrity looking exactly the same in terms of physical maturity as they did in their most recent video evidence. The maturity completion confirming piece of video evidence has to have been made a minimum of three years before the most recent video evidence. This video evidence is given for most of the child actors and actresses, whenever possible, but not for any of the child musicians. Unlike movies and TV shows, music videos don’t always make for great video evidence, as proper shots of the musicians lasting longer than a couple of seconds aren’t always easy to come by. So establishing the age at which the people affected by the syndrome stop physically maturing is best done with actors and actresses, where the video evidence chosen is always perfect.

That music videos often make for inadequate video evidence also meant that with some bands certain members had to be left out of the comparison. Finding video evidence of solo artists and the lead singers of bands that’s at least good enough to be usable is almost always possible, but when it comes to non-front man band members sometimes there’s just nothing conclusive.

Inclusion as an adult in the celebrity comparison requires video evidence showing that the celebrity was an adult before they were 30 years old. Showing that a celebrity had physically matured into adulthood by the age of 50 does nothing to prove the existence of the syndrome, as none of the children have yet reached 50, making the 50 year old adult useless as a comparison. Of course, there is no maximum age allowed for the children in the comparison, as the older the child the more it demonstrates that something is wrong, but there is a minimum age requirement. The children have to be at least 20 years old in their most recent video evidence. Many of those classified as adults have video evidence of their being an adult by the age of 20, so including children as young as 20 is fair. Especially considering that many of the children in the celebrity comparison are confirmed to have stopped physically maturing before they were 20.

The celebrities chosen for the comparison were all born after 1945, the oldest being Diane Keaton, born in 1946. Older celebrities weren’t included for many reasons. One being the quality of the video evidence. Most old movies made after 1935 have good picture clarity, but even the ones made in colour don’t have quite the same look as the more modern movies. “A Time to Kill” made in 1996 has exactly the same picture quality as “Spiderman 2” made in 2004, so the blatant physical maturity difference between Matthew McConaughey and Tobey Maguire can’t be explained away with an argument about how picture quality is to blame for any perceived difference between the two actors.

Another reason is that most, if not all of the older celebrities would be completely unrecognizable to the majority of young people. Since they typically don’t watch old movies, most young people probably wouldn’t know more than a few old-time film stars, if that many.

Excluding the older celebrities also allows for a greater focus to be placed on the period of time when the syndrome begins to show itself, without increasing the overall number of celebrities in the comparison. This emphasizes the syndrome’s starting point and helps to show exactly how it progressed.

It should also be noted that in the celebrity comparison movies are considered to have been made in the year before they were released in theaters, and TV shows and music videos in the same year that they first aired. The celebrity comparison can only use these types of video evidence, though in most cases the most recent video evidence of a celebrity will actually be an appearance on some kind of TV talk show or entertainment show. But because these types of TV appearances are never seen by a large enough amount of viewers, and just as importantly, because they can’t easily be viewed after they first air, they can’t be included in the comparison.

All that said and out of the way, here it is: The Celebrity Comparison »
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