A Marie Antoinette, just for us.

NEVER let it be said that Paris Hilton does not stimulate the intellect. I have woven her into a scholarly daisy chain featuring three famous novelists and a great statesman, and she fits.

It came about this way: When I decided to write about her, I had to consult the Britannica and two quotation dictionaries to find out who coined the expression "the great unwashed." Turns out it was Edward Bulwer-Lytton in The Last Days of Pompeii, though the usual bevy of spoilers known as "some scholars" credits Burke or Walter Scott. It didn't really matter who said it, but I wanted to cite the original version because I intended to use as my theme Herman Wouk's variation on it that turns up in his 1955 novel, Marjorie Morningstar: "The great unwashed worship the washed." Wouk used this as a throwaway line about snobbery in college sororities, but today it is the key to understanding Paris Hilton's America.

The traditional attitude toward the famous used to operate on the trade-off: They're no different from us/we're just like them. Movie magazines of the '30s and '40s took this tack, showing pictures of Joan Crawford mopping her kitchen floor and Susan Hayward chasing after her lively twin boys. I remember the old "movie books," as we called them, and we used to laugh over them. Nobody believed the stars didn't have plenty of hired help, but we accepted the ruse in the spirit of democratic idealism.

Many of today's celebrity magazines still encourage fans to identify with celebrities, as in Us magazine's "They're just like US" features about stars buying groceries and doing everyday chores. Despite their stratospheric incomes and palatial homes, we still strive for a Pogo-like mentality of "We have met the celebrities and they are us."

The exception to the longstanding rules of the game is Paris Hilton. She is nothing like us, we are nothing like her, and we have no wish to see this particular twain meet. The democratic ideal is dead and we, the Great Unwashed, are partying on its grave.

Paris worshipers fall into two groups. The smaller, unimportant one consists of the ditzier sort of teenage girls and displaced romantics of all ages and both sexes who really do like her for whatever reason.

The other, much larger group consists of purported Paris haters, and they are legion. They are the intelligent, well-educated, sophisticated people who have coined the clever portmanteau words describing her and her effect on contemporary life: celebutante, celebridiot, celebrotramp, celebrobsession, celebrotropism. They are also members of the self-satisfied and sanctimonious majority who are quick to condemn "hate speech" and call for 24-7 tolerance, yet they proclaimed Paris "easy to hate" and called her stupid, mindless, a dumb blonde, an airhead, and a no-talent twit with a cryogenic-lab IQ.

The opprobrium has been non-stop and fearless; eager and giggly and, when delivered on camera, accompanied by proud smirks and glittery eyes as hard and cold as agates. The outward evidence leaves no doubt that Paris is the most hated person in America, but outward evidence is worthless when dealing with human nature. People devote the better part of their lives to the task of fooling themselves, and one of their favorite techniques is protesting too much.

Nobody hates Paris Hilton. On the contrary, we worship her as our only remaining weapon against the relentless democracy that has enfolded us like a grotty shroud and turned us all into an undifferentiated Great Unwashed. Deprived of the psychological security bestowed by hierarchy, pecking orders, and a sense of ordained place, we struggle constantly against the unspoken and inadmissible knowledge that equality is standing on our collective air hose in hobnailed boots.

We need to look up to somebody, anybody; for something, anything. Somebody who can do no wrong to revive that great unsung victim of egalitarian fairplay known as carte blanche. We need, in short, exactly what Paris provides with such effortless and uncanny perceptiveness: our very own Marie Antoinette.

The resemblance is clone-like. Paris's Hall of Mirrors is the runway, the red carpet, and the perp walk, but her swanking stride never changes. They also share the same undeveloped schoolgirlish sense of humor that tends to come out wrong and fall flat, leaving a false impression of flippant cruelty. Legions of sympathetic historians, having convinced themselves that the Queen of France was actually tragic and maternal, have insisted that she never said "Let them eat cake." But it wasn't Marie Antoinette who was tragic and maternal, it was Norma Shearer in the movie. Proof that she really did say it can be found in something in the same vein that Paris Hilton said when asked about Wal-Mart: "What do they sell? Walls?" In both cases, all the courtiers laughed uproariously without reflecting that a schoolgirl can't tell a bon mot from a bon-bon.

We need Paris and we know it, which is why at least one NATIONAL REVIEW ONLINE blogger/analyst asks, "How is it that so many readers actually seem sympathetic to Paris Hilton?" and then quotes letters that typically begin, "I don't like Paris Hilton, but ..." We revel in her because she's the only panache in town. Our political leadership has sunk so low that we can't elect anything better than competent mediocrities, so all we have left are those who are "famous for being famous." The need to look up, no matter at what, is being satisfied now by Paris. It matters not that, as some have said, "she doesn't deserve to be famous." That hasn't bothered us up to now, so why accuse Paris? Fame itself and by itself is the only kind of specialness we have left, and we are making the most of it.

Florence King can be reached at P.O. Box 7113, Fredericksburg, VA 22404.