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Heather Havrilesky feels for The Runaway Bride:

The Runaway Bride doesn't want to be known as the Runaway Bride! She'd prefer to be seen as a human being, you know, albeit a confused one, with feelings and emotions and stuff.

Here's the thing, though, little lady: When you get your 15 minutes of fame, and you want to extend it to 30 or 40 minutes or even a full hour of fame, and maybe you'd like to get a big fat paycheck out of it, too? Well, then you have to take whatever it is you got famous for, and you have to ride that pony basically until it dies -- or you die. Whichever comes first.

That's how lame former contestants on "The Real World" like Trishelle get paid to speak at colleges, or just to romp around in a hot tub on "The Surreal Life." That's how Amber Frey got her own made-for-TV movie and her own book deal. That's how Stephen Glass and Michael Jackson's accuser and so on manage to have such an extended half-life in the public eye. You get money, and we get "That Slut From 'The Real World'" or "That Chick Who Slept With Scott Peterson Then Helped Turn Him In" or "That Liar Whose Lies Were Published."

You got a book deal, buttercup, because you promised to serve up the Runaway Bride, and she only exists because you're reasonably attractive and ran like a chicken and lied with impunity about the whole thing. We love overwhelmed, freaked-out, attractive, self-destructive liars like you. We want to hear all about what a lying rat you are, so we can hate you even more for making your poor parents lose sleep and wring their hands and weep on national TV.

That said, I sort of felt sorry for the little perfectionist in her interview with Katie Couric on NBC. She reminds me of a lot of the repressed, cheery Southern types of girls I grew up with, really nice women with nothing but pure intentions who didn't have anywhere to put the occasional negative thought, because Southern girls aren't supposed to have negative thoughts, even the smart, driven, slightly quirky girls like Jennifer Wilbanks. So all those negative thoughts pile up as they smile through the pain, and eventually they end up shoplifting $38 worth of crap from Wal-Mart (like Jennifer did) or they run away with the plumber or kill themselves or just die slowly inside while driving the kids back and forth from soccer practice.

That fiancé of hers is pretty wooden, too. I'm not convinced that his repressive notions, including the one that they shouldn't have sex until they're married, isn't a big part of the problem there. We all admire him for standing by his woman, but ... I'm guessing that she sort of wishes he'd bail. Dumping him outright would be an admission of failure, something she's said is nearly impossible for her.

So, fine! I have empathy for the stupid Runaway Bride! I see her as a human being, not just some sad chump meant to solicit our spite, Jerry Springer-style! This kind of empathy for small-time criminals and media one-hit wonders is obviously just another step on the pathway to total insignificance, culturally, but what can we do? The beauty of the small screen is that it manipulates us into investing our emotions and thoughts in people who clearly don't -- and shouldn't -- matter to us at all.