Sometime in the last month I read
an article by someone who claimed they'd been betrayed by a boy band singer
they'd worshiped growing up. He was a member of the Backstreet Boys, NSYNC, The
Old New Kids on the Block – I didn't follow teen music growing up and for all
intents and purposes its irrelevant. Because I've read some version of this
exact article so many times on this site alone I've lost count. All that matters is that this author felt betrayed
when he learned to his horror, sometime in the few weeks, months, whatever,
that this former teen idol was the one thing this site can not allow to exist:
a Trump supporter.
I have a stock reaction to these
kinds of articles that some of my readers are aware of particularly recently
that I tried to share but this particularly open-minded induvial naturally
chose to be a grown-up and block me. What I'd like to do is a write a more
personal article about things I wish I'd said to him – not because he
would have listened but because I think they are things that maybe some people
on this site might be willing to here.
First of all, how did this author
know this artist - for the sake of clarity
I'll refer to him as Kevin – had only recently become a Trump supporter?
For all this man knows he's been a Republican his entire life. Perhaps he was
an endorser of the War on Terror, the Patriot Act and the Surge. Maybe he believed
Obama was born in Kenya and got in on the ground floor of the Tea Party. Maybe
he donated residuals from his album to Mitt Romney's campaigns for President as
early as 2008. This author would have no
way of knowing this because its only
within the last decade that we've insisted on every detail of our lives being
posted on social media.
This is excusable: he himself said
he was fourteen when he first heard Kevin sing as part of Backstreets Boys on
The Block and its not like that any teenager during the 2000s would have cared
what a person's politics were or had a way of tracking it down on Myspace. It
becomes less excusable when he grew older but its excusable to read your values
into people you admire whether they're true or not.
I myself made a blanket assumption
that I should have known better by now: that this individual might be open to
rational debate if I tried to reason with him. So I left the kind of extended
comment I'm known for doing. It wasn't one of my more inflammatory ones: I just
said that I didn't think celebrities owed their audiences anything other than
performances, that virtue signaling cost nothing and that basically every time
a celebrity says anything they cause independents to vote Republicans. I knew
going in I was likely to receive pushback and be called names but I did this
with my eyes open.
At first this individual was
passive-aggressive saying he hadn't even bothered to read my comment because it
was too long and by the way he didn't care what I thought. Then I did respond
with sarcasm and expected that I would block him not long after. He actually
did me the pleasure but not before giving the final word:
If I'm going to invest money into
hearing a celebrity's music, I think they should share my values.
I must applaud him for actually
saying the quiet part out loud. I've written similar articles in the last month
about why I think celebrities are unqualified to talk about anything but acting
and while many people supported me quite a few chose to burn me in virtual
effigy, calling me all the horrible names they do when they engage in the kind
of reasoned debate when they are called on it. My only surprise was that I was
being attacked in what wasn't one of my more political articles even in
regard to Hollywood.
But now here are some of the
things I wish I'd said to this individual and indeed the far too many
people online and off who genuinely seem to think this is a given.
First this just goes to prove the
transactional nature that the young and left-wing people tend to think about basically
anything in today's society. The institution, the system or the celebrity owes them
everything and they owe nothing in return. This turns JFK's famous
statement on its head: Ask not what you can do for your country, demand your
country do everything for you.
The second point, related to the
original statement is a rhetorical question: is it now a requirement for any
figure, political, performer or online celebrity to have the values of the
public be a prerequisite before they give their approval? Because I've seen the
vetting process online and based on this site alone, no one could meet this
group's standards because the Overton Window keeps moving leftward and even if
an individual should pass every single test the mob could arbitrarily decide to
reject them whenever they feel like it.
Third and this is the point of the
article: why do so many people online take the word of any public figure at
face value, particularly those in Hollywood or the performing industry? They
don't give that benefit of the doubt to figures in Silicon Valley, corporate
billionaires and they never trust politicians? The assumption is that if they say
anything that is liberal or progressive it is purely lip service and of course
if they show conservative values that is the true measure of who they
really are.
But no one seems to consider the
other side of it: why do so many people believe that if a celebrity posts
support of a progressive statement in a hashtag or wears a button on a red
carpet or shouts it out at an awards show that is the true measure of what they
believe?
Actors, singers and to an extent
athletes are performers which by its definition means that there's a degree of
fiction in their public persona. (I'll stick with TV because that's what I
mostly write about here.) Michael C. Hall isn't a serial killer; Jon Hamm isn't
an ad exec in 1960s New York and Bryan Cranston isn't a chemistry teacher who
cooks meth to provide for his family. They're actors first and foremost. So if Mark Ruffalo speaks out in favor of
defunding ICE or against corporate interests, why should I or anyone accept
that is a true expression of his feelings?
All elected officials are
performers to an extent. I've been watching representatives senators and candidates
for local and higher office in campaign ads ever since I was eight years old. And I'm pretty sure that by the time I was twelve
I knew better than to take what a campaign ad said about their positions at
face value, particularly when they said their opponents was bent on destroying
America if elected. This, for the record, is a bipartisan affair: Republicans
have been saying Democrats will do that if they are elected and Democrats have
been saying the same about Republicans long before Trump started running
for office. I stopped taking what they
said at face values long before I even reached by teenage years.
So if Bryan Cranston or Rosie
O'Donnell or any of a hundred other celebrities say that they are loyal to the
progressive cause and that they believe in working class values I have no more
reason to take them seriously then I would if I saw Ted Cruz or Andrew Cuomo if
they talked about the middle class? If anything I'd trust celebrities far less because
they are much richer then me and almost certainly don't know nearly as much
about politics as anyone whose been in public life for twenty years?
Because as I've said over and over
and over (and will keep saying) if an actor or a singer were to shout Defund
Ice or Free Palestine at the Emmys it costs them nothing to do so. They are hundreds
of miles from the scenes of conflict surrounded by an enclave of people who
share their values. If Bad Bunny were to say F--- Ice in Minneapolis where ICE
actually was, he would get a very different reaction then when he says it at
the Grammys or at the Super Bowl. He
knows that. Everybody in the room knows that. They're making the assumption – a
very shaky one – that everyone watching them on TV does not know that. Given the reactions of some of the people
online, these stars may be correct in that thinking.
And let's not forget that celebrities
are far more skilled in public relations and optics then someone whose been a
DC insider for thirty years. I don't think for a second any statement they make
in front of a camera has not been rehearsed in front of their agents half a
dozen times before it comes out with the right amount of angst and sanctimony on
a red carpet or film festival. Part of the gift of being an actor is being able
to fake anything, even sincerity. These
people are performers and they know better how to rehearse and perform that as
well as the ability to appear that they are spontaneous. I believe when
an actor is shocked to win an Oscar or an Emmy after weeks of being told
someone else is going to win it; when they make any statement that is political
I'm certain that they've had a whole variation that they've been rehearsing for
days, if not weeks.
If Billie Eilish had at the
Grammies said: "Legalize heroin' or "stop the poaching of rhinos in
Africa" I would have believed she was being honest about her support for
those issues. Mainly because they are not applause lines and would no doubt
cause everybody in New York to go dead silent and wonder "What is she
talking about?" By contrast when
she said, "No one is illegal on stolen land." I have absolutely no
doubt she rehearsed variations on that line countless times in the days leading
up to the Grammies. It would have been a disappointment if she hadn't
commented on it among her brethren.
Shouting out a cause or wearing a
button costs a celebrity nothing. We all know that in the past decade that to
take a position that is not political is considered even more of a
betrayal to the liberal cause then if you were a conservative. There's a contingent online that believes that
it is more important to appear like you are in favor of all the right
things rather than do anything to help them become a reality. They really think that the causes of freedom
are realized by protesting or wearing buttons or with a hashtag. I've found out
that if you tell them that its actually harder then that they get very angry.
A celebrity's job has always been
to entertain us, to help provide escape from the frequently dark and horrible
reality around us. Regardless of their
political affiliation they have far less power to change the world that those
in social media truly believe. Most of the people who think otherwise are immature,
if not physically then emotionally. Celebrities are mostly adults. They should know
better by now and they should certainly act that way.
No comments:
Post a Comment