Dumbfounded
Brad Pitt, ever the social activist, says he won't be marrying Angelina Jolie until the restrictions on who can marry whom are dropped. "Angie and I will consider tying the knot when everyone else in the country who wants to be married is legally able," the 42-year-old actor reveals in Esquire magazine's October issue, on newsstands Sept. 19.
I have one question. Just one:
Does anyone care??????
Okay, I lied. I have two:
Does he think his threatening not to marry Angelina is going to make anyone change their mind on the issue of gay marriage?????
Gah! I'm sick of these two. And I liked him much better before he opened his mouth. I feel that way about most Hollywood stars regardless of their political stance. It's not about agreeing or disagreeing with them, it's about the fact they think they're going to change people's opinions just because they're rich and famous. I don't want to know their political affiliations. I want them to entertain me and that's it. I feel that way about my favorite authors, too. If they started spouting political babble, I wouldn't read them anymore, no matter what they had to say.
Am I the only one who thinks this way?
I have one question. Just one:
Does anyone care??????
Okay, I lied. I have two:
Does he think his threatening not to marry Angelina is going to make anyone change their mind on the issue of gay marriage?????
Gah! I'm sick of these two. And I liked him much better before he opened his mouth. I feel that way about most Hollywood stars regardless of their political stance. It's not about agreeing or disagreeing with them, it's about the fact they think they're going to change people's opinions just because they're rich and famous. I don't want to know their political affiliations. I want them to entertain me and that's it. I feel that way about my favorite authors, too. If they started spouting political babble, I wouldn't read them anymore, no matter what they had to say.
Am I the only one who thinks this way?
posted by Elisabeth Naughton at 4:38 PM
7Comments:
No, I'm right there with you, baby! I hate it when people use their role as an entertainer as a vehicle for their agenda.
I actually like Brad now that he's more socially conscious and treating his fame with more responsibility. There are people who take their fame and power (and let's face it: with fame comes the power to influence) for granted. I'm glad the Jolie-Pitts are wielding theirs for good instead of wasting it or excessively worrying about how to remain on top.
I respectfully disagree. I have been socially active my entire life. I have spent years working with TB-infected refugees from Vietnam, teaching them English and advocating for them as they came here years after the war, when our government finally consented to let children fathered by GIs into the country as citizens. I mentor unwed teen moms, some as young as 12. I help babies born into atrocious situations of domestic violence and abuse. People in my life know this about me. They have become educated by virtue of coming to my Christmas parties and cocktail parties where I collect gifts for foster kids and the homeless for those who want to bring a gift and leave it under my tree. If I was suddenly brilliantly famous tomorrow--my social activism wouldn't change one iota--I'd only have a lot more cash to give. And if someone asked me in an interview a question about my activism, I would speak to it. And if ONE person learned about the crimes in Dafur, or the hungry children under their noses right here in their own cities, or the crack dens and drive-bys a few miles from their fancy restaurants . . . and then decided to give money or their time, then I left the world a better place.
E
What he said wasn't terrible--but, c'mon, if he really wanted to marry Angie, he would. Besides that, people in entertainment have as much right to say their political or societal opinion as anyone else. It's just when they start talking about what drugs we should or shouldn't take that I think they're wacky.
ROFL, Edie. My DH works for a pharmaceutical company, so I won't touch that one. ;)
Good for you, Erica. It sounds like you do a lot of great work in your community. My hat's off to you.
I don't have a problem with celebrities using their status to bring light to injustices in the world. I have a problem with the fact a lot of the time it turns political, which it seems Pitt and Jolie are doing more and more these days.
elisabeth:
Thanks . . . but I disagree again. LOL! (Rabble-rouser!)
It is almost impossible to be a social activist and NOT be political. I am a Buddhist . . . and compassion is a tenet, but then again, how do you separate Tibetan Buddhism from the crime of the Chinese government against Tibet--and the way the world stood by and allowed it (no oil in Tibet) and still does. And if Richard Gere (a Tibetan Buddhist) mentions it--it is central to who he is as a human--it's "political." Why DOES the world watch what happens in Dafur--but we stepped in over in Iraq? We have family fighting there . . . I don't mean to open an anti-war vs. war argument. I only mean to point out it is very hard to raise ANY social issue and NOT have politics be part of it. People in many cities legislate the homeless. They want them to go away. People tend to think they're "lazy" or what have you--but as a social issue and commentary, it speaks far more to the lack of mental illness care. They are disproportinately mentally ill--and we don't want, as a nation, to pay those costs in medical care. So . . . I hear you. And I definitely could see how for some people it's annoying. And it's definitely annoying if the celebrity is really a dolt and doesn't even KNOW much about what they are talking about. But it's really true, I honestly believe, that it's difficult to separate social issues from politics.
E
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