In this day and age, social media allows for an all-access pass to the political opinions and philosophies of anyone and everyone, including Hollywood stars. However, it should be made made absolutely clear that just because someone is a high-paid Hollywood figurehead, it does not make their views any more right or true than yours.
This isn’t to say that the political beliefs of Hollywood should be discounted entirely, but instead that they should be held no higher than anyone else’s, and one should not alter his or her way of thinking for anyone, even if it is written in a country song.
There is a lot of buzz surrounding Taylor Swift’s endorsement of Phil Bredesen for Senate and Jim Cooper for the House of Representatives last week. The platform that Swift—or her public relations advisor, rather—chose to use to endorse the Democratic candidate was Instagram, with which she included a trendy black-and-white selfie above as well, for the viewing pleasure of her fans.
Truth be told, there was nothing wrong with what Swift wrote. This is America, and everyone is and always will be entitled to their own political beliefs. However, the popstar does suggest that we “may never find a candidate or party with whom we agree 100 percent on every issue, but we have to vote anyway,” which seems to be the standard tip that today’s megastars love to belch out: Just go vote, it doesn’t matter what for or if you fully agree, but go vote anyway because we’re Americans and that’s what we do best.
I’d take that advice with a grain of salt, whether it comes from the mouth of Taylor Swift or a political science professor.
That being said, Hollywood stars like Kanye West who heavily endorsed Donald Trump should also watch how they phrase their thoughts on the matter. Everyone knows that Kanye West has been nothing short of eccentric when it comes to sharing his thoughts on the Trump Administration, which he has every right to do. However, if you’re going to make a public statement viewed by millions of people, you might want to consider how it sounds out aloud beforehand.
For example: “When you hear about slavery for 400 years . . . For 400 years? That sounds like a choice,” says Kanye. No, Kanye, slavery wasn’t a choice, even though voting is, which one might guess was an underlying idea of the message.
We’ve taken politics too far in Hollywood. These days, if someone wants a recap of what happened in Washington this weekend, they can just watch Saturday Night Live instead of regular news channels. And talk show hosts are out of control. Whoopi Goldberg, for example, who hosts the talk show The View, kicked her own guest Judge Pirro off because of a political debate gone wrong. Goldberg even refuses to say the president’s name. The point of having a talk show is to get facts and information to viewers, not to kick the guests off halfway through. It seems contradictory to me for a talk show host to censor herself and silence certain guests with opposing beliefs . . . when it is a “talk” show.
Here are some takeaways: Voting is important, and not just because Hollywood says so, but voting for what someone feels is right is much more important than just choosing the lesser of two evils. Secondly, understand that the people in Hollywood are just as crazy as anyone else, and vice versa. They do not have all the answers, they just have twice as many opinions because they also echo the opinions of their public relations team.
Finally, never try to endorse your new book onstage with Whoopi Goldberg, but if you do, plan an exit strategy beforehand.