Come for the politics, stay for the snark.
by John Cole| 25 Comments
This post is in: General Stupidity
I hate it as much as anyone when know-nothing loudmouths like the Dixie Chicks run around overseas and bash the President and I cringe every time Gore Vidal opens his mouth. But lists of stars to boycott and lists of ‘patriotic entertainers’ are just damn creepy.
Get a life. I may hate Alec Baldwin’s political views, but if he was hosting SNL tonight, you can be damned sure I would be tuning in to watch. I guess that means I must hate America.
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And freaky next to creepy!
John Cole is on-point and you can add a ice-cold brew with it: I hate it as much as anyone…
STUPIDITY WATCH
John Cole points to two lists: Stars to Boycott and Patriotic Entertainers. People who create lists like this, just by doing so lose any credibility they have. Go read this Steven Den Beste post about peoples’ rights to voice their…
Stupidity Abounds
Someone apparently found the extra spare time to create two lists specifying which celebrities to boycott and which celebrities are…
mark
Can’t get enough of Pete Schweaty’s balls, eh? hehe
I agree with you, John. But it happens on both sides. I do find it ironic, though, that the two most well-known conservative acting icons (Reagan and Heston) are former heads of the SAG union.
andrew
Being a fairly hawkish lib I don’t find myself agreeing to often with Tim Robbins or Sean Penn, but to boycott them I would have to be either a total dope or a Sean Hannity fan (generally those two things go hand-in-hand). Those two men make great movies, go see Mystic River if you haven’t yet.
Ralph Gizzip
There’s a big difference between refusing to partake of the entertainment of an actor’s work simply because of their political views and a boycott of their work.
For example, I think Tim Robbins is stupid but I’ll still watch “Bull Durham” or “The Shawshank Redemption.” What I DIDN’T do was pay the ticket price at the theatre to see them. I borrow them from the public library or watch them on TV. Poor ticket sales impact actors and musicians far more than your refusal to watch or listen to their work.
Barbra Streisand, OTOH, I just can’t stand in any way, shape, or form.
Keith Berry
John,
We keep agreeing like this, and people are gonna start to talk.
Keith
DANEgerus
The asshat brigade brings it upon themselves and I personally find it ‘entertaining.’ Though most of these has-beens don’t have productions to boycott.
Besides… It’s not ‘entertaining’ to have entertainers spewing ignorance as they abuse their celebrity status to rant…
Fact is if your going to shrilly howl ‘McCarthyism’ at a Press conference the list of idiocies committed is long and nobody is supressing your dissent when you can call a press conference to spew…
So somebody took them up on their offer and has thrown down the gauntlet and said they would post the stupidity… fine…
How many times have these entertainers called for boycotts? tuna? grapes? Anybody marching against Nuclear power plants now that the consequences are revealed?
They got what they wished for… martyrdom. And an additional post-career ‘fifteen minutes’…
Sean
yeah, that bruce springsteen is such an america-hating commie.. even ronald reagan praised him and wanted to use his songs on the campaign trail
CleverNameHere
Why is it creepy? Stupid, I can understand, lame perhaps, but it’s not like this is a hit list.
You aren’t going to find Susan Sarandon’s broken body in the street one morning, as dogs tear at her bullet-ridden flesh. To my knowledge, none of the Dixie Chicks have “disappeared”. (Though I’m not a country fan, so I can’t be too sure that the Chickies are still knockin around)
Part of celebrity, part of the “star attraction”, is the connection a performer makes with his or her audience. Fans aren’t just interested in the performances, they’re attached to the performers themselves. And the relationship with the performer colors the appreciation of the performance.
Maybe not for you, but that’s the way it is for a lot of people. To give a distantly related example, any performance in a school play is likely poor from a critical standpoint, but if it’s your son or daughter, it’s Tony worthy.
But when, in a fan’s eyes, the star is tarnished, so is the star’s work.
cptham
I agree with CleverName. Why is it creepy. I kind of like knowing who in hollywood supports our country and who doesnt. It doesnt mean I wont go to see a movie (love LOTR, cant stand Vigo Mortensen) It is just nice to know there are some performers who believe in the United States. BTW, I thought Wil Wheaton was dead
Stentor
I find it much easier just to boycott news stories about celebrities’ political opinions.
caleb
You know…..it must be reeeaaalllllyyy hard for these people.
I mean, what do you do if you reeeeaaaallllyyy want to see the next Brian Denehy movie, but Harrison Ford is in it?
Or Springstein does the theme score?
Do you go to the ticket booth and say you’re only going to pay 3 of the 8 dollars it will cost cause you don’t want your other 5 dollars getting into the hands of that dasterdly America-hating Harrison Ford?
Talk about life shattering decisions.
John Cole
Enemies lists are creepy. Period.
Eric Sivula
How exactly is my choice to avoid a group of actors who use their celebrity to push political agendas I disagree with an ‘enemy list’? They use celebrity that my patronage helped maintain to spread a message I find distasteful. So I stop helping them. Just as I would not give money to a company that spread a message I disagree with. Disney for example.
I have not heard anyone call for these people to lose their jobs, be imprisoned, or attacked. There are still plenty of people who don’t think Danny Glover’s support of Castro is a reason to avoid his films. I just happen not to be one of those people.
Ricky
Baldwin usually hosts about once per month, doesn’t he? :)
tom scott
Well John, what other boycotts do you find creepy?
A couple of years ago three things intersected to make me look into this situation a little bit. A letter to the editor in the Anchorage Daily News from several middle school girls that were going go activist against Wal-Mart, K-Mart, etc to ensure the companies did not sell clothing, etc from companies associated with sweatshops-think Nike. (Here is a simlar letter in the St Augustine paper>This was a project by their middle school teacher. Both letters were instigated by middle school “teachers” (yes, sneer quotes for these teachers) At the same time Jonah Goldberg had this article in National Review. Sweatshops were all over the place. Isn’t it strange though that 41 school children killed in a fireworks explosion in China draws little to no attention? My original source, Human Events, is not online att. But just in case you think one explosion is anecdotal here’s another list.
People are boycotted for earning money. Children die in schools and the myopic teachers cannot bring themselves to criticize a communist country-that would be McCarthyite. Now that’s creepy.
andrew
Boycotts can be instruments of social change, but I fail to see what is accomplished by not buying a Matt Damon movie on DVD.
Tom-
These teachers weren’t boycotting stores because they earn money. Sweatshop labor, that is forced or coerced labor in poor conditions, is a serious issue. We as a society stopped allowing it within our borders long ago. Goldberg seems to be mixing anti-trade sentiments with anti-sweatshop activism. I see his point about people who are anti-trade, since I believe multinational corporations can spur economic development in poor nations.
The abscence of criticism doesn’t amount to an endorsement. These teachers aren’t endorsing sweatshops in China, and they certainly aren’t endorsing the sweatshops because they are in a communist nation, as you implied.
HH
Alec hosted a couple months ago, it was pretty good. Though any episode with “The Falconer” is classic.
Michelle
Stuff like that bothers me for several reasons.
Primarily becuase we as a society complain (with some justification I admit) that our pop icons are bad influences. Drug use, alcoholism, sex scandals, brief and tawdry marriages, the list goes on.
Yet we seem to castigate those who use voice political opnions far more than we do those who treat the institution of marriage as a game or any other immorality that is Big News.
And not only that, it seems only to be those on the left who are castigated. I mean, why is it okay for Reagan and Charlton Heston and Arnold Schwarzenegger to get involved in politics, but not Sean Penn or Tim Robbins?
Personally, considering the how so few people vote, I would think we would be glad to see stars pushing for political discourse and education, after all, anything that counters voter apathy is a good thing, right?
But instead news must cover Janet’s breast and Why J-Lo and Ben broke up, while those who have political opinions counter to Rush Limbaugh are called bad influences.
John is absolutely right, it IS creepy.
caleb
“I mean, why is it okay for Reagan and Charlton Heston and Arnold Schwarzenegger to get involved in politics, but not Sean Penn or Tim Robbins?”
It’s all about agreeance(man, I can’t stop laughing at Durst.).
If one agrees with what a certain celebrity is saying then, go right ahead Mr./Mrs./Ms. Celebrity.
If one doesn’t, then that celebrity should shut the hell up.
Hypocrisy is part of the human condition.
DANEgerus
Holding asshats responsible for abusing their celebrity status to toss uninformed opinions is the complaint. The method suggested is stupid but freedom of speech is freedom of speech and that means opinions ventured will be rebutted.
Besides…
AHnuld ‘won’ an ‘election’… I am so sorry that chaps anybodies ass but it’s hardly the same thing as when Gwyneth Paltrow rips America as unsafe, because its ALLOURFAULT, and her non-Citizen husband slips a Kerry endorsement into an awards ceremony.
In fact Gephardt might have gotten more votes if his credibility hadn’t been destroyed by Babs-fax immasculating him.
Phil
yeah, that bruce springsteen is such an america-hating commie.. even ronald reagan praised him and wanted to use his songs on the campaign trail
Er . . . um . . .
OK, back up a few steps. Springsteen’s political proclivities aside, the only reason Reagan wanted to use Springsteen’s song on the campaign trail was because it was called “Born in the USA,” and it was based on a monumental — catastrophic, even — misreading of the song.
Put it this way: It would be like Bush using, say, Bruce Cockburn’s “If I Had A Rocket Launcher.”
Zach
Now, if I boycott all of those entertainers, who’s left?
andrew
Is John Dead?