School shootings, presidential elections, Middle Eastern missile wars — these constant events pervade the news and overwhelm our social media feeds in both the United States and across the globe. According to a September 2024 Pew Research study, roughly 54% of adults glean at least some of their news from social media sources. With the vast amount of information out there, the ability to discern facts from fiction has gotten progressively harder. 

Who have we turned to in order to form or back up our own opinions?

I’ll give you a hint: it’s not the trusted news sources. It’s not subject experts. It’s not even people who have been involved in said events. 

The correct answer would be celebrities.

Now, though, it has gone beyond simply releasing a statement and getting “likes.” Ashley Spillane of The Ash Center at Harvard University conducted a study on the effectiveness of celebrity endorsements in elections and voting registrations.

In 2018, Taylor Swift’s single Instagram story about voting registration provoked 65,000 people to click the posted link and register to vote. In 2019, on her “Sweetener” world tour, Ariana Grande set up voter registration booths at her American dates and broke the record for most tour registrations for the company who served as her partner. Thus, Spillane even went as far as to conclude that celebrities could swing an entire presidential election. 

Ava Rabinowitz, a sophomore at Wilton High School, admits that “depending on what the celebrity is known for, like having a personal connection to the issue or is known for being smart, it’s possible for a celebrity to change my opinion.”

Rabinowitz does not stand alone as a survey conducted by the Wellesley Center for Women found that on average, a single middle school student follows 154 celebrity and influencer accounts on Instagram. The developing brains of preteens and teenagers can only fact-check a small percent of the media that they consume daily, so it’s no surprise that many internalize celebrity thoughts and opinions as their own.

Celebrities have proven that they have influence on matters outside of their vocation. The real question, however, lies in whether or not they should publicly speak on these matters; meanwhile, should fan bases demand that they form stances on issues? 

In most cases, the answer remains fairly simple: no. 

The expectation of celebrities to voice an opinion on matters unrelated to their field has made people forget the job of the average celebrity. In most cases, these stars have forged a career in making music, acting in movies, walking the fashion runway, or in general are famous for being famous.

As the think tank  The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace puts it, “It is unrealistic, however, to expect all artists to also be activists when their primary focus, rightly, is creating music and entertaining. Balancing this with the pressures of political engagement is a tight rope to walk.” The argument that these people have a moral responsibility to the world conflicts with the entire industry of entertainment, built on the goal to delight, amuse, and provoke the common people of society.

I recognize that celebrities have done immense amounts of good for many movements worldwide. According to The Chandler Institute of Governance, multiple celebrity philanthropic endeavors, like Oprah Winfrey’s lobbying for the National Child Protection Act and Elizabeth Taylor’s raising of millions of dollars for AIDS charities, have made a huge impact on important causes. However, charitable acts and political endorsements are different branches of the same tree. 

The perks of stardom include the ability to leverage fame to bring awareness and support to a personal cause. The problems arise when pressure causes celebrities to form a public-facing opinion or create the expectation to engage in activism. 

The public’s demands fail to take into account the celebrities’ actual feelings about the topic and instead serve to validate only the opinions of the private citizen. Just take a look at the average celebrity or influencer’s comment section on Instagram, where people in the celeb’s fan base expect them to have a specific, predetermined stance on issues. Failure to adopt these opinions certainly results in mockery and backlash. 

The concept of cancel culture today demonstrates the hypocrisy of many online “activists.” Ross Douthat, a New York Times columnist, points to how “if the celebrity does something that the fan doesn’t immediately sort of like, they don’t just follow the celebrity. They become sort of disappointed with the celebrity, like when Taylor Swift was dating a musician who had said some unwoke or politically incorrect things, and there was this whole group of Taylor Swift fans who were like, doesn’t she understand she has a responsibility to us?” No wonder many celebrities feel beholden to their fans and followers, often rushing to post supportive memes, regardless of the interpretation by a wider audience as nonsensical or unintelligent.

The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace cites The Chicks as an example, recalling the immense amounts of hate and death threats they received from right-wing listeners after publicly criticizing former President George W. Bush’s decision to invade Iraq in 2003. The group “was blacklisted by radio stations, its music sales plummeted, and its CDs were burnt or otherwise destroyed in public protests.” Having an opinion could cost a celebrity their career, and cancel culture cannot possibly coexist with these demands.

Sophia Svezia, another sophomore at Wilton High School, believes that while “celebrities don’t have the qualifications to say anything about an issue” they also “shouldn’t have to say anything, and I believe that applies to everyone.” 

While celebrities’ jobs often result in losing the privacy afforded to the rest of us, requiring them to divulge their stances and internal thoughts about every single newsworthy issue goes too far. If they have done their research or seek to promote awareness for a cause, great, let us hear what they have to say. However, if they have no relationship with the issue at all, or lack knowledge or understanding, let’s stop asking.

So, the next time you have the urge to form an opinion on current events, think about who you genuinely trust to give you the facts. 

If you decide to turn to celebrities, keep in mind their intentions. Do they have direct connections to the issue? Do they only want publicity attached to their name? Were they coerced by strangers on the internet? 

In the end, we must take their words with a grain of salt, do our own research, and consider our other trusted sources. Maybe if we let celebrities off the hook, they can spend more time making the albums, films, and television shows that we would all rather talk about anyway.