Do the opinions of celebrity matter?

The media regularly bring to our attention a great many people who have become well known in various fields. Never before has society had so many celebrities and many of them are desperate to be interviewed by journalists. Often what they have to say is trivial, but they realize that many of them owe most of their fame to the media and they want to keep themselves in the public eye. If you are a minor celebrity, anything is better than being ignored.

Because most of what such celebrities say is neither important nor memorable, many people, myself included, pay little attention to their opinions. Many of us do not even read the glossy magazines or the tabloid newspapers, which tend to publish the views of minor celebrities, although sometimes their views appear in the features pages of our daily broadsheets.

A pop star or film actor who has just had a baby, may pontificate on the problems and delights of motherhood. She is unlikely to have anything new to say about such a subject and, since she can afford constant paid childcare, her experiences of motherhood are not likely to be representative of those of women in general. She is probably just using her maternal state to keep her in the news, in the hope that it will add to her popularity as a singer or actor and contribute to the enhancement of her career.

To be fair, the opinions of some celebrities are worth paying attention to. At least a few of them are interested in issues which should be a matter of importance to all of us, issues such as global warming, the destruction of the rainforests, world poverty and so on. A good example of such a celebrity is Bob Geldoff, who has done so much to draw attention Africa. to, and tried to alleviate, the terrible scale of starvation in

The celebrities who speak on such issues are rarely experts on them and so why should we pay particular attention to them? The fact is that people are more likely to pay attention to these issues if someone well known discusses them publicly. The more famous the person, the more attention is likely to be paid to the issue. That is why charities try to get famous people to be associated with their organizations. If they can get a famous ‘name’, such as the late Princess Diana, to speak and act on their behalf, they collect more money.

The opinions of some celebrities can be particularly valuable to young people. Young people are more likely than their elders to be impressed by the exploits and views of some celebrities, such as pop stars, fashion models, footballers and some other sports stars. Their exploits and views are often undesirable and a bad example to the young.

However, some celebrity opinions can be a force for good in relation to young people, and these opinions should be listened to carefully. For example, a young female pop star or fashion model might decide to comment publicly on the problem of eating disorders and how she overcame hers. Likewise, a young footballer might tell of how drug abuse would have destroyed his career if he had not sought treatment.

Basically, much of what so-called celebrities say can easily be ignored because their opinions are trivial and are usually expressed to attract publicity only. However, we should not tar all of them with the same brush. A few of them have something useful to say.