Do idiotic celebrities do their pet causes more harm than good?

[William Wallace]

Based on this article discussing Jessica Alba's advocacy against "brain toxins," I say yes, asshole celebrities do more harm than good. I'm not bothered by this mind you. Their causes are usually ridiculous anyway, but that's besides the point for now.

If the goal is to educate voters to make informed decisions about important topics, why do you want obviously ignorant models spreading the word? If somebody does decide to defend that strategy, I'll explain why I think it's unwise, but I'll wait until someone takes it up.

[PowerSlave]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HCmyFbPdXI

I laugh my ass off everytime I see this clip.

I"m sure that most celebrities aren't complete bafoons when it comes to these issues but, they're notorious for not being able to articulate themselves very well on the subject at hand. And then you have the Jennie McCarthy's. I'm sure that their hearts are in the right place most of the time, though. I can imagine them being guilt-tripped into speaking out about a cause as well.

[hefdaddy42]

In most cases, celebrities are idiots.  So yes, most of the time they probably do more harm than good with people who aren't die-hard fans of them in the first place.

[El Barto]

No.  Some people will just believe anything they here from anybody who sounds credible.  If it's not Jessica Alba, it's some asshole news anchor.  People like this are a fact of life.  But,  a minority of people will here what she says and decide to investigate further.  Maybe she's right, maybe she's wrong.  Let's find out!  In this case, she's doing a good thing by raising awareness of something that might or might not be important.  So basically, the harm is occurring everyday regardless, via the nightly news, morning paper, dipshit friends at the watercooler, or simple minded actors,  and while the potential for good is small, it is present.

[LieLowTheWantedMan]

Definitely not and I can't possibly see why.

[William Wallace]

No.  Some people will just believe anything they here from anybody who sounds credible.  If it's not Jessica Alba, it's some asshole news anchor.  People like this are a fact of life.  But,  a minority of people will here what she says and decide to investigate further.  Maybe she's right, maybe she's wrong.  Let's find out!  In this case, she's doing a good thing by raising awareness of something that might or might not be important.  So basically, the harm is occurring everyday regardless, via the nightly news, morning paper, dipshit friends at the watercooler, or simple minded actors,  and while the potential for good is small, it is present.

So if people have access everyday to bad information, aren't crusading celebrities making it that much more likely that they will be exposed to it? And let's be honest, do we want the kind of person that takes cues from Jessica Alba "investigating" the toxicity of Bisphenol-A?

[tjanuranus]

so she is trying to bring awareness about BPA's? There is something wrong with that?

[ClairvoyantCat]

I can agree that celebrities are generally not the right people to listen to, but I don't really see where you jumped to the conclusion that they are actually harmful to it. 

And let's be honest, do we want the kind of person that takes cues from Jessica Alba "investigating" the toxicity of Bisphenol-A?

Maybe not, but having a celebrity bring attention to an issue makes it more likely that the problem will fall into the right hands.  It really doesn't matter that it's a stupid celebrity, because it isn't likely to be branded as "Alba's issue" anyway.  (Hopefully)  The important part of it is that one a celebrity makes something an issue it can buzz around long enough to be picked up on by the right people.  So I can't see how it's a bad thing.

[tjanuranus]

She's probably more intelligent that half the idiots in congress.

[William Wallace]

She's probably more intelligent that half the idiots in congress.

If true, this is not very inspiring. But I doubt it is true. 

[tjanuranus]

She's probably more intelligent that half the idiots in congress.

If true, this is not very inspiring. But I doubt it is true. 

I would put Jessica Alba's intelligence up against this bullshit any day.