Celebrity

Although always an insufferable part of American society, celebrities have engendered a new wave of ridicule as war with Iraq grows imminent. Barbra Streisand spews hot air on Iranian [sic] president Saddam Hussein and her buddy Richard Gebhardt [sic]. Sheryl Crow informs that to solve our problems we need to have no enemies. Sean Penn travels to Baghdad and (surprise!) discovers poverty and privation. Dustin Hoffman, Janeane Garofalo, Viggo Mortensen, Madonna, Richard Gere, Alec Baldwin, Susan Sarandon, Woody Harrelson, Dave Matthews – not only do they all hew to the liberal worldview, they feel compelled to make sure the public knows how they stand.

At this point, it’s become too easy to pile on the celebrities, the same ones who owe their creative freedom to the liberties enshrined in the Free World (try a concert in Riyadh, Madonna, and you’ll see what I mean.) But one question that’s unasked and unanswered is: why are celebrities hard-wired to a liberal ideology? Sure, there’s the rare exceptions like Charlton Heston and Arnold Schwarzenegger; but for the vast majority of Hollywood, Americans just aren’t being taxed enough, are too belligerent, and can never spend enough on breast cancer research.

I have a theory.

This theory is based on the “bread and circuses” policy of ancient Rome. The idea was that if you kept the masses fat, dumb and happy with food and entertainment, they would have no need to agitate for political change. Thus, to keep the Romans complacent, the emperors offered the circus with chariot races and gladiator fights. For hundreds of years, the Circus Maximus was the site for Ben Hur-type chariot races, holding upwards of 100 competitions a day occasionally punctuated with animal fights.

To some degree, movie stars and rock musicians must understand that the work they do is frivolous and trivial. They’ll never cure cancer or design a building, but worse than that, their lifework is a distraction, a diversion, a sop to the masses. They are the modern-day extension of the Roman circus, entertaining on a stage and helping people to forget their troubles. Make ‘em laugh, make ‘em cry, sleep now sleep.

So, for celebrities, it’s never enough to make people happy with their performance. They need to justify their inflated self-worth, and the most accessible way to do that is to be liberal. As P.J. O’Rourke noted:

The principal feature of American liberalism is sanctimoniousness. By loudly denouncing all bad things—war and hunger and date rape—liberals testify to their own terrific goodness. More important, they promote themselves to membership in a self-selecting elite of those who care deeply about such things.... It’s a kind of natural aristocracy, and the wonderful thing about this aristocracy is that you don’t have to be brave, smart, strong or even lucky to join it, you just have to be liberal.

Nothing to it. The ego is salved with a red ribbon on the lapel. Any lingering guilt is wiped away with a healthy donation to PETA and, for the truly self-absorbed, a public statement of condemnation. The topic doesn’t really matter as long as it’s not too complex: war, AIDS, fur coats = BAD / education reform, farm policy, war on terrorism = HUH? As long as you can stir up a frothy batch of self-satisfied indignation, you’re in the club. See you at Sardi’s after the benefit dinner.

It’s been said that a conservative is a liberal who’s been mugged. In the rarefied world of celebrity, where a tax increase doesn’t matter when you have four homes, these prattling personalities never have to worry as long as their tuxedoed bodyguards are nearby.