Ask a kid who their hero is and they might give you a superhero, one of their parents, or a celebrity. A hero is someone you look up to and want to be like someday. Celebrities can influence upcoming generations in more ways than one.
The famous rapper, Kanye West, introduced his unique “Yeezy” clothing line last fall. Surprisingly I’ve already seen this style in our school’s hallways. It has also sparked quite the craze online. Another famous rapper, Drake, has inspired a new wave of dance moves. You can find people dancing to his hit song “Hotline Bling” all over Vine.
The question remains, is it good or bad for one person to have this much of an impact on our society? Just like everything else this situation has its pros and cons.
When a kid chooses a celebrity to take after it’s only limiting their individuality. They will spend their life looking up to someone they can most likely never be. It would be better for everyone to create their own styles and express their own ideas. When companies want people to buy their products they advertise them right? Well an effective form of advertising is celebrity endorsement. When these kids see their heros wearing a certain brand or using some expensive product, they want to do the same. Companies are exploiting the views of society and treating the celebrities’ influence as a commodity, all to make an extra buck.
A lot of things in society are out of the common citizen’s reach. If a celebrity matures to the point where they realize how much they affect people’s actions they could use this to enact change necessary to the betterment of our society. Over the past ten years organizations like the American Lung Association, have been fighting hard to rid cigarettes from our daily lives. If you can get a celebrity to endorse this kind of movement then more people will want to take part.
While the pros and cons both have situations where they can affect each other in adverse ways, not every celebrity is a bad person. They didn’t choose to become famous; it was really society’s choice to idolize them. If the person in question behaves appropriately and doesn’t use their role for personal gain then I can’t accuse them of being a threat to our lives.
