What has overshadowed all these stories is the 'revelation' that men with power in Hollywood have been sexual predators for decades. That's the Real news after all! I call it a 'revelation' because, while it may sound new to many of us, most of Hollywood seems to have known about them all along. Hollywood has become the defacto American aristocracy. We hold, in the highest esteem, the actors who entertain us. We, as a culture, are drawn to the famous and want to know all about them. We can read all about their personal lives while in line at the grocery store. In what is the greatest of ironies they have become the moral voice of our generation. If the rich and famous believe it...it must be true. If they are 'doing it' it must be worth doing!
Let's bear in mind for a moment exactly what actors do. They don't cure diseases. They don't feed the hungry. They don't defend their country. They don't build our homes or grow our food. They don't put their lives on the line keeping our streets safe. They pretend to be other people in front of a camera for the approval of strangers. They just entertain us. If they pretended to be other people without the cameras rolling they would be seen as common liars and con artists. Those who engage in sexual activity for the camera would be seen as common prostitutes...if there were no camera. The camera brings fame. Look at how many people want to be in front of it. Reality shows are at record numbers because of the promise of making, even the lowliest of us famous!
Many actors do this for obscene amounts of money that come with the fame it brings. For that many of them have sold their souls and compromised, or completely sold out, any values they may have begun with. Because, obviously, riches and fame are more important than integrity and good character.
Many actors, out of guilt or perhaps the desire for even more fame, take the time to advocate for some social cause so they can alleviate their consciences and convince themselves that they do something of value in our society. Many even tell us how they think we should vote! You see, Hollywood types and politicians have a great deal in common. Both want to be seen as good, decent people regardless of what they are really like in their private lives. Their lives are all about appearances over actual substance. Now...I like well written, well acted movies that tell a good story or makes some point. They entertain me...for a couple of hours at a time.
Hollywood also cranks out more filth in the form of movies than a sewage treatment plant. What I'm talking about are those movies that glorify gun violence and gratuitous sex because those things sell...very much like illegal drugs. They appeal to the lowest, basest parts of us.
The people that make those movies tend to subtly, and sometimes not so subtly, push their own values off on the rest of us. While glorifying gun violence they preach to the rest of us the evils of owning guns. While making contemptuous comments about people of faith they advocate for all kinds of perversion. While giving lip service to treating women as the equals of men...those in power have sexually abused and degraded women just because they could. The same is true of those homosexuals in positions of power...many of them have equally abused their positions over young men and women because they could.
We are finding these things out now because it has become fashionable for victims to speak up. Many of the victims bear some responsibility for the culture that permeates Hollywood because most have waited to speak up for fear of their careers being damaged. They've held their silence to advance in their careers and allowed their abusers to continue their predatory behavior on new victims for decades...
These are the people who tell the rest of America what we should value? These are the people who want to tell the rest of us how to live? That sounds like a very bad B-movie comedy doesn't it? All they, in fact, do is pull down and trample on the values that have made this country great and sustained it through multiple wars and upheavals.
We, as a society, need to put actors and other Hollywood types in their proper place as simply entertainers and nothing more. They have it in their power to educate and uplift but few of them ever exercise that. They are no better than any one of the rest of us. In fact one may argue that they have something missing in themselves that they have a need to be recognized by strangers and held on some kind of pedestals because we can identify with the characters they pretend to be. I call that pathetic...worse yet some are plain evil. None of them are worth looking up to...
