ETERAZ

Today, it seems that celebrities and a social conscience are two indissociable halves of a single package. Nowadays every celeb and his mother seems to be peddling his or her philanthropic wares. To advocate a cause is as essential as sporting the newest Vivian Westwood, Prada or Dolce & Gabbana. A veritable who’s who of the Hollywood pantheon are either affiliated with some charity or initiative intended to ‘make the world a better place’: Leonardo DiCaprio is chairman of Earth Day, Pamela Anderson is an active member of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), Bono co-founded Debt Aids Trade in Africa (DATA), and Sean Penn has been over the last couple of years on an unrelenting mission to impeach George W. Bush, while visiting and making quite a bit of noise about Iraq, Iran and Venezuela along the way.

This is but to name a few of the many showbiz luminaries who’ve decided to turn their attention to the many shades of activism and concerned citizenship. Although it’s by no means an entirely novel phenomenon, one only has to look at John Lennon’s impassioned opposition to the war in Vietnam in the 60s and Live Aid spearheaded by musician cum philanthropist Bob Geldof in 1985; celebrities fighting for the mantle of ‘do-gooder of the year’ has become commonplace and subject to massive media attention. Of course the more skeptical are quick to bring celebrities motives under the microscope. They appropriately question if altruism is really at work here, or whether philanthropy has now emerged as the latest marketing scam for enlivening a pop star’s flagging career? The thing however that really irks the skeptics is that when celebrities talk, people listen, and by no means in small numbers, but en masse.

But how did this come to pass? Do many individuals just no longer care, or are they simply bored to tears with the stale and creaking delivery of today’s politicians? The less cynical contend that perhaps only an injection of glitterati is able to bring life to the intricacies of third-world debt relief, the potential for environmental disaster and the mistakes of past and present American foreign policy. As is so often claimed, celebrities are America’s and possibly the world’s new royalty. The reverence for celebrity in Dubai is as fervent as anywhere you’re likely to come by and does not look like diminishing in the foreseeable future.

On the flip side, many allege that it’s preposterous for entertainers to be taking a leading role in the setting of the political agenda. Politicians have been accused of merely pandering to the media circus. Celebrities simply aren’t qualified to speak informatively about the issues, and the fact that many people hang on their every word with bated breath means they should act more responsibly. They are role-models after all who a great many people admire and look up to. Many lament the influence of celebrities is not commensurate with their expertise, which is almost entirely second-hand and delivered by the cronies in their employ. But at the same time one might ask, would you exclude a builder from voicing his political opinion because he doesn’t have a degree from the John F. Kennedy School of Government? Of course not.

Another and arguably more trenchant criticism of celebrity endorsement is that it detracts from the seriousness of the issues themselves, and feeds the self-styled image of ego-maniacal blowhards. In short, celebrity endorsement usually entails lashings of style and little if any substance. Although the jaded reception of what some have called the ‘rent-a-baby’ schemes of Madonna and Angelina Jolie, may well be warranted, the sustained and long-established charity work by Geldof and Bono is of a different caliber altogether. Even though unstinting praise and laudation may have to be held in reserve for the time being, it’s difficult to sully their intentions and efforts on behalf of the world’s most needy.

The Live 8 concerts held in July 2005 were for the most part regarded as a terrific success, bringing enough political pressure to bear for the G8 countries meeting a few days later at the Gleneagles Hotel to pledge to double the 2004 levels of aid given to poorer nations, from $25 billion to $50 billion by 2010. In April of 2007 only 10% of the additional aid promised has been provided by the eight member states.[1] This has led many to conclude that only a sustained political movement can ensure a cause’s longevity and maintain the momentum of ‘grand gestures’ such as the Live 8 concerts.

Skepticism regarding celebrity interventions continues. For example, Bono and the Kennedy clan’s Bobby Shriver’s initiative, Product Red, launched in January of 2006, has come in for a great deal of flak. Many have argued that the initiative fosters the fantasy that the eradication of world poverty can be achieved at a profit, and without forgoing any of our own worldly pleasures. Product Red is a brand that was established in coordination with a host of leading corporations such as American Express, Apple Inc., Microsoft and Gap in order to raise money for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Product Red’s founders have emphasized that the initiative is not a charity but ‘a commercial initiative designed to create awareness and a sustainable flow of money from the private sector into the Global Fund to fight the AIDS pandemic in Africa’.[2]

The benefits of this scheme however remain to be seen and at present it appears to be little more than a lubricant for a rampant consumerism, which on occasion suffers from pangs of conscience. Ethical buying some have argued is just a way of making us feel better about our excessive and decadent spending, since a minuscule percentage of the profits of heavily overpriced goods, goes to help poor Africans in some far away land. The fact that the AmEx board is heavily populated with former CEOs and senior staff from major pharmaceutical companies doesn’t do anything to disabuse its opponents of their hostility. [3] AmEx is not only making money as a result of the Product Red initiative since it can count itself amongst the growing number of ‘ethical’ corporations, but also reaping the benefits of the funds diverted to the Global Fund, which will then go on to buy the antiretroviral drugs the big pharmaceutical companies themselves produce. If this is in fact the case, then it’s as vicious a circle as you’re likely to come by.

These critics argue further that the attempt to marry an ethical consumerism with the mantra of profits at all costs is incapable of providing us with the solutions to poverty and disease which are currently raging across Africa, just as by the time eco-technologies and economic growth fall in sync it’ll be too late to stave of ecological catastrophe. In a nutshell, we are trying to have our cake and eat it and celebrities are merely the handmaidens of corporate greed masking itself as benevolence and largesse. They are just pawns in a much bigger game. Hard choices, sacrifices and trade-offs will need to be made sooner rather than later. The debate is ongoing and we can be sure it will continue for some time to come.

[1] G8 leaders fail to meet African aid pledge, David Blair, The Daily Telegraph, April 24th 2007
[2] Quoted in Why the new Amex card makes me see RED, Daniel Ben-Ami, Spiked-Online, September 28th 2006
[3] Shopping is Not Sharing, Richard Kim, The Nation, October 17th 2006

© Sadegh Kabeer