Would you go to a real estate agent for medical advice or to a doctor to sell your home? Why is it, then, that politicians on Capitol Hill continue to turn to Hollywood celebrities to testify about topics outside of their expertise as filmmakers and stars?
The list of celebrities who have appeared in front of Congress to testify on issues unrelated to acting, directing, or modeling is too long to rehash here. The incentive for both members of Congress who issues such invitations and the celebrities who accept them is clear: for the Congressmen or women, their Congressional hearings and pet issues actually get press coverage when they otherwise would not; and for the celebrities, they get positive press attention for something besides their love lives, and are potentially taken more seriously by the public.
The most recent celebrity to appear on the Hill to testify was film star Ashton Kutcher, who spoke in front of the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. He was even pictured blowing a kiss to 80-year old Senator John McCain (R-Arizona) after discussing the not-so-pleasant issue of sex-trafficking. Kutcher, as described in his official Hill testimony, is an “actor, entrepreneur, tech investor, producer and philanthropist” in addition to being the co-founder of an organization called Thorn, the purpose of which is primarily to help police officers track sex-trafficking victims.
The hearing, while serious in parts, naturally landed on the gossip website TMZ thanks to that aforementioned kiss between the lawmaker and the actor, after McCain made a joke about Kutcher’s looks. The only part of the hearing that actually made it onto the mainstream celebrity gossip site was that 40 second clip, with little background on why Kutcher was actually testifying. How much good did the appearance do to highlight the issue of sex-trafficking? Considering most news outlets only covered the fact that Kutcher was there and that his organization was supposedly behind thousands of rescues, likely not very much. The end result, more than anything, was a more serious image tune-up for the star who got his start in Hollywood pulling pranks on other stars, and a modicum of press coverage for the Senate Committee. McCain may have even been able to talk to the press for an entire day without having to discuss President Donald Trump.
And what about that testimony? Well, it turns out, there may be more to the story than meets the eye. After Kutcher’s appearance, Reason delved into some of the numbers cited by Kutcher on behalf of his organization, Thorn, and their main project, Spotlight. Reason reported:
According to Kutcher’s testimony before Sen. John McCain and other U.S. lawmakers, the app—funded by the McCain Foundation—has helped save more than 6,000 U.S. sex-trafficking victims, including 2,000 minors, in the past 12 months.
There’s almost certainly overlap between the FBI and state investigations. But even if we count all cases separately, we’re looking at a total of 2,580 investigations into sex or labor trafficking—5,725 less cases than Thorn allegedly helped identify in a one-year period.
So what you’re telling me is that a vanity project helmed by a Hollywood celebrity might not be as effective as the celebrity claims it is? Shocking information for many, I’m sure.
With the election of President Donald Trump, Americans have listened non-stop to pundits and the media rail about how ill-qualified the former reality star is for the Oval Office. We’ve also heard denunciations of Trump from a perpetually tone-deaf Hollywood elite, which has relentlessly lectured and harangued Americans at every opportunity; on talk shows, at award shows, and during interviews, since November. What’s rich, then, is hearing these same celebrities who spend their time criticizing Trump’s inexperience turn around and do the exact same thing they accuse him of doing: pretending to be an expert on a complicated issue which they clearly don’t understand.
Kutcher is no fan of the current president or his supporters; he told CNN that Trump voters had been “bamboozled.” Last year, local news in Grand Rapids, Iowa, reported that Kutcher, who was there to get out the vote for Hillary Clinton, told those assembled, “If elected, Clinton’s administration will be guided by common sense and her government will be ‘data-driven’.” Considering Kutcher’s difficulties with data within his own organization, even while testifying on Capitol Hill, perhaps he should acknowledge that if he’s going to criticize one of his unqualified peers who ended up in the Oval Office, he should make sure his own numbers add up first.
The post Stop Ashton Kutcher Before He Testifies Again! appeared first on Acculturated.