How are the Majority of Celebrities Inappropriate Role Models for the Youth?

According to Webster dictionary, a celebrity is defined as a famous or celebrated person. Celebrities serves as role models, heroes, cultural commentators, charity spokespeople, and political candidates. An exploration of celebrity culture uncovers changing conceptions of legitimacy, authority, and credibility at play in our culture (The Hedgehog Review, 2005) .There is a celebrity culture that has engulfed Canada, and indeed North America for a while now because celebrity culture is alluring, even to those who are embarrassed to admit it. There has been increasing infiltration of celebrity culture into politics. The media might have deliberately and unwittingly contributed in perpetuating this celebrity culture.

Being a celebrity is not all it is cracked up to be. They have to deal with situations that the average citizen most likely cannot relate to. For example, many celebrities constantly encounter paparazzi who stalk them in order to take their picture, invading their privacy. Celebrities must also juggle demanding jobs, while maintaining a home life that many attempt to live as normally as possible. Celebrities lead busy, hectic lives that require them to appear in public frequently, exposing themselves to intense scrutiny; nonetheless, the private lives of celebrities should be off limits because everyone has a First Amendment right to privacy, it is invading their privacy not our business, causes different problems such as serious damage problems that might end up messing with their careers, and affecting family members in a negative way.

But the past decades a new brand of role models has arisen, celebrity role models. People who have become famous thanks to their music or for example Hollywood. Especially figures in the rap musical genre are trying to be role models for teens and adolescents all around the United States. African American rap role models have become so important in contemporary United States society because many African American adolescents and teens needs, but miss, a role model in their daily life.

In his book, “Money and Class in America,” Lewis Lapham states, “The ardor of the American faith in money easily surpasses the intensity achieved by other societies in other times and places.” This notion is the reoccurring theme in Lapham’s book. America is so taken with the idea that without money your achievements do not mean as much as they would if they came with a large sum of cash. We as a society value money over more important qualities such as knowledge or integrity.

In this world people put lots of stress on celebrities to be perfect all the time. Celebrities are worldwide. Celebrates cannot walk down the street without being bombarded by paparazzi. All of that comes with a reason. Kids look up to them, so celebrities have to be media train. Like with rappers, most of their characters portray a life full of crime and enjoyment. Children see that and they think its real life. Kids are on the internet doing ridiculous things to get frame. In this day and age with no free thinkers pop culture is effecting the youth.

In later years, the children/teenagers will become subject to issues of conformity that are modeled on mainstream media icons.

Athletes, singers, actors – what do all these people have in common? They’re idols; people who are loved, looked up to, and copied because they’re so good at what they do. They’re the examples every child patterns themselves after. But are they a good influence? Consider an athlete like Ray Rice, who plays well on the field, but beats his wife when the cameras aren’t looking. Or, an actor like Johnny Depp, who skillfully makes a story come to life on the screen, but slips into a drug-addict lifestyle like it’s a sweater. These are the people who will define our future – not who the new generation is, but who they look up to. If the wrong people are chosen to pattern ourselves after, it turns into chaos. For example, look at the Slender Man

More and more are people trying to keep the dream that being rich is the goal in American society. Celebrities are looked upon and leaders of society because their opinions are broadcasted daily on televisions during award shows, lately talk shows and social media. With millions of followers these celebrities have, children want to attain the goal of an affluent life by looking up to what they perceive to be glamorous lifestyles. The consumer society is the result

Our challenger said that celebrities should not be role models because they promote inappropriate behavior. Even celebrities who are considered role models make mistakes and don’t mean for these actions to appeal to their fans. They are

Our third argument is ‘Celebrities influence the youth of today’. The youth of today are much modernised, instead of reading books of history and relating to the heroes of yesterday, they tend to watch movies, TV shows and make the celebrities the hero of today. The main reason why the youth especially make celebrities their role models is because at one point of time in their life they want to become like those role models, they want to have same amount of fame, they want to be popular and loved amongst others like the role models. Some of them get inspired so much that they even want to look exactly like the role models. For example: Harman Badeja a fairly new Indian movie star got so Inspired by Hritik Roshan a superstar in Bollywood, that he has made his face and hair look exactly like him.

. Even in today’s world social media plays a large part in pushing what success is when speaking about role models. The proper role models for youth are not deemed as successful and are not shown on social media or television. This makes it hard from day one for those who see something such as a positive example because it does not seem to be the most poplar way in school. Students in the earlier years are easier

Do celebrities make bad role models? I believe they do. Kids see celebrities in the news everyday and mimic what they do, thinking that they should be like them. But that is wrong. Most celebrities don’t know what they are doing in their life because they have a hard time telling reality from fantasy. They are like you and me, but people think that they are more than that. Most magazines and movies have pictures/videos of airbrushed celebrities and when teenager look at these they start believing that looking like how celebrities do is the only way to be popular and loved.

Most people would say that in order to be considered a good role model, you first need to be considered a good person. A good person is typically a person who has empathy for others, tries their best to make good decisions, and follows the law. After reading this description, of what a good person is, celebrities would not typically be the first group of people that would pop into your head because of their bad reputations, but that doesn't mean that all public figures are known for their bad choices. Celebrities should be famous for their talents and skills in some sort of field, or they could just have a great life story and have done great things in their life which inspired people to do the same. After all, everyday people run red lights all the time and no one would ever know, but the moment a celebrity gets one traffic ticket, it will be instantly posted all over every single magazine and news station. Public figures should be considered role models because, many public figures can serve as inspiration to do great things and a great example of what can happen if you make bad decisions.

Role models in the media are also essential for young people. These are idols, actors, athletes, authors, politicians, revolutionaries or any other person who is known because of their fame. Media role models have a high influence over young people because they are often placed on a pedestal, and worshipped like gods. It is important for youth to be wary of negative media role models because they may glamorize truly wrong values. An example of this is seen if we look at Paris Hilton. She lives a fascinating and alluring lifestyle, yet was convicted for driving under the influence of alcohol. Because of her, many other young girls may believe that drinking and driving is okay, or even cool. Role models in the media are important because of the widespread effect they have on youth all over the world.

Nasra Bishumba interviewed singer Miley Cyrus and this is what Miley had to say, “My job isn’t to tell your kids how to act or how not to act because I’m still figuring that out for myself. To take that away from me is a bit selfish.” I agree with her because most of the celebrities our kids look up to are still kids their self, growing up and learning from their own mistakes. So how are we going to let our kids look up to other kids? Then of course there are others who see celebrities as good role models like Kristine Tucker. She stated, ‘’Celebrities who complete college coursework, have an interest in politics, write books, study literature, travel abroad or engage in debates showcase their intellectual skills.’’ Majority of the stars today’s youth look up to didn’t even finish school. They have their mangers write out statements to say in an interview to sound well educated or have others talk for them. This is not how we want our kids to learn. We don’t want them to speak the minds of others to sound well educated. We want for our kids to have a mind of their own, be-able