For most people, it’s hard to imagine what life would be like if you were a celebrity who had a platform that everyone listened to. For actress Blake Lively, she’s been in the spotlight since 16 years old, when she starred in “Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants.” After an interview for her newest movie, “It Ends With Us,” fans are starting to see how Lively portrays herself and her brand to the public and they aren’t happy. It goes to show, are celebrities out of touch with reality? Will they always use their platforms for good?
Once “It Ends With Us” came out, Lively did an interview about the movie with Chicago film reporter Jake Hamilton, and her co-star Brandon Sklenar. The movie is a remake of the popular book by Colleen Hoover, and it tackled strong themes like domestic abuse. Lively treated this serious-toned interview like a lighthearted, funny Q&A. It went something like this.
“If someone understands the themes of this movie and comes across you in public and they want to really talk to you, what’s the best way for them to be able to talk to you about this,” Hamilton said. “How would you recommend they go about it?”
“Maybe asking for, like, my address, or my phone number. Or, like, location share I could just location-share you and then we could …” Lively replied to Hamilton in his interview, rambling on.
This response was ignorant in so many ways. Lively should have done a better job at assessing the vibe of this interview, and understanding that this was not the right time to try and sound quirky and make a dry-humored joke. It was insensitive to anyone suffering from domestic violence who watched the movie and wanted to hear a caring response from Lively.
After taking the role for this movie, Lively thought this would be the perfect opportunity to shamelessly promote her hair brand, Blake Brown Beauty. She launched the brand on Instagram while showing pictures of her hair at the “It Ends With Us” press tour. While celebrities advertising their other businesses in their work is nothing new, it just comes at a rocky time for Lively, considering the theme of the movie is not as lighthearted as she is playing it out to be in the press.
Not all celebrities use their platform for their own gain, and are out of touch with real world issues though. Look at singer, songwriter Hozier. When he came here to Lincoln, Nebraska on August 14th, he spent a fraction of his show speaking out on political humanitarian issues like abortion, LGBTQ rights, and the war in Gaza. He could have gone on stage to sing another song, but instead, he used his platform to speak for what he believes in.
“A lot more celebrities should use their platform like Hozier did in Lincoln,” senior Addison Catlin said. “It brings good insight to things that we aren’t necessarily thinking about, and by having someone with such a big platform perform and do that it really puts these issues under a looking glass and makes it more apparent.”
It’s important that we pick the celebrities we follow and support wisely. Give your attention to people who hold similar values to you, individuals who put out and work towards something bigger than themselves. Blake Lively is just an example of how some celebrities don’t use their platform for the betterment of society, just for themselves.
