So say the 8 million of us!
I don’t like Ashton Kutcher one little bit.
I say this knowing full well it is based upon precious little aside from what I have seen and read about about him over the past several years.
After all;
- I HAVE NEVER seen one of his movies. Seriously, I looked it up on imdb and everything – and I watch an awful lot of movies, I mean I’ve seen a Twilight movie (against my will)!
- I HAVE NEVER watched an episode of his mean spirited prank show with the oh-so-extreme handle, Punk’d.
- I HAVE NEVER seen an episode of his two more popular sit-coms, those being That 70s Show and Two and a Half Men. (And I really mean NEVER, I think I saw one episode of the Charlie Sheen era; not for me).
So what does that leave?
- I KNOW he was once an underwear model.
- I KNOW he is/was/whatever married to a woman old enough to be his Mum.
- I KNOW he seems to be well followed on Twitter.
And now.
- I KNOW he has been reviled of late because of his ignorant tweet regarding a college football coach, and that this has caused him a fairly massive media backlash and a caning from his ‘fans’.
This is the only thing I care about today. I shouldn’t, but I do.
Let’s recap my knowledge; former underwear model turned actor, famous for creating mean show, marrying an older woman, and stepping into the role left vacant by a middle aged man suffering a very public meltdown.
Also famous for twitter. As I write the man has over 8 MILLION followers and has issued over 7 THOUSAND tweets. That is a possible 980,000 characters of knowledge, wisdom and insight such as “Cleaning your ear with a Q-tip is the best cleaning satisfaction ever”, from the 20th October.
Ladies and Gents: Society’s moral compass.
Oh and he also occasionally sends out pics of his granny-wife in granny-panties.
So why should we care that this underwear model suffered premature twittulation? Should we really expect a guy with the unique skill of wearing a baseball cap sideways to be our moral compass? I mean the fact that this *cough* celebrity has eight million followers just means there are eight million people out there stupider than him.
Being an Australian I can’t say I follow American Football at pro or college level, but as an NBA fan who uses occasionally watches ESPN Sportscenter
for lockout news I couldn’t miss the blanket coverage of the Penn State debacle the other day.
The events that took place are reprehensible and sickening, and while
the long revered coach isn’t as guilty as the perpetrator there is no doubt
that by turning a blind eye he deserves every derogatory comment coming his way. Given the gravity of the crimes hopefully there are legal repercussions as well. It will forever stain his record and so it should, as it should for anyone else who covered up or ignored the facts.
But should a bonehead who sends on average 7 tweets a day be expected to fact check every single one? What does he owe to his followers aside from being – as far as I can tell – accessible and famous without validation?
I might digress from this assassinating his persona for a moment to ask this question: If a friend came up and said “Wow they sacked That Guy. Isn’t that sad?”, rather than release a verbal torrent about their insensitivity and stupidity wouldn’t you ask the follow up “Yeah but did you hear why?”, thereby giving them the benefit of the doubt? THENNNNN, if they say something moronic like “Yeah but I mean it’s not like he was the bad guy” then by all means let fly, unfriend, unfollow, and ignore to your social media mogul-heart’s content.
Or do it in person like actual friends used to.
Ashton Kutcher was guilty of trying to capitalize on little more than a budding media tornado as it was building steam. He didn’t check the facts but that doesn’t mean he was siding with the accused. He didn’t report the facts but fuck me, if we’re relying on the star of ‘Dude, where’s my car’ for accuracy and integrity in reporting then my friends we have bigger issues to worry about than I thought.
The fact that he has since come out, owned up immediately and been (apparently) genuine in his remorse is necessary but not evidence of guilt, only an itchy trigger finger. It just gets the media another more famous target to spread the blame to, thereby maintaining the furore for another couple of ratings friendly days.
I still don’t like Ashton Kutcher, I have zero plans to watch any of his back catalog of movies or TV shows, nor anything he might be fortunate enough to be overpaid to appear in next. I will not be following him on twitter or eagerly reading about his inevitable divorce (so that he can continue banging underwear models nearer his age – the very fact his apologetic post shitstorm “I’m just trying to be a good person” tweet rings so false).
But just at this moment I feel compelled to stick up for a guy who is unjustly being the whipping boy for just another 140 characters of inanity so that the media can keep this thing in the press without having to revisit once again the disgusting and depressing real facts of the case.
I still don’t like him and can’t believe he is even vaguely famous, but right at the minute I kinda feel sorry for him.
OGR
