Music megastar Lady Gaga is — reportedly — going to do her next album for free.
Not surprisingly, Lady Gaga is also a known Obama supporter. Just what we need. Another millionaire in favor of socialism.
Many of Lady Gaga’s fans are socialists just like her. Yet if Lady Gaga had never been allowed to make a profit in the first place, would she be where she is today? She didn’t get where she is with her own money. She got where she is, in part, because of an already established music industry. The music industry is certainly a for-profit business, a direct result of the capitalism that socialists so despise.
Why is it virtuous for Lady Gaga to denounce the system that enabled her to become who she is? (Support of Obama is equivalent to denouncing capitalism.) Even if the essence of virtue is to give away all your money, then why is the system that enables you to make the money in the first place so evil and bad?
This is the question celebrity socialists never have to answer, because nobody ever asks them. I’m asking it now, but people will call it “inflammatory” which is just another way of saying: “I don’t like that question. Don’t ask it.”
As for giving away her profits, I have another question. If giving your money away is so virtuous, then why be public about it? It seems to me that if you had more money than you wanted or needed, and you wanted to give it away, then you would simply and quietly give it away. You wouldn’t feel the need to tell everyone about it. Where’s the “virtue” in that?
If the real purpose of giving your profits away is to do good for others, then it wouldn’t (or at least shouldn’t) even occur to you to tell anybody.
Also, I wonder how much Lady Gaga’s fans will actually value her next album, assuming it’s given away for free? People tend not to value that which they don’t have to pay for. Something given to you as an entitlement tends to be something you value less than something you have to put your time and effort into attaining. Consider any spoiled child. The child who never has to work for anything has little or no appreciation for it. You don’t value what’s given and what’s promised to always be there for you.
Lady Gaga should be ashamed of herself for even wanting to give the products of her efforts away. Doesn’t she think her work is worth anything? If not, then why is she wasting her time producing songs and videos that are worthless? And if she does think these efforts are valuable, and she’s proud of them, then why should a fan be unwilling to pay even a small portion of his or her income to enjoy it?
Human beings trade. It’s what we do, and what we should do, because we can think and produce valuable things. A person charging for his or her services is saying, in essence, “I’m proud of what I did. And it’s worth something.” The people who willingly pay the price are expressing their agreement, and the cost of the product or service confirms their value of it.
This is why socialism is so wrong. It’s unnatural, illogical and irrational. Why? Because it removes the concept of value from human relationships.
It’s also phony. The publicly “virtuous” Lady Gaga knows full well that she works hard for her money, and that without a system of capitalism and profit, she would never have found fans throughout the world. By supporting Obama and the other destroyers of the social system that made her who she is, she’s revealing a hatred of her own self. Does Lady Gaga hate herself? I have no idea. What I do know is that the neuroses of misguided leftist celebrities should not be imposed on the rest of us, those of us who still prefer to live in freedom and under capitalism.
Lady Gaga, I beg of you: Please shut up and sing.