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Captain America Lives Up To Title

Chris Evans, actor behind the shield, takes on David Duke.

By Christina St-JeanPublished 7 years ago 2 min read
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Chris Evans has joined the growing ranks of celebrities using their power to generate some good. He's taken a stand against former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke regarding his support of the confirmation of Jeff Sessions as Attorney General, and added, via Twitter, that "If David Duke....DAVID!...DUKE!... thinks you're right, then you are unequivocally wrong."

Duke then proceeded to say that Evans was just another "typical dumb actor." Evans then proceeded to reveal Duke's prior quotes that revealed just how deep the former KKK leader's bigotry ran and added that he stood by his original quote as a result.

While some might complain that airing their political views is not the mandate of actors everywhere, there is a power that comes with celebrity that makes them perhaps more valuable as a commodity than the endless parade of advertisements that air during presidential campaigns.

This could seem simply like another actor following in the same vein as Meryl Streep, who was earlier in the year called "overrated" by President Trump, but in many ways, it's not. Celebrities can have surprising political influence, as evidenced by the simple fact that there are an increasing number of celebrities endorsing one candidate over the other and said candidate winning the popular vote. People watch what celebrities say or do, and Chris Evans, among countless other celebrities, is more than aware of this.

Also, this is not the first time that Evans has spoken out against Trump or his policies; he's spoken against the president's immigration policies, gun control and the Dakota Access Pipeline. He's willing, as many others are, to take on people he views as bigoted and narrow-minded, such as Dr. David Duke.

By using the fallback position of Evans being just another "dumb actor," Duke is coming across as the playground bully who doesn't know how to deal with the person who's standing up to him. "Oh, yeah? Well, you suck!" might be something along the lines of what Duke is actually thinking.

In engaging with Evans in this manner, Duke is not presenting well. It does, in fact, make it increasingly easier for Evans to come across as the noble hero and Duke something along the lines of Red Skull. Evans chose to be relatively subtle; he posted quotes demonstrating Duke's bigotry without name calling, and stood by his views. While it is not the "come out swinging" approach that Captain America has endorsed in the past, it certainly is a little more classy than calling someone dumb. He didn't debase himself and actually let Duke's own words work against him.

It is, indeed, something Captain America might do.

celebritiesactivism
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About the Creator

Christina St-Jean

I'm a high school English and French teacher who trains in the martial arts and works towards continuous self-improvement.

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