The day before yesterday it was Dionysius Savvopoulos. Some time ago Tanya Tsanaklidou, Sokratis Malamas, Natasha Bofiliou. Whenever an artist expresses a political opinion, a political position through his words or actions, he becomes the number one topic of discussion in Greek social networks. The first trend on Twitter, the first topic of discussion in long posts by different users on Facebook.

Those who do not agree with the political position expressed publicly by artists denigrate them, classifying them and often their work as a hated camp, exposing them to ostracism. “That’s why I never listened to him/her, I never liked him, I talked about it for years,” they often say, and this is the mildest form the conversation takes.

Those who agree suddenly recognize their artistic value. They become their most ardent admirers. This is how an artistic fan club turns into a political program. But why do we pay so much attention to what artists say, even if it is about subjects in which they have no more knowledge or experience than the average citizen?

“These people influence public opinion, they are idols, opinion-forming figures with great influence,” Panteion University sociology professor Georgia Petraki tells K. “They contribute to the construction of separate worlds that exist in society, cultures, subcultures, groups that are formed through political agreements or disagreements,” he adds, emphasizing that for this reason the opinion they express is always of interest to public opinion.

Accordingly, Vassilis Pavlopoulos, Associate Professor of Intercultural Psychology at EKPA, emphasizes that we idealize the artists we love and appropriate them for ourselves. “The content of art is emotionally charged, each giving it its own meaning, creating a personal relationship with each artist and setting a high bar of expectations,” he notes. “When, in our opinion, the artists that we consider our property do not correspond to the circumstances, their attitude causes us an internal conflict,” explains Mr. Pavlopoulos.

However, the scale that each respective topic takes on on social media is not just for artists, he adds, but for any current person whose posting could trigger an avalanche of reactions. “It also has to do with the so-called cancellation culture,” Mr. Pavlopoulos points out about the viral dimension that the relevant topics take on every time, “the mood we have to knock people off the throne we put them on.”