Blake Shelton and Gwen Stefani. You've heard that they're dating now, haven't you? You probably have. And you've probably voiced your opinion about it too.
Blake and Gwen's relationship is a lot like my relationship with food. It can be exciting, it can be messy, but it shouldn't matter to anyone else.
I personally am super stoked for Blake and Gwen. They both got out of relationships recently that lasted a good amount of time and were clearly full of love. Yet for some reason, most media outlets, and just about everyone seems to think that this is unacceptable and inappropriate. Why? Because two co-stars are not allowed to date? Because it's not fair to Miranda Lambert that her ex-husband would move on and find new love? Because Gwen deserves someone better than a hilarious, six-time Grammy nominee who has also charted 24 singles including 15 number ones and won The Voice four out of eight times? Look, I don't want to talk about this anymore because that is exactly the opposite of my goal with this article.
My point is, love is hard. I myself have dealt with the struggles of maintaining a relationship and heartbreak. But the reality is every relationship has its flaws. And who are we to judge and decipher who celebrities are allowed to date? To be honest, I know this is a bold statement, but when you criticize celebrities for dating you are doing the same exact thing as telling a white man that he can't date a black woman or that a homosexual man he can't date another homosexual man. Do you see what I mean? It's an issue that ultimately does not concern your voice. You can have an opinion, sure. But would you want to constantly be surrounded by people telling you that they don't approve of your relationship? Can you imagine how much harder that would make it to maintain a healthy one? And let's not forget how hard healthy relationships are to maintain before people start criticizing them.
Celebrities have it tough.
I know what you're thinking. "But Harry, they're rich! They can do whatever they want! They never have to worry about any serious issues!" No, y'all. They're people just like us. And let me put this into perspective for you. When you go to the beach, you go to relax and get away. Right? Well, when celebrities go to the beach they are surrounded by people taking unwanted pictures of them who eventually post it on the Internet for the whole world to see. And then an article will be written explaining why their body just doesn't look the same anymore. And then thousands of people will re-post the article and talk to their friends about how out of shape this celebrity now is. This doesn't just happen when they go to the beach, this happens when they go to the movies, when they go eat lunch (how would you look mid-bite of a Chipotle burrito?), and even at their home. Celebrities already have a lot more on their plate than we tend to give them credit for and the last thing they need is millions of people putting even more on that plate.
It really doesn't matter who's dating who. It really doesn't matter what we think of it. Celebrities will move on with their lives and so will we, and 99.9% of the time we will never once have an interaction with them. So why waste our time? Celebrities see the nasty tweets you send, they see the articles in the magazines and they hear the criticism on The Real where other celebrities try to explain why a relationship they have never witnessed first-hand is failing.
Let's support one-another. As I said earlier, love is hard. Every relationship has its flaws, but it also has its beauty. Let's talk about the beauty in relationships! How much do we love Beyoncé and Jay-Z? Let's talk about them and inspire our kids and each other to be just as in love as Beyoncé and Jay-Z. We don't need to talk about the ugly love of celebrities. Because when it comes down to it, we CAN see when celebrities are in love. It's something that is very easy to notice on screen. It's in their eyes. It's in their smile. But the hardships of relationships are never portrayed through a screen. Every fight in a relationship has two sides and unless you are one of those two people you just don't know anything for sure. A truth is only known by the person who experiences it first-hand. But regardless, it doesn't matter. It's not our job to judge other people's experiences. Let's worry about our own.
While I do think showing public support of celebrity relationships can only be beneficial and is much more resourceful than criticizing it, let's just focus on things that matter and things that affect us. I don't want to read why it's a big deal that Blake and Gwen are holding hands and why their relationship is unacceptable. I want to read about heroes that are putting their lives at risk to keep me safe everyday.
Let's talk about racism. Let's talk about homelessness. Let's talk about equality. Let's talk about family. Let's talk about love - inspiring love. Let's talk about the things that really matter. And most importantly, let's support one another. And yes, that includes celebrities. Rant over.




















