Kids as icons for causes

Jackie Evancho. Anyone who has watched "America's Got Talent" last year (or found about her on YouTube since that's where she auditioned for the show) already know about her. For anyone who stumbles upon here not knowing who she is or don't watch reality tv, Jackie Evancho is a child soprano singer (and I do admit her voice is captivating). Recently she performed at an event hosted by the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) for their campaign against the Canadian seal hunt. I won't discuss the hunt in this post but I will give my opinions and views on this in another.

Video of her singing and giving out her views on the issue here.

Kids pretty much bring the "aww" factor in everything. This could be from a girl's first dance recital (she may be two steps behind the group yet she looks adorable in that costume) to some kid from Africa or Asia who has to support his whole family on those World Vision infomercials. Just make you go "aww" when seeing this.

Then there is something for the kids to look up to as a role model of some sorts. It's along the lines of "Hey, we're kids your age and we're taking action." Take this old public service announcement featuring cast members of the show "Full House" here.

A third thing I guess I could add are propaganda videos. Thanks to the internet and video sharing sites it should be easy to find some video of kids showing that they're happy living in whatever country they are from and creepily showing that there's nothing to fear. I think this might be a good example.

Anyways I'm not too sure how Jackie Evancho came to being a supporter of HSUS's campaign since she was in Canada performing with The Canadian Tenors for a Christmas special over a month ago before this. Maybe someone from the HSUS came up to her and told her or her parents about what they know about the Canadian seal hunt or she knew about it beforehand and kept quiet about it. Yet again in the HSUS video she does mention her soft spot for seals.

On the other hand I thinking, what if there was a 10-year-old child like her used to advocate for the seal hunt? Probably the reaction might be "what the hell were mom and dad thinking using their kid for something like this?"

Anyways that's all I have to say for now. Note that I have nothing against Jackie, just seeing her got me thinking about kids and how they're used as icons for social issues.