This time around, many of Hollywood's leading celebrities are wasting no time in wading into the fight over same-sex marriage. Most analysts expect another initiative on the next statewide ballot, though this one likely will write same-sex marriage into the Constitution.
Film and TV activists and their professional political advisors expect the campaigns for and against the measure to be the hottest waged, and most expensive, in California history.
It was striking how quickly celebs responded to last week's state Supreme Court ruling upholding Proposition 8, the ban on same-sex marriage -- and what form that took. Many made use of their new Twitter accounts. Here's a sampling:
Demi Moore, twittering as mrskutcher: "Heartbreaking CA Supreme Court decision. I am ashamed. Let's raise some $ for a new ballot measure next year. I know we can do this."
Nicky Hilton, as MissNickyHilton: "This is disgusting. rejectprop8"
Ashlee Simpson, twittering as ashsimpsonwentz: " . . . So sad that California is backwards. Lame. So Lame . . ."
Emmy Rossum, as herself: "check out the calif. prop 8 transcript. We are a progressive state no more :( Iowa is now way cooler . . . "
And Ellen DeGeneres, as TheEllenShow: "Equality please."
Archer targets human trafficking
For Hollywood types concerned with international human rights issues, the town's newest hot ticket is an invitation to one of the salons actress Anne Archer is holding these days in her sprawling ranch house in one of the Westside's tonier canyons.
The salons, called the Hope and Human Rights Speakers Series, are sponsored by Archer's Artists for Human Rights group.
Next week's guest is activist and author Kevin Bales, president of Free the Slaves, an organization devoted to eradicating human trafficking. South African Nobel laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu has called Bales, who won renown for his 1999 book "Disposable People," the world's "foremost authority on modern-day slavery." He's also received a Peabody and two Emmys for his documentaries on the problem.
Slavery may seem like a 19th century relic, but in his writing Bales points out that 27 million people around the globe currently are held in the kind of economic bondage we traditionally recognize as enslavement. Perhaps most shocking, activists estimate that 14,500 people are trafficked illegally into the United States each year to work in conditions that amount to slavery in places such as factories and brothels.
