Doug asks a pertinent question. My answer: I don’t really know. Since there are in the world many viscerally pressing and real and legal and medical threats to people’s lives w/r/t rape and abortion, it seems like Justin Bieber’s ideas about it aren’t really that important. And there are many people writing thoughtfully, powerfully, and well about rape and abortion—who cares what Justin Bieber thinks?

That’s not a bad question, per se.

There’s a larger implication, probably, that has to do with Bieber’s and Rolling Stone’s huge audiences, and the I’m assuming malleability of a world of youths hearing from their hero that rape just happens so deal with it or whatever. That seems pernicious.

There have been a few Twitter protests against rape victim shaming and abortion legislation that gained some traction and are doing good things. They even trended in some metro areas. Justin Bieber has 7.3 million followers on Twitter. That’s a pretty big soap box. Rolling Stone has a circulation of 1.4 million. Its website is the most popular online music magazine, with 2.2 million visitors in December 2010. That’s a pretty big audience.

Demagogues are only as powerful as people let them be, and Bieber’s pretty popular. Lots of people pay money to see him and hear him and stuff. The fact that he’s 16 isn’t really that relevant. The fact that he’s one of the most popular people in the world is.