Celebrity Acts of Kindness

With all the celebrity mishaps that are appearing in the news these days, it's easy to figure that they are all a bunch of spoiled kids! Between repeated rehab visits, drunk driving incidents and public temper tantrums, the rich and the famous are not so bad! In fact, a number of them are really kind hearted people. Need proof? Here it is!

Let's start with Angelina Jolie. This supermom not only adopted 3 children from abroad, in addition to having one herself, she is also a Goodwill ambassador. She works as an ambassador for the UN and visits refugee camps in some of the world's most war-torn countries. While on visits, she lives with the regular UN field staff and doesn't enjoy any luxuries, paying all her own expenses. On top of this, she also has donated funds to several refugee causes.

Orphans are always a popular cause and Jessica Simpson has made full use of this. When she won a sports car at the MTV Music Video Awards, instead of accepting it, she asked Chrysler to replace it with a minivan to be donated to Casa Hogar Elim, a Mexican orphanage that the star had visited at age 11. She personally delivered the van and hung around to take photos with the excited orphans, performing two acts of kindness in the same day!

Alec Baldwin has recently been receiving a lot of flack for his highly publicized phone call with his daughter. But this actor isn't all angry dad, he also recently donated a large sum of money to pay for a young soldier's college education when she returns from Iraq. After reading about her in the New York Times, Baldwin decided to help out and called her mother up at work to let her know that he wanted to put up the money necessary for the girl to finish her education.

In this internet age, it's only right that a celebrity should use the web to promote charities and that is exactly what Kevin Bacon has done with his Six Degrees of Separation website. Here people are able to support their favorite charities and the site will hopefully attract a lot of attention for these charities.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, John Travolta filled his private plane with supplies for the survivors and flew them down to New Orleans himself. This simple, selfless act went unrewarded, but that doesn't seem to matter to the actor. He was just happy to help those in need.

Oprah has long been known for her generosity and this list just wouldn't be complete without including her. She founded Orphans Angel Network back in 1998 and since then, this organization has done a lot of good work, including opening schools and donating $1 million worth of school uniforms to students in South Africa. In addition, Oprah frequently features people in need on her show and goes out of her way to help them find solutions and often provides sponsored gifts.

Celebrities are not all drug addicted drunks although those are the ones that seem to make the news most often. Meanwhile, behind the scenes, others from the rich and famous lifestyle are quietly making the world a better place.