It has some effect if you happen to meet a TV personality. It has even more effect when the age difference is minimal and you, as close as you may be in age, are far apart. Giulia Salemi is 30 years old and has 1.9 million followers on Instagram. The author, radio presenter and speaker was born in Piacenza and is of Iranian descent. Her mother, Fariba Tehrani, left Tehran at the age of 18 to escape the difficult conditions in her country at the height of the revolution in those years. From the protests in Iran to her own assertion of female empowerment, Giulia has always been very outspoken on social media about often difficult issues. «We are lucky to have a large following so we have a responsibility to be a voice. I do not presume to believe that my opinion or support can change anything, but I definitely feel better when I dedicate my time to a cause I believe in and for which social awareness needs to be created,» she said.

This is the dilemma of our time, so to speak. It's about how much responsibility we viewers and fans give to public figures and content creators who are neither politicians nor activists. And yet - perhaps - each of us, simply by existing, has some responsibility to take sides and speak out on certain issues. «Life is often about expectations. There is an intelligent public that experiences our positions and thoughts as contributions for their own sake, and then there is a section of the public that is only there to criticise anyone who says or does anything. The famous social frustration that has now become an Olympic sport.» (laughs)