Angelina Jolie is a Celebrity Do-Gooder

Angelina Jolie recently topped Reuters’ celebrity do-gooder poll for both her work as a U.N. goodwill ambassador and raising awareness of suffering in Africa.

On the bottom of the list? Fellow adoptive mother Madonna! The Queen of Pop was voted the least respected celebrity altruist of 2007 because of claims she used her fame and wealth to circumvent Malawian adoption rules.

“People aren’t stupid,” said Peter Walker, director of the Feinstein International Famine Center at Tufts University. “They can really sense when it’s just an endorsement and when somebody really means it. Someone like Angelina Jolie comes across as having more integrity than some celebrities and a greater sense that she doesn’t just do this for the publicity.”

One voter in the poll hurled quite the insult: “Madonna seems to do philanthropy the way she’s done Indian culture, sex and just about everything – like a disposable fad.”

Ouch!

Brad Pitt, Mia Farrow and Don Cheadle also won praise for their advocacy on behalf of Sudan’s war-torn Darfur region.