Why brilliant minds do not have following
An observation about people liking
Brilliant minds do not have a cult like following. People might admire for who they are and their contributions. But they do not have fan clubs, events around them and breaking news coverage about their day to day activities.
I guess it is because, it is hard to understand thier works. It takes substancial amount of mental energy and thought process to even read and understand their accomplishments and what they are upto.
For movie stars and political figures, it is straight forward. Zero barriers to understand them. They also keep their languages very simple to understand. As a consequence, they can also stir the emotions easily.
They only talk about things that are so relatable and make them personal eventhough the facts say otherwise. An example I saw growing up is about Petrol. All opposition parties protested about petrol and gas prices. Until recently, after closing of strait of hormuz, I came to understand the fact that India imports upto 90% of the fuel it consumes. So India is susceptible to Global factors. It does not have control over prices.
Other topics they choose is religion, caste systems, sports, movies, languages etc.
This does not mean, everyone in the said categories are this way.