She's unquestionably the defining figure in popular culture at the moment, has been for over a year and could continue to be so for some time, though the speed of pop careers gets ever more rapid and the intensity of burn-outs ever more severe. She is, at present, immeasurably more significant as a cultural figure than 95% of the people more typically discussed on this site.

That doesn't mean her music is better, though I do think she has made some classic pop hits and her stylistic influence is huge and global.

As for her being a 'bad influence', I think that's what those old preachers said about Elvis.