Lady Gaga talks about that mean Facebook group for the first time

Even Lady Gaga, the extremely accomplished singer and actress, faced bullying when she was younger.

It’s been known among her fans for a while now that when Gaga—whose real name is Stefani Germanotta—was at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, certain people looked down on her dreams of stardom. A screenshot has long been circulating of a Facebook group called “Stefani Germanotta, you will never be famous.” Looking at it now, it’s hard not to laugh at how wrong those anonymous Facebook bullies were. Lady Gaga is a household name now with a truly massive fanbase.

But Gaga never actually confirmed the Facebook account was real—until now. Her attention was drawn to it when someone posted a TikTok juxtaposing the old screenshot with a list of all Gaga’s incredible accolades, including her 13 Grammies, 18 Billboard Music Awards, and her Best Original Song Academy Award. Gaga commented on the TikTok, saying, “Some people I went to college [with] made this way back when… this is why you can’t give up when people doubt you or put you down—gotta keep going.” The comment has over 110k likes so far. And it’s good advice.

Gaga’s on top of the world right now, with her new movie Joker: Folie à Deux about to come out. But things weren’t easy for her when she was an 18-year-old just starting to move forward in her career. Back in 2016, her classmate Lauren Bohn wrote an essay reminiscing about Gaga and what exactly people posted to the Facebook group, and it wasn’t pretty:

The group was peppered with comments, sharp as porcupine needles, vilifying the aspiring musician for being an “attention-whore.” Scores asked: “Who does she think she is?” I also remember one dude posting a flyer for one of her upcoming gigs at a local village bar. He had clearly stomped on the flyer, an outline of his muddy sole [soul] struggling to eclipse her name.

There were only 12 people in the group, but (as any bullying victim will tell you) it can take far fewer than that to make a person doubt themselves. Luckily, Lady Gaga was able to rise above it.