Kayleigh Rose Amstutz, better known by her stage name Chappell Roan, condemned “creepy” and “weird” fan behavior in two new TikTok videos.
The pop star is fairly new to the world of parasocial fan behavior, as she only recently experienced a meteoric rise to fame. While she was first discovered in 2017 after uploading singing videos to YouTube, she experienced a setback when her initial record label dropped her. It wasn’t until 2023 that she released her first studio album through Island Records, which immediately garnered a cult following and was labeled as one of the best albums of 2023. It wasn’t long before Roan was performing with Olivia Rodrigo and securing gigs at major music festivals like the Lollapalooza.
However, her fame has come with some drawbacks. On one side, she has faced backlash and criticism from conservatives for her vocal support of the LGBTQ+ community and the hiring of drag performers for her tour. From the other side, she has experienced additional harassment from individuals who claim to be fans.
Chappell Roan speaks out against toxic fan behavior
Recently, Roan took to TikTok to express her struggles with parasocial fan behavior. In the first TikTok video on the subject, she asked her fans whether they would do the same things to a female stranger that they had done to her. She questioned, “If you saw a random woman on the street, would you yell at her from the car window?” Roan went on to question if they would harass a stranger “in public” or would go up to them and ask them to take a photo, then get “mad” at them if they refused.
The pop star continued, “Would you stalk her family? Would you follow her around? Would you try to dissect her life and bully her online?” Roan also questioned why anyone would assume that someone is a good or bad person or believe everything online about them without knowing them. In case viewers still didn’t get the point, she concluded, “I’m a random b*tch, you’re a random b*tch. Just think about that for a second, okay?”
After pointing out the reality that celebrities and fans do not actually know anything about one another and should treat each other the same as strangers would, Roan followed up with a second video, getting more in-depth about the issue. In her second video, she condemned the normalization of fans harassing, abusing, and stalking celebrities. She emphasized that arguments that such toxic fan behavior is “normal” or “comes along with the job” don’t actually “make it normal.” Roan stated, “I don’t want whatever the f*ck you think you’re supposed to be entitled to when you see a celebrity.” Another motivator for her video was her experience getting criticized and dealing with fan anger whenever she denied their random requests for time and attention.
In conclusion, she stated, “I’m allowed to say ‘no’ to creepy behavior, okay?” Roan makes an excellent point that celebrities have a complete right to deny photos, hugs, or any other requests from fans. Sadly, as Roan recognizes, when celebrities try to speak out about invasive and creepy fan behavior, they often get shut down with arguments that fan harassment just comes with the territory. While it’s true that celebrities will always face some level of public scrutiny and lack of privacy, that doesn’t mean fans should just be given a free pass to misbehave. Stalking a celebrity’s family or following a celebrity around yelling at them because they refused to take a picture is behavior that should never be normalized.
A lot of celebrities never even explicitly seek out fame and attention. Many are simply trying to express themselves artistically and do what they love, and it’s bizarre to say they have to deal with harassment because of that. Fortunately, celebrities like Roan aren’t afraid to speak out and remind individuals that their self-declared “fan” status doesn’t actually make them entitled to anything.
Published: Aug 20, 2024 06:13 pm