Like any other, Chappell Roan wants to visit the cinema.
With her criticism of “predatory behavior disguised as’superfan’ behavior,” rising pop sensation Chappell Roan has rekindled the conversation about the negative aspects of fan culture.
The 26-year-old took to social media last week to once more request that her 4 million Instagram followers respect her personal space. She stated that she does not want to be contacted when she is “clocked out,” which refers to when she is not doing press or performing.
We can all agree that it is unacceptable to stalk, touch family members without their consent, or doxx them. However, Roan’s remarks that she does not “owe a mutual exchange of energy” to fans have polarized fans and colleagues at ABC Entertainment.
With celebrities sharing more and more of their life online, the conversation around parasocial relationships has become increasingly prevalent, and Chappell Roan has fallen squarely in the thick of it.
I could go on forever on the psychological foundations of parasocial relationships, but Bo Burnham’s 2013 comedy special what provides the clearest definition of parasocial relationships that I have found.
You might simultaneously enrage fans of The 1975 and Swifties! Swift is far less blunt than Hottest 100 winner Doja Cat, who has an openly antagonistic connection with her Kittenz fan group. She said on social media in May of last year that anyone identifying as a Kitten need to “get a job” and “delete [their] entire account and reassess everything.”
Yet not just the biggest pop icons in our culture deal with parasocial connections.
The Guardian was informed in 2022 by co-hosts of the Australian pop culture podcast Shameless, Michelle Andrews and Zara McDonald, that they had purposefully stopped disclosing personal details on the show after receiving an excessive number of hateful direct messages. Following her disclosure of her personal sexual assault incident, Andrews received so many aggressive messages from followers relating their own stories that she had to ask them to stop.
Doja, Chappell Roan, and the Shameless co-hosts are all adored for being “genuine” in their work, which is one thing that they have in common. Social media natives Doja and Chappell are becoming more and more popular because of their raw, humorous online personas, and McDonald and Andrews’ podcast is centered around their friendship. Fans naturally have a sense of familiarity with these persons. To some extent, their success can be attributed to their approachability.
