Leave the Pop Girls Alone

Internet discourses are often a cycle. Two years ago it was about Ariana Grande’s body and this week it’s about her alarming body frame again. On the other end of the spectrum, Zara Larsson is often praised for her physique and now the internet is pestering her for her workout routine after her viral Lollapalooza performance. Katseye member Sophia announces a hiatus to focus on her mental health, the second member of the group to do so after Manon February of this year. Tyla, if not for discourses around her ethnicity is usually labelled as a “mean girl”, an accusation which was heightened by her recent content with livestreamer Kai Cenat.  

And I could go on-and-on about the endless discussions of pop stars that appear on my feed. It is as if the focus is about their status as a public figure rather than their music. The allure of the celebrity. 

Pop celebrities—especially women—have always been under scrutiny. In turn, the fans (or the general public) show concern, interest, or curiosity by contributing to the discussion. At times, these fan reactions can add to the online vitriol the stars are already subject to.

“People see us as women to rank. They’ll grade us based on how pretty we are, our singing skill, dancing skill, and then add it up and give us a percentage.”

— Lara Raj, Katseye. Source: BBC Interview

Hey, maybe it is better than having no noise in your name at all. After all, visibility and engagement is what drives the capitalistic gears of pop music (and also the record labels). Some of them could be—or definitely—trolls. Or bots. Or whatever non-human entity is waddling through the current state of the dead internet. 

Every time I open a social media app, discourses about pop stars show up on my feed and with it, the vile, nasty, misogynistic comments as well. These types of awful rhetoric are pushed further into people’s feeds because the algorithm rewards engagement. Thus, hate speech isn’t just coming from one corner of the internet, it is now easily accessible from one scroll of the feed, which, consequently, influences people to think the same and normalise this type of behaviour.

But anyway, for the actual people out there with a working, conscious brain: let’s think critically. Online anonymity shelters us from how we conduct our online personas to how we are in actuality. These women are real people. While a lot of them are stronger mentally, they are not just pixels we see on the screen for us to project whatever insecurity or hatred we have burning inside our hearts. 

Recognising our parasocial attachments and turning those into a healthy parasocial relationship can help us think before we spew hatred. Or maybe just put our phone down, lower our screen time hours, and engage with other things that make us happy in life.