[I]nfluencers’ personal choices affect the community they’ve cultivated, often leaving followers, especially vulnerable young people, feeling disillusioned and adrift. Those who appear to flip-flop can cause “intense feelings of betrayal,” said Sally A. Theran, a clinical psychologist and professor at Wellesley College who has researched parasocial relationships — the one-sided ties people form with media figures and influencers — and disordered eating in adolescence.“I think if you’re going to put yourself out there, and if you’re going to earn money, then you’re positioning yourself as a leader in this domain, and you should take responsibility for the repercussions,” Ms. Theran said.
On a recent episode of the Burnt Toast podcast covering the rise of fat influencers losing weight, Virginia Sole-Smith, a journalist who writes about diet culture... [said,] “You used the hashtags in order to grow your following in order to post your affiliate links, get your sponsor deals, all of that.... So now what you’re basically telling us is you co-opted all that rhetoric and you don’t believe it at all, and that is pretty gross.”...
February 26, 2024
"She talks about everything. Every pimple she has on her face, every rash she gets on her arm. So why hasn’t she mentioned this?"/"She completely altered her body, and she won’t cop to it."
Complaints of followers of a newly thin Instagrammer, quoted in "They Promoted Body Positivity. Then They Lost Weight. Do plus-size influencers owe their followers an explanation when their bodies change?" (NYT).
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"You used the hashtags in order to grow your following in order to post your affiliate links, get your sponsor deals, all of that.... So now what you’re basically telling us is you co-opted all that rhetoric and you don’t believe it at all"
Silly rubes, didn't they realize the point of all this is to Buy Large Mansions?
It's a well known phenomenon that weight loss in a person can create resentment around them. It changes the pecking order.
"Owe" is the wrong framing.
For no matter how many years I enjoy a product, if the product changes in a way that I don't like, I'll stop buying it. Am I annoyed at the manufacturer for changing something I like? Yes, I am. Do I feel they owe it to me to keep it the way I want? Of course not. That's dumb.
Do her followers have a right to be pissed off if they don't get what they want? Of course. Yes. Always yes. Stop following if you're not getting what you want.
"Do plus-size influencers owe their followers an explanation when their bodies change?"
That is an absolutely masterful use of the passive voice. Well done, NYT. Well done indeed.
People are tied to their animal character whether they admit it or not. Females are particularly sensitive to this. It's not news, rather, it's evidence of social-media driven mental health issues. Short attention spans and elevated anxiety are the most direct explanation for all of this. Excessive fat is unhealthy. Full stop. This is science.
See Billie Elish's transformations from 2019 to 2024. She was once the poster child for trendy body positivity and public mental illness and then became a classic woman.
In 2020: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/scaachikoul/billie-eilish-photo-body-image-weight
By 2021 (see the Marylin Monroe low-cut dress): https://www.lifeandstylemag.com/posts/billie-eilishs-weight-loss-transformation-photos/
LOL! Why not just congratulate her on getting her weight under control? Her life will be better without being fat.
Related, "healthy at any size" is a lie, a lie that costs lives. It just needs to stop.
Makes sense. Influencers get criticized when they become positive influences.
Do plus-size influencers owe their followers an explanation when their bodies change?
No
I have seen YouTube videos on this subject. The followers seem to think they own these influencers and that they are owed something.
"News" for neurotics.
I doubt I really want to read this NYT article that seems to be a growing list concerned about people losing weight. I'm not sure why a person can't be supportive of being body positive (being happy with your body) and still being interested in losing weight. I suspect it has to do with identity politics.
Once you have been identified in an acceptable DEI categorization, then why would you change?
Influencer? check
Body Positive? check
Weight loss? unacceptable!
Support gay rights? check
Transexual? check
De-transitioner? unacceptable!
They sweat the details more.
Mean fat girls. You've come a long way, baby.
It's so sad that young people want to be influenzers.
This reminds me of the mothers who would not give up pandering their daughters to perverts because if they didn't do it, they would no longer be famous.
It was a mutually agreed-upon lie that obesity was healthy. Each party knew the foundation of the relationship was dishonesty.
“I think if you’re going to put yourself out there, and if you’re going to earn money, then you’re positioning yourself as a leader in this domain, and you should take responsibility for the repercussions,”
OK, sure.
How about:
I'm sorry you felt your excessive weight was OK in part because I claimed to be OK with my excessive weight. I have taken control of my weight and life and have gotten happier and healthier. So you can try to have a littleresponsibility in your life or find another obese "influencer' that will tell you 5 foot 3 and 350 pounds is beautiful and healthy.
Peace out, fatties.
"Those who appear to flip-flop can cause “intense feelings of betrayal,” said Sally A. Theran"
Lesson learned: Express a position, then never change?
Should the ones who don't lose weight be responsible for the repercussions in followers who remain (or become) out-of-shape and obese?
No. They owe their followers nothing.
Haven't heard the word "parasocial" before. Reminds me of "parasite" which fits as a replacement.
"Do [minors] owe their [parents] an explanation when their bodies change [sex]?"
Wonder what the NYT thinks the answer is there?
So Annie in Misery had a parasocial relationship with Paul -- at least until she got to look after him personally with devotion and tenderness. Seems . . . unhealthy which I suppose is the case with any relationship taken to extremes where the need to control suppresses all else.
So who actually pays these "influencers"? When Fat Lady Z says she earns $100k a month, who coughs up that obscene boodle?
That's easy, chirps the generic know-nothing, the advertisers! This elicits a derisive harumph from Quaestor, who suspects fast food chains, confectioners, and ice cream vendors own the hidden hands that dole out the cash to convince absurd young women to increase their deleterious intake of tasty shit in the mistaken belief they will find love despite the disgusting rolls of former Big Macs they carry on their hips.
The recent collapse of Sports Illustrated ought to be a word to the wise. No matter how many TikToks featuring rollie-pollies twerking their cratered butts, no matter what flamingly gay fashion designer can be bribed to display his products plastered to the quivering flesh of waddling models, no matter how creative the advertising, the dogs will not eat the dog food. And don't point at the Venus of Willendorf and suggest cavemen thought fat was beautiful. For all we know, that ugly little talisman may have been a cautionary counter-example, Don't look like this, little cavegirl, if you want the caveboys to bring you mastodon steaks.
My understanding is that a lot of body positive influencers started dying in their late 30s to mid 40s from conditions caused by obesity so some of the ones that are still alive started to lose weight.
There is no reason to listen to the complaints of random strangers.
Western civilization is now decrying the inauthentically fat.
Why do I have the feeling this is a one-way street? Here we see an influencer who's part of a woke element of the cultural universe being portrayed as a traitor for exercising her right to go off in some other, non-woke direction. But would it also be portrayed as a betrayal if a gorgeous and fit beauty-products influencer suddenly decided to let herself go and joined the body-positively movement? No, she would be celebrated for becoming progressive and enlightened.
Or, to use another example, has the NYT run a lot of stories about how psychologically traumatizing it was for traditional Christian families when Disney decided to become a propaganda outfit for homosexuality, transsexualism, etc.?
The public: "You owe us information about your life."
Celebrity: "Nuts!"
Their influence on their followers was outsize when they were. Now they're just normies but the fad was silly so their loss is our gain.
When Lizzo dies from an artery clogged up with a chicken wing, the fat fad will fade fast.
"She talks about everything. Every pimple... every rash..."
Who the f**k wants to be "influenced" by someone like that?
Healthy and fit with a forward-looking paradigm. Good for her... and a cautionary tale for the influenced.
The sort of people who become obsessed with "plus sized" influencers are probably mostly in one of three categories:
1. Fat people who desperately want someone to justify their life style choices rather than change.
2. Mentally ill people who are trying to latch onto some cause. Quite a few "woke" fall into this category, looking for a fashionable "victim" group to champion.
3. People with fetishes for fatties.
Losing weight alienates the lot of them.
I suppose some of the influencers may be very entertaining and gather a following that way, and they probably would be able to keep most of the audience, but the members of one or more of the above categories are going to be very vocal and that's what you hear.
I look upon "influencers" as modern day carny barkers, sideshow touts, product pimps. The idea that the products or policies or lifestyles being sold to you have any value must face the old dictum of "caveat emptor" or bad decisions will be made.
The obese person is less obese. That is a good thing. She can still promote the idea that obesity is somehow a positive in life, but fewer people will believe her. That is also a good thing.
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