Influencers, I don’t want to hear your geopolitical takes
Please no more performative activism for PR
Tana Mongeau and Brooke Schofield are known for many things: their comedy, raunchy sexcapades, their LA influencer lifestyle, and their funny stories. I am a big fan of them, watching almost every episode of their podcast “Canceled.” While multi-talented, they are not known for their political views or activism.
Up until last week, fans of the pod had been harping on the duo for their silence regarding the Israel-Palestine conflict. It is a worldwide issue, and many fans would like to see them use their large platform to advocate for good. On their Reddit page, one poster complained that Tana’s association with someone who is very pro-Israel is “beyond disgusting.” Another user responded that “it is disgraceful” and even though Tana had said nothing in support of either side, “those who remain neutral help the oppressor.”
Not long after this post, in podcast episode 84 Tana mentioned the conflict. She made a nice, albeit lukewarm statement, claiming that the conflict is not anymore “about politics but genocide.” She said it feels “dystopian” to not say anything, mentioned that they are donating to families affected, and left links to charities aiding Palestinian families in the episode description.
Viewers received this statement relatively positively, but still had criticisms. One Reddit user noted how Tana did not mention the name Palestine at all, making the statement “unnecessarily vague,” and declared, “it’s giving toeing the line.”
However, another user was disappointed about the nitpicking of Tana’s statement, replying on the same post that people do not care about innocent civilians being killed but rather “making advocacy towards the crucial situation a gotcha moment.”
I am more inclined to agree with the last comment. This exact situation has become a pattern online. Every time a major political event occurs, people expect their favorite influencers to say something about it. Then, their statement is lackluster at best or downright misinformation at worst, the influencer receives backlash, and the cycle repeats with the next piece of global news.
We are stuck on this hamster wheel that is a lose-lose scenario. The influencers in question are often famous for lifestyle or beauty content (I am not talking about creators who have proven they care about political activism). They are generally more educated on “the clean-girl aesthetic” or “Hailey Beiber nails” rather than the latest geopolitical conflict. Yet, they are hounded by their followers to make a statement, where they often run the risk of saying the wrong thing, receiving even more backlash, and thus damaging their livelihood. On the other side, followers are negatively impacted too as they can end up drawing wrong information from faulty influencer statements. Additionally, followers can simply glom on to their idols’ beliefs without critically thinking about the actual issue beyond that one statement.
The main reason why followers want influencers to speak up is because of their reach – influencers have access to millions of people that most activists could not even imagine 50 years ago. It is a well-intentioned sentiment. Nevertheless, those millions of people are tuned in for entertainment purposes, not politics. On social media, we follow different creators for different purposes. Similar to how I have friends to get lunch with versus friends to go out with, I follow certain creators for fashion tips, others for cultural commentary, and different creators for comedy. I would not try to change my lunch friend into a wild and crazy going-out friend, like how I would not expect my favorite beauty guru to suddenly teach me about Plato.
Yes, these massive platforms are powerful and have great potential to be used for good, but what good is a possibly misinformed statement from an uneducated and dispassionate influencer? Performative activism has been a derogatory insult ever since it reared its head on a larger scale in 2020, yet we keep feeding into it. Instead, we should focus on giving activists or scholars who care about the issues at hand and understand nuance the same behemoth platforms that beauty influencers obtain. We do not need to try to make a triangle a square, there is more than enough social media attention for everyone to get a slice.
Moreover, it is a valid desire to be against supporting people who do not align with your values. If it is really important for you to support creators who will make political statements, by all means go ahead. The great thing about being a social media user is that we can choose what we consume. You have the power to decide who you want to support, and there is no need to make an influencer conform to your conception of proper civic duty.
One might wonder, why do we spend so much of our time contributing to this cycle? This phenomenon stems from the increased presence of parasocial relationships in our lives with the rise of celebrity culture. Parasocial relationships are one-sided connections in which one person extends emotional energy regarding the other person based on a projection of them rather than a real interaction. Social media users form these parasocial relations with influencers – we comment and care about what they say and do without them ever knowing who we are. This dynamic gives us a false sense of importance in the other person’s life. We are deluded into thinking that our opinions matter to the other person and that they should do what we want.
To an extent, influencers have to respond to viewer feedback to keep their following. Although, we have no right to demand someone to make a public statement on something they are uneducated about and force them to believe what we think they should believe. Frankly, it is bizarre how common it is to tell influencers what their political actions should be, when politics used to be something so private and personal that it was taboo to bring up at the dinner table.
We, as followers, need to remember that we have exit power. Sometimes it is more powerful to simply unfollow than make an influencer say something that may result in more harm than good to both the creator and their impressionable viewers. Words are powerful, and noxious statements can have resounding effects.
All of this mess on social media has made us lose the plot on productive political discourse. We tear apart someone else’s rhetoric instead of focusing on the real issue. We give our valuable attention to uninformed social media posters instead of researching and educating ourselves. There is so much aggression and vitriol about politics online that only accelerates the extremism and polarization we are facing in today’s political climate. People obtain an all-or-nothing mentality, an influencer is either with or against our specific beliefs, which deteriorates the institutions of debate and discussion.
One of the most vital tenets of society is education, and being politically active is a powerful tool for democracy. I welcome the passionate beliefs many people are having about social issues with the increased exposure social media brings. I just hope that we can channel that energy into making positive change instead of using it to tear each other down.