So, I discovered Sali through her ITB series on YouTube and decided to follow her on Instagram. It was refreshing to follow someone who seemed a little outside of the influencer bubble. Then I saw her Insta story about this new documentary about "dragging sites" and found my way over to here. Like so many others, I expected to see vitriol and hate, but have instead found predominantly constructive criticism and sociopolitical discussion. The fact that this woman is using her privilege, position and power to bully, gaslight and stifle debate is horrifying. Needless to say, if she hasn't been talking about this site and calling wolf, I would never have known she was on here and I would never have seen screenshots of her ugly tweets (I'm not even on Twitter). What disturbs me aren't people making flippant jokes about her husband being a nanny, it's the words and accusations that she herself is posting. Seeing them in relation to the actual posts here, they are downright hyperbolic.
Although these sites are not without their issues, they are often the only safe place viewers and consumers have to discuss shady business practices. I actually found them for the first time when trying to ascertain whether an influencer was sponsored by a company...I'd made a purchase based on their recommendation and could not understand why the product was so bad. (Side note - this, Sali, is why it isn't crazy for viewers to wonder about your relationship with brands; it's not to defame you but to ask a genuine question in the context of a very dishonest industry. A simple clarification would suffice for readers here.)
What Sali is experiencing isn't anything new. We have had these discussions since the dawning of celebrity culture, and such discussions escalated yesrs ago with the advent of reality TV: what happens to human beings when their lives and personalities are commodified? What does it do to their psychology given that such commodification opens their very lives up to scrutiny? How is their psychology affected when they receive outpourings of adoration in conjunction with criticism? Moreover, what are the implications for our political systems where representatives are also treated in the same vain? How are people to participate without going crazy? (The example of Dianne Abbott comes to mind once again.) Now, that's a documentary I would watch.