The Pop Corporation

Chappell Roan’s rise to fame has been sudden and very interesting. Often, meteoric rises are met with suspicion and chatter about being an industry plant and all that – but for our money, no such thing could be levelled at Roan given her very obvious and striking talent. Add to this, her whole personality is markedly different from a lot of other pop stars and she’s generally a breath of fresh air.

So with that, when someone is doing things their own way, we shouldn’t be at all surprised when they speak in a manner which doesn’t fit with the normal popstar tropes. Fact is, Roan looks the part, has the songs, but also, is willing to speak her mind which is a wonderful thing in a market that feels someone saturated by manicured images and promotion.

With that, Roan has hit out against her own fans in what is an absolutely correct take. If you’re a young person on TikTok, you’ll no doubt know about this already – we’ll keep it text based for those who like their phones and devices to be silent.

In 2024, Stan Culture has seen music fandom take a worrying turn, with obsessive nature and brigading online being encouraged. Taylor Swift, Harry Styles and Nicki Minaj have some of the most, shall we say active fans in the market. While most are just effusive and enthusiastic, often we see things spilling over the lip and getting ugly. We’re about to enter a period in pop where, if musicians are going to forgo the need to use traditional media and create their own platforms, then responsible channels will need to address any problematic behaviour from their fans as likely, they’re the only people who will be listened to. How they do this, remains to be seen.

Roan has kicked things off though in a rather forthright manner, which we suspect the majority of her fans will welcome. She’s hit out at the behaviour of some as ‘weird’ and ‘creepy’, and once you’ve heard all she’s had to say, then only an idiot would suggest ‘this is what you signed up for’.

Roan said: “If you saw a random woman on the street, would you yell at her from the car window? Would you harass her in public? Would you go up to a random lady and say, ‘Can I get a photo with you?’ And she’s like, ‘No, what the fuck?’ And then you get mad at this random lady?”

“Would you be offended if she says no to your time because she has her own time? Would you stalk her family? Would you follow her around? Would you try to dissect her life and bully her online? This is a lady you don’t know. And she doesn’t know you at all. Would you assume that she’s a good person, assume she’s a bad person? Would you assume everything you read about her online is true? I’m a random bitch. You’re a random bitch. Just think about that for a second, okay?”

She continued: “I don’t care that abuse and harassment, stalking, whatever is a normal thing to do to people who are famous or a little famous, whatever. I don’t care that it’s normal. I don’t care that this crazy type of behavior comes along with the job, the career field I’ve chosen. That does not make it okay. That doesn’t make it normal. It doesn’t mean I want it. It doesn’t mean that I like it. I don’t want whatever the fuck you think you’re supposed to be entitled to whenever you see a celebrity.”

“I don’t give a fuck if you think it’s selfish of me to say no for a photo or for your time or for a hug. That’s not normal. That’s weird. It’s weird how people think that you know a person just ’cause you see them online or you listen to the art they make. That’s fucking weird. I’m allowed to say no to creepy behaviour, okay?”

She has touched on this before, saying that the behaviour of certain fans would make her consider quitting altogether. In an interview on a podcast, she stated: “People have started to be freaks — like, [they] follow me and know where my parents live, and where my sister works. All this weird shit.”

“This is the time when a few years ago when I said that if [there were] stalker vibes or my family was in danger, I would quit. And we’re there. We’re there! I’m just kind of in this battle… I’ve pumped the brakes on, honestly, anything to make me more known. It’s kind of a forest fire right now. I’m not trying to go do a bunch of shit.”

We’ll have to see how this all develops, but at last, we seem to have a popstar who sincerely doesn’t care a great deal for the artifice of the music industry and her ducking out if things get weird isn’t an idle threat. Stans, be warned – loving something too hard can make it run away.