Chappell Roan performs at Outside Lands at Golden Gate Park on August 11 in San Francisco, California. Photo / Getty Images
OPINION
If you only recently started hearing the name Chappell Roan, you’re not alone. In fact, I’m sorry to say you’re not even that special, as the majority of people around the world had never heard of her either. Now, she’s everywhere.
Chappell Roan’s meteoric rise to fame has been nothing short of phenomenal. It may sound like she came out of nowhere, like some kind of overnight success story, but the Pink Pony Club singer has been hard at work on her music career for the last decade, even if 2024 will go down as the year she found true global success.
After being an opener at part of Olivia Rodrigo’s Guts tour last year, she appeared in the NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert series and her performance went viral (6.3 million views but that number is likely to be outdated in a few hours when you read this). Incredible performances at Coachella and Lollapalooza then cemented her as the biggest music star of this year. She’s gone from a relatively unknown opener for Olivia Rodrigo to a special guest star, all within the same tour.
This kind of stratospheric stardom has come with a few downsides.
Earlier this week, the singer-songwriter took to social media to call out the “creepy behaviour” she says she and her family have been the targets of.
In two separate TikTok videos, the singer said both she and her family have been stalked and harassed, and mentioned instances where people got upset with her when she turned down requests for photos.
“If you saw a random woman on the street, would you yell at her from your car window? Would you harass her in public? Would you go up to a random lady and say, ‘Can I take a photo with you?’ and she says ‘No, what the f***?’ and then you get mad at this random lady?” Roan said.
“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 online about her is true? I’m a random bitch, you’re a random bitch. Just think about that for a second, OK?”
Visibly upset, Roan added that she doesn’t care that “this crazy type of behaviour comes along with the job”.
“That does not make it OK, that doesn’t make it normal. That doesn’t mean that I want it, that doesn’t mean that I like it,” she said.
“I don’t want whatever the f*** you think you’re supposed to be entitled to whenever you see a celebrity,” the singer continued. “I don’t give a f*** 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 because you see them online and you listen to the art they make. That’s f*****g weird! I’m allowed to say no to creepy behaviour, OK?”
Her comments left her fans divided. Some took offence, called her rude, said she was being ungrateful to fans and that perhaps she is not built to handle this level of fame (who is?).
Others, however, applauded her for speaking up and setting healthy boundaries for herself.
chappell roan is braver than me i’d be doing this to everyone that ever bothered me pic.twitter.com/kKp7fOLE9j
— alexa (@glusong) August 19, 2024
I actually think it’s super sane and slay of Chappell Roan to repeatedly put her foot down about stalkers and explicitly outline the way she would like to be treated by fans in order to do her best artistic work and preserve he health. I hope people respect her boundaries.
— Saint (S.T.) Gibson UPDATES (@s_t_gibson) August 20, 2024
It’s very clear from replies and reactions who watched Chappell Roan’s video and thought “what if I met my hero and they didn’t want to take a picture with me” rather than “what if a bunch of weirdos decided they had a constitutional right to stalk me and my family”
— Phil Incelmo (@WheredJasonGo) August 20, 2024
This is not the first time Roan has expressed her discomfort over the way her fans approach her – and she’s even mentioned she might quit making music altogether because of it. Speaking to Drew Afualo on the podcast The Comment Section in June, she said, “people have started to be freaks, like, follow me and know where my parents live, and where my sister works. All this weird s***”.
“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,” she added.
In that same month, she cried on stage during a concert, explaining to the audience that she was feeling overwhelmed by her newfound fame. “I just want to be honest with the crowd and I just feel a little off today because I think that my career has just kind of gone really fast, and it’s really hard to keep up,” she said.
What the reaction to her videos highlighted is that we need to have a serious discussion about fandoms and what we have grown to expect of celebrities.
Some will argue that it’s always been this way – we give them their fame and wealth and they give us autographs and selfies. The argument that “this is how it’s always been” is very seldom a strong case for keeping things as they are. In any case, it hasn’t really always been this way. What the advent of smartphones and social media has done for our ability to track and feel close to our favourite stars, we certainly can’t compare with anything else. Social media algorithms mix up the posts we see from our personal friends (the people we know in real life) with those of the celebrities we follow. In our brains it all becomes the same and, suddenly, we come to expect of people like Chappell Roan the level of intimacy and connection we expect from a friend. I know I am over-simplifying and there are other elements at play but this is definitely a part of it – and a scary one, out of our control.
The shift we have seen in the dynamics of para-social relationships post-pandemic cannot be overstated and some of the expectations fans put on artists are bordering on toxic. There are numerous instances that go well beyond just wanting a “meet and greet” with your favourite artist, with some fans acting as if they deserve the level of friendship and intimacy they have unilaterally decided they have with a particular star. Shaking hands is no longer enough, stars need to tell us they love us.
Several artists have come out in recent months speaking up against intrusive fan behaviour – only to be met with the same kind of criticism Roan is currently receiving.
Tyler, The Creator and Chappell Roan both spoke out recently about how fan behavior has gotten out of hand.
— Pigeons & Planes (@PigsAndPlans) August 21, 2024
With all the stories about stalking, privacy invasion, and stage-rushing, is there a problem with fan entitlement and how society treats celebrities today?
If more… pic.twitter.com/x25axhLPnq
In July last year for example, a fan asked Doja Cat to declare her love for her fanbase online. The singer replied with what can only be described as a statement of fact: “I don’t even know y’all.”
It cost her a fair few fans – some fan accounts online were deactivated following the exchange – but doesn’t she have a point? Why do we feel like celebrities owe us anything? It’s a weird social contract that many want to break out of, because they don’t feel like they should be signed up for it in the first place.
Chappell Roan is a persona. Her real name is Kayleigh Rose Amstutz and she is human. When Kayleigh is on stage, she is Chappell Roan. Outside of that, she is Kayleigh, an individual with a right to privacy.
However much you love her music, however deeply her lyrics speak to your soul, Chappell Roan owes you nothing – least of all her mental health.
This might seem weird coming from me, the least calm person on god’s green Earth, but we should all collectively consider calming down.
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