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One Direction was an apt name for a band that catapulted to superstardom in 2011, with their single ‘What Makes You Beautiful’. I had grown up in the era of the Boy Band, with Boyzone being my favourite, and I knew the effect a cute, floppy-haired pop star could have on the mind of a “tweenage” girl. The floppy-haired teen who sang the opening lines in One Direction’s first music video was Liam Payne, who tragically died after falling from a hotel balcony on October 16 this year.
I paid little attention to One Direction over the next decade, but Liam Payne would appear on my TikTok feed in 2022; a clip of him appearing on influencer Logan Paul’s podcast, Impaulsive, had gone viral due to a handful of mildly “controversial” statements he made about One Direction and some of his former bandmates. Unfortunately, the more serious statements made in that interview did not get the same air time, including Payne’s admission to turning to alcohol and drugs to cope with the pressures of fame.
It was that same internet that ‘Directioners’ returned to, in a pilgrimage of grief, when the news of Liam Payne’s tragic death was made public. Shockingly, within hours of the news breaking, TMZ published cropped photos of Liam Payne’s lifeless body on their website; soon after, social media was flooded with conspiracy theories, speculation and disbelief, as fans tried to wrap their heads around the tragedy.
Social media became home to distasteful jokes and unsubstantiated “theories” surrounding Payne’s death that would eventually become headlines. The news cycle was churning out stories so fast, that Liam Payne’s sister found out about her brother’s passing through a notification from a news app.
The night before Liam Payne died, he was seen taking photos with fans outside his hotel, the same hotel where he would fall to his death, and where pictures of his body were taken, not by paparazzi but by a member of the public, and posted to X. The moments Payne spent smiling and chatting to fans should have been how he was remembered online, however, in the age of the internet every moment is up for grabs, soon to be made into viral content. So while Cheryl Tweedy is completely justified in her criticism of the media’s coverage of Liam Payne’s death, the public too has to answer for his dehumanisation.
As long as youth and sex appeal remain profitable, the celebrity industrial complex will continue to churn out pop stars just like Liam Payne, many of whom will struggle with addiction and poor mental health; this, unfortunately, we cannot control. Although it is impossible to predict who fame’s next victim will be, and who we will regret making into a meme, we can control the standards we keep for ourselves, the fans, and not stoop to the levels of the paparazzi we once so heavily condemned.
Feature image via